Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare Lt Col Jarred Prier USAF Abstract This article demonstrates how social media is a tool for modern information-age warfare It builds on analysis of three distinct topics social networking propaganda and news and information sharing Two case studies are used to show how state and nonstate actors use social media to employ time-tested propaganda techniques to yield far-reaching results The spread of the propaganda message is accomplished by tapping into an existing narrative then amplifying that message with a network of automatic “bot” accounts to force the social media platform algorithm to recognize that message as a trending topic The first case study analyzes Islamic State IS as a nonstate actor while the second case observes Russia as a state actor with each providing evidence of successful influence operations using social media Coercion and persuasion will continue to be decisive factors in information warfare as more countries attempt to build influence operations on social media ✵✵✵✵✵ For years analysts in the defense and intelligence communities have warned lawmakers and the American public of the risks of a cyber Pearl Harbor The fear of a widespread cyber-based attack loomed over the country following intrusions against Yahoo email accounts in 2012 Sony Studios in 2014 and even the United States government Office of Personnel Management OPM in 2015 The average American likely did not understand exactly how or for what purposes US adversaries Lt Col Jarred Prier USAF currently serves as director of operations for the 20th Bomb Squadron He completed a USAF fellowship at the Walsh School of Foreign Service at Georgetown University and earned a master’s degree from the School of Advanced Air and Space Studies at Air University Maxwell Air Force Base Alabama Prier also holds a master of science degree in international relations from Troy University Alabama This article evolved from his thesis 50 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare were operating within the cyber domain but the implications of future attacks were not difficult to imagine Enemies of the United States could target vulnerable power grids stock markets train switches academic institutions banks and communications systems in the opening salvos of this new type of warfare 1 In contrast to more traditional forms of cyberattack cyber operations today target people within a society influencing their beliefs as well as behaviors and diminishing trust in the government US adversaries now seek to control and exploit the trend mechanism on social media to harm US interests discredit public and private institutions and sow domestic strife “Commanding the trend” represents a relatively novel and increasingly dangerous means of persuasion within social media Thus instead of attacking the military or economic infrastructure state and nonstate actors outside the United States can access regular streams of online information via social media to influence networked groups within the United States This article analyzes how two US adversaries hijacked social media using four factors associated with command of the trend First it provides a basis for commanding the trend in social media by analyzing social media as a tool for obtaining and spreading information It then looks more specifically at how US adversaries use social media to command the trend and target US citizens with malicious propaganda Next the two most prominent recent case studies provide evidence of how nonstate and state actors use social media to counter the United States The first case study covers IS from 2014 to 2016 by examining the group’s use of social media for recruiting spreading propaganda and proliferating terror threats The second case describes the pattern of Russian hacking espionage disinformation and manipulation of social media with a particular focus on the United States presidential election of 2016 Evidence for this second case study comes from nearly two years of research on Twitter accounts believed to be part of a Russian information warfare network The article concludes with implications and predictions of how social media will continue to develop what can be expected in the future and how the United States can respond to the growing threat of adversaries commanding the trend Commanding the Trend in Social Media The adaptation of social media as a tool of modern warfare should not be surprising Internet technology evolved to meet the needs of Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 51 Jarred Prier information-age warfare around 2006 with the dawn of Web 2 0 which allowed internet users to create content instead of just consuming online material Instead the individual could decide what was important and only read what was important on demand Not only could users select what news they want to see but they could also use the medium to create news based on their opinions 2 The social nature of humans ultimately led to virtual networking As such traditional forms of media were bound to give way to a more tailorable form of communication US adversaries were quick to find ways to exploit the openness of the internet eventually developing techniques to employ social media networks as a tool to spread propaganda Social media creates a point of injection for propaganda and has become the nexus of information operations and cyber warfare To understand this we must examine the important concept of the social media trend and look briefly into the fundamentals of propaganda Also important is the spread of news on social media specifically the spread of “fake news” and how propaganda penetrates mainstream media outlets Trending Social Media Social media