Glimpse Into a French Operation – DFRLab – Medium

Le rapport mentionné dans l’article

#TrollTracker: Glimpse Into a French Operation – DFRLab – Medium
▻https://medium.com/dfrlab/trolltracker-glimpse-into-a-french-operation-f78dcae78924

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A network of inauthentic Facebook and Instagram accounts impersonated French-speaking users whose posts ranged from soccer and fashion tips for Muslim women to attacks on French President Emmanuel Macron, in a manner similar to the Russian troll operation which targeted the United States from 2014 through 2018, according to traces of their activity left online.

Facebook removed the accounts from its platform for “coordinated inauthentic behavior,” meaning these pages, which posed as organizations and individuals from different parts of the political spectrum or focused on opposite sides of a debate, were centrally operated. Most of the accounts were focused on building their audiences among French users, suggesting that this was an operation in its early stages.
[…]
Before the November 13 announcement, Facebook shared the names of 11 French-language Instagram accounts, which the company identified as “inauthentic” with @DFRLab.
Three of the accounts posed as African women: @une_camerounaise_fiere, @femme_combattante, and @moonlight_en_france. One, @football_et_france, posed as a football fan group focused on encouraging the “Ultras” across all clubs. A more political account, @france__rouge, posed as a Trotskyist, while another, @espoir_de_france, posed as a nationalist.
Of the rest, @action_verte focused on environmental issues, @les_femmes_musulmanes on Muslim women and fashion, and @contre_guerre on conflict, especially in Africa. @la_voix_etranger and @france_pour_tous engaged on immigration issues.
In its November 13 update, Facebook provided screenshots from two Facebook pages, named “fée-ministr” and “la France libre.” Those screenshots showed posts promoting feminist messages.
[…]
More than half of them followed substantially more accounts than they had followers, a strong indication that they were not having great impact yet, and were actively building their audience. Many of these accounts routinely used “audience building” hashtags such as #follow4follow or #like4like, encouraging French users to engage with their content.

In total, the French-language Instagram accounts had a little under 70,000 followers, half of that number being driven by the most-followed account in this network, @les_femmes_musulmanes. According to Facebook’s update, around 65,000 users followed at least one of the Facebook pages. This does not appear to have been a massively effective operation: nonetheless, the set is of interest as it illustrates the latest themes and techniques used by actors to target French users with coordinated inauthentic behavior online.

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Conclusions
Facebook determined that this network was one of “coordinated inauthentic activity.” There is insufficient evidence to provide a firm attribution to the Russian Internet Research Agency; the accounts certainly behaved like troll factory accounts, but such behavior is not confined to Russian information operations.

The accounts did not appear to have particular impact. Other than @les_femmes_musulmanes, none achieved a significant following. Their audience-building strategies suggest that the operation was in its early stages; their followings suggest that it still had some way to go.

While the content was largely innocuous, and even positive in some cases (quotes of famous French poets, empowering images), the fact that it was posted by a coordinated inauthentic network, and included strongly political messages, suggests that this was an attempt to gain influence and, potentially, push divisive and inflammatory messages to these audiences at a later stage.

On notera, que des mots contenant "russ" figurent 10 fois dans le rapport (une onzième occurrence est dans les propositions d’autres sujets à suivre à la fin du document), dont 2 dans l’introduction et 2 dans la conclusion, le reste indiquant :
• pour rappeler que la Russie a déjà pratiqué ce genre d’opération et rappeler les thèmes préférés de cette intervention (2)
• pour redire que la façon de procéder pour gonfler son audience ressemble à celui de la ferme à trolls russe
• pour mentionner qu’une image utilisée contenait un mot en russe (3 occurrences, dont une dans la légende de l’image)

Enfin, l’article du Monde a déjà été relayé deux fois ici,
• le 28/11 par un compte sans abonné ni abonnement et dont c’est le seul message
• le 29/11 par un récent membre, probablement enseignant, qui a posté 48 messages depuis le premier le 23/10 et jamais étoilé de billets

Ah oui, précision sur l’auteur du rapport tel que décrit dans son compte Twitter

@DFRLab
@AtlanticCouncil’s Digital Forensic Research Lab. Catalyzing a global network of digital forensic researchers, following conflicts in real time.

#Atlantic_Council