Modelling Computational Propaganda

Sebastian Garcia

Stratosphere Lab, Civilsphere, AIC

www.civilsphereproject.org

sebastian.garcia@agents.fel.cvut.cz, @eldracote

There will be no war anymore without misinformation and cyberattacks

Fake News is not news

Social networks and phones disrupted the game

The anonymity of the Internet gives non-attribution for everyone. Everyone

The true power of fake news is not the news itself, its the suppression of trust in any news

Computational propaganda: Should we detect it?

70 countries do domestic computational propaganda. Including CZ

7 countries do foreign computational propaganda

71% is pro-gov, pro-party

89% attacks opposition

34% spread division

Still humans mostly

Facebook/Twitter mostly

Authorities -> Amplification

Most Govs, politicians, 3. party

How to deal with it?

AI for Detecting Computational Propaganda

Distribution Patterns

Profile of users

Profile of users

Timing patterns

Coordination

Early detection of foreign propaganda attacks

- Suppression

- Attacks on opposition