A Chinese marketing firm likely organized and promoted protests in Washington last year as part of a wide-ranging pro-Beijing influence camp
China is stepping up its manipulation of US public opinion. It worked well for Putin in 2016 so why would Xi Jinping ignore the potential?
A Chinese marketing firm likely organized and promoted protests in Washington last year as part of a wide-ranging pro-Beijing influence campaign, according to new research. The Chinese firm also used a network of over 70 fake news websites to promote pro-China content in an example of the more aggressive efforts by pro-China operatives to influence US political debate in recent years, according to security firm Mandiant, which analyzed the activity. One of the protests was against a US government ban on goods produced in China’s Xinjiang region, where US officials have accused the Chinese government of systematic repression of the Uyghurs. The other protest was on the sidelines of a June conference on international religious freedom, Mandiant said. One of the protests only attracted roughly a dozen people but it showed the scope and ambition of the pro-China efforts. The hired protesters, who included self-proclaimed musicians and actors in the Washington, DC, area, apparently had no idea they were being enlisted in a pro-China influence campaign, the Mandiant researchers said. The campaign backed by the Chinese firm, Shanghai Haixun Technology Co., Ltd., is “intended to sow discord in US society,” Ryan Serabian, a senior analyst at Mandiant, told CNN.
Rent-a-protester is nothing new. There are companies like this one which will create a scene for you — for a price.
A bigger problem is the proliferation of bogus news sites. They often have names and branding which look like (but aren't identical) to those of legit news organizations.
It doesn't help matters that Google News is way lax about what it considers a "news" site.
Of course the most fertile ground for fake news sites is social media. Meta (Facebook, Instagram, etc.) is more interested in boosting activity than in accuracy of information. And Twitter (or whatever Elon is calling it today) these days has become a playpen for Nazis.
People need to SIMPLY STOP getting news from dubious social media sources.
There are plenty of respected sources for news. But it takes a bit more effort than just glancing at an unmoderated feed.
No source is 100% perfect; but a good news source will admit an error and then offer a correction.
Public broadcasters in liberal democracies are good sources. Even public broadcasters in some non-English speaking democracies may have English language content. Americans in particular need to get more news directly from reliable sources in other countries. It's a big world out there.
The corporatization and monopolization of local and regional newspapers in the US has been terrible news. However a lot of smaller excellent news sites have sprung up to fill the gap in local coverage in many municipalities.
So create your own news feed of legit sources – but keep it separate from strictly opinion sites.
If you do run across a dubious site pretending to be a news source, don't hesitate to call them out publicly. This "news site" may just be a propaganda boiler room operating in Shanghai or Saint Petersburg. It may seem like a game of whack-a-mole to some degree but keeping the lifespans of such sites short prevents them from building a base.
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Speaking of China, apparently Foreign Minister Qin Gang has been purged.
China’s foreign minister Qin Gang ousted in surprise shake-up of Xi Jinping’s foreign policy leadership
