• USA Are Foreign-Influenced Social Media Campaigns Part of the New Political Playbook? - Pacific Standard
    https://psmag.com/news/are-foreign-influenced-social-media-campaigns-part-of-the-new-political-playb

    On the first day of November of 2017, the Senate Judiciary Committee grilled contrite representatives from Facebook, Twitter, and Google about their companies’ roles in the Russian meddling during the 2016 presidential election. The senators spent nearly three hours chastising the social media platforms for their dereliction. In between the grandstanding, the senators expressed genuine concern about how foreign nations used these platforms, and whether media companies would be able to stop the next country from copying the Russian scheme. But even as lawmakers reflect on the Russian interference, new foreign influence campaigns are already underway.

    This time, rather than trying to choose a president, the campaigns sought to affect President Donald Trump and America’s reaction to the Qatar diplomatic crisis, which began on June 5th, when Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, and Egypt cut diplomatic ties with Qatar and established an air, sea, and land blockade around the country.