sites like Twitter and Facebook employ an algorithm to analyze words phrases or hashtags to create a list of topics sorted in order of popularity This “trend list” is a quick way to review the most discussed topics at a given time According to a 2011 study on social media a trending topic “will capture the attention of a large audience for a short time” and thus “contributes to agenda setting mechanisms ”3 Using existing online networks in conjunction with automatic “bot” accounts foreign agents can insert propaganda into a social media platform create a trend and rapidly disseminate a message faster and cheaper than through any other medium Social media facilitates the spread of a narrative outside a particular social cluster of true believers by commanding the trend It hinges on four factors 1 a message that fits an existing even if obscure narrative 2 a group of true believers predisposed to the message 3 a relatively small team of agents or cyber warriors and 4 a network of automated “bot” accounts The existing narrative and the true believers who subscribe to it are endogenous so any propaganda must fit that narrative to penetrate the network of true believers Usually the cyber team is responsible for crafting the specific message for dissemination The cyber team then generates 52 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare videos memes or fake news often in collusion with the true believers To achieve the effective spread of propaganda the true believers the cyber team and the bot network combine efforts to take command of the trend Thus an adversary in the information age can influence the population using a variety of propaganda techniques primarily through social media combined with online news sources and traditional forms of media A trending topic transcends networks and becomes the mechanism for the spread of information across social clusters Here the focus is primarily on Twitter a “microblogging” site where each post is limited to 140 characters 4 Facebook also has a trends list but it is less visible than the Twitter trends list and the two applications serve different purposes Facebook maintains a function of bringing friends and families together On Facebook your connections are typically more intimate connections than you would expect on Twitter which focuses less on bringing people together and more on bringing ideas together As a microblog Twitter’s core notion is to share your thoughts and feelings about the world around you with a group of people who share similar interests The individuals who follow each other may not be friends but could be a team of like-minded academics journalists sports fans or politicos When a person tweets that tweet can be viewed by anyone who follows that person or anyone who searches for that topic using Twitter’s search tool Additionally anyone can “retweet” someone else’s tweet which broadcasts the original to a new audience Twitter makes real-time idea and event sharing possible on a global scale 5 Another method for quick referencing on Twitter is using a “hashtag ” The tweet would then be visible to anyone who clicked on the link along with all of the other tweets using the same hashtag A trend can spread a message to a wide group outside of a person’s typical social network Moreover malicious actors can use trends to spread a message using multiple forms of media on multiple platforms with the ultimate goal of garnering coverage in the mainstream media Command of the trend is a powerful method of spreading information whereby according to an article in the Guardian “you can take an existing trending topic such as fake news and then weaponise it You can turn it against the very media that uncovered it ”6 Because Twitter is an idea-sharing platform it is very popular for rapidly spreading information especially among journalists and academics Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 53 Jarred Prier however malicious users have also taken to Twitter for the same benefits in recent years At one time groups like al-Qaeda preferred creating websites but now “Twitter has emerged as the internet application most preferred by terrorists even more popular than self-designed websites or Facebook ”7 Twitter makes it easy to spread a message to both supporters and foes outside of a particular network Groups trying to disseminate a message as widely as possible can rely on the trend function to reach across multiple networks Three methods help control what is trending on social media trend distribution trend hijacking and trend creation The first method is relatively easy and requires the least amount of resources Trend distribution is simply applying a message to every trending topic For example someone could tweet a picture of the president with a message in the form of a meme—a stylistic device that applies culturally relevant humor to a photo or video—along with the unrelated hashtag #SuperBowl Anyone who clicks on that trend list expecting to see something about football will see that meme of the president Trend hijacking requires more resources in the form of either more followers spreading the message or a network of “bots” autonomous programs that can interact with computer systems or users designed to spread the message automatically Of the three methods to gain command of the trend trend creation requires the most effort It necessitates either money to promote a trend or knowledge of the social media environment around the topic and most likely a network of several automatic bot accounts Bot accounts are non-human accounts that automatically tweet and retweet based on a set of programmed rules In 2014 Twitter estimated that only 5 percent of accounts were bots that number has grown along with the total users and now tops 15 percent 8 Some of the accounts are “news bots ” which just retweet the trending topics Some of the accounts are for advertising purposes which try to dominate conversations to generate revenue through clicks on links Some bots are trolls which like a human version of an online troll tweet to disrupt the civil conversation For malicious actors seeking to influence a population through trends on social media the best way to establish trends is to build a network of bot accounts programmed to tweet at various intervals respond to certain words or retweet when directed by a master account Figure 1 illustrates the basics of a bot network The top of the chain is a small 54 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare core group That team is composed of human-controlled accounts with a large number of followers The accounts are typically adversary cyber warriors or true believers with a large following Under the core group is the bot network Bots tend to follow each other and the core group Below the bot network is a group consisting of the true believers without a large following These human-controlled accounts are a part of the network but they appear to be outsiders because of the weaker links between the accounts The bottom group lacks a large following but they do follow the core group sometimes follow bot accounts and seldom follow each other Small Core Group Larger Group with Strong Ties Small Outsiders with Weak Ties Figure 1 Illustration of a bot network Enough bots working together can quickly start a trend or take over a trend but bot accounts themselves can only bridge the structural hole between networks not completely change a narrative To change a narrative to conduct an effective influence operation requires a group to combine a well-coordinated bot campaign with essential elements of propaganda Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 55 Jarred Prier Propaganda Primer Messaging designed to influence behavior has been around for centuries but became easier as methods of mass communication enabled wider dissemination of propaganda Observing the rise of mass media and its presence in daily life French philosopher Jacques Ellul noted the simplicity of propaganda in 1965 According to Ellul “Propaganda ceases where simple dialogue begins ”9 That said it is worth noting Eric Hoffer’s comments that “propaganda on its own cannot force its way into unwilling minds neither can it inculcate something wholly new ”10 For propaganda to function it needs a previously existing narrative to build upon as well as a network of true believers who already buy into the underlying theme Social media helps the propagandist spread the message through an established network A person is inclined to believe information on social media because the people he chooses to follow share things that fit his existing beliefs That person in turn is likely to share the information with others in his network to others who are like-minded and those predisposed to the message With enough shares a particular social network accepts the propaganda storyline as fact But up to this point the effects are relatively localized The most effective propaganda campaigns are not confined just to those predisposed to the message Essentially propaganda permeates everyday experiences and the individual targeted with a massive media blitz will never fully understand that the ideas he has are not entirely his own A modern example of this phenomenon was observable during the Arab Spring as propaganda spread on Facebook “helped middle-class Egyptians understand that they were not alone in their frustration ”11 In short propaganda is simpler to grasp if everyone around a person seems to share the same emotions on a particular subject Even a general discussion among the crowd can provide the illusion that propaganda is information 12 In other words propaganda creates heuristics which is a way the mind simplifies problem solving by relying on quickly accessible data The availability heuristic weighs the amount and frequency of information received as well as recentness of the information as more informative than the source or accuracy of the information 13 Essentially the mind creates a shortcut based on the most—or most recent— information available simply because it can be remembered easily Often the availability heuristic manifests itself in information received through media coverage The availability heuristic is important to understanding individual opinion formation and how propaganda can exploit the shortcuts our minds make to form opinions The lines in figure 2 show formation 56 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare of opinions temporally with bold arrows influencing a final opinion more than light arrows The circled containers indicate a penetration point for propaganda exploitation As previously described mass media enables rapid spread of propaganda which feeds the availability heuristic The internet makes it possible to flood the average person’s daily intake of information which aids the spread of propaganda One of the primary principles of propaganda is that the message must resonate with the target Therefore when presented with information that is within your belief structure your bias is confirmed and you accept the propaganda If it is outside of your network you may initially reject the story but the volume of information may create an availability heuristic in your mind Over time the propaganda becomes normalized—and even believable It is confirmed when a fake news story is reported by the mainstream media which has become reliant on social media for spreading and receiving news PAST Cultural Values TIME Social Characteristics of Parents Social Characteristics of the Individual Values Held by Parents Identification with Groups Events in the World Media Coverage of Events Perception of Events Values Internalized by the Individual Values Internalized by Peers Prior Opinions Opinions Expressed by Peers Opinion PRESENT Figure 2 Model of individual opinion formation Reproduced by permission from Alan D Monroe Public Opinion in America New York Dodd Mead and Co 1975 147 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 57 Jarred Prier Figure 3 maps the process of how propaganda can penetrate a network that is not predisposed to the message This outside network is a group that is ideologically opposed to the group of true believers The outside network is likely aware of the existing narrative but does not necessarily subscribe to the underlying beliefs that support the narrative Cyber Team Existing Narrative True Believers Outside Network Propaganda • Hacked Emails • Forged Documents Videos • Memes • Fake News • Real news supporting propaganda • Threats • Power demonstration video photos Bot Network Trend Other Resources Journalists • Media which supports propaganda • State-owned media • Other social media platforms This is optional Idea Message Tweets Figure 3 Process map of how propaganda spreads via the trend Command of the trend enables the contemporary propaganda model to create a “firehose of information” that permits the insertion of false narratives over time and at all times 14 Trending items produce the illusion of reality in some cases even being reported by journalists Because untruths can spread so quickly now the internet has created “both deliberate and unwitting propaganda” since the early 1990s through the proliferation of rumors passed as legitimate news 15 The normalization of these types of rumors over time combined with the rapidity and volume of new false narratives over social media opened the door for “fake news ” The availability heuristic and the firehose of disinformation can slowly alter opinions as propaganda crosses networks by way of the trend but 58 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare the amount of influence will likely be minimal unless it comes from a source that a nonbeliever finds trustworthy An individual may see the propaganda and believe the message is popular because it is trending but still not buy into the message itself Instead the individual will likely turn to a trusted source of news to test the validity of the propaganda Therefore we must now analyze modern journalism to determine how command of the trend can transform propaganda from fake news to real news Social Networks and Social Media Currently 72 percent of Americans get digital news primarily from a mobile device and people now prefer online news sources to print sources by a two-to-one ratio 16 The news consumer now selects from an abundance of options besides a local newspaper based on how the consumer perceives the credibility of the resource As social media usage has become more widespread users have become ensconced within specific self-selected groups which means that news and views are shared nearly exclusively with like-minded users In network terminology this group phenomenon is called homophily More colloquially it reflects the concept that “birds of a feather flock together ” Homophily within social media creates an aura of expertise and trustworthiness where those factors would not normally exist Along the lines of social networking and propaganda people are more willing to believe things that fit into their worldview Once source credibility is established there is a tendency to accept that source as an expert on other issues as well even if the issue is unrelated to the area of originally perceived expertise 17 Ultimately this “echo chamber” can promote the scenario in which your friend is “just as much a source of insightful analysis on the nuances of U S foreign policy towards Iran as regional scholars arms control experts or journalists covering the State Department ”18 If social media facilitates self-reinforcing networks of like-minded users how can a propaganda message traverse networks where there are no overlapping nodes This link between networks is only based on that single topic and can be easily severed Thus to employ social media effectively as a tool of propaganda an adversary cannot rely on individual weak links between networks Instead an adversary must exploit a feature within the social media platform that enables cross-network data sharing on a massive scale the trending topics list Trends are visible to everyone Regardless of who follows whom on a given social media platStrategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 59 Jarred Prier form all users see the topics algorithmically generated by the platform as being the most popular topics at that particular moment Given this universal and unavoidable visibility “popular topics contribute to the collective awareness of what is trending and at times can also affect the public agenda of the community ”19 In this manner a trending topic can bridge the gap between clusters of social networks A malicious actor can quickly spread propaganda by injecting a narrative onto the trend list The combination of networking on social media propaganda and reliance on unverifiable online news sources introduces the possibility of completely falsified news stories entering the mainstream of public consciousness This phenomenon commonly called fake news has generated significant criticism from both sides of the American political spectrum with some labeling any contrary viewpoints fake In reality fake news consists of more than just bad headlines buried ledes or poorly sourced stories 20 Fake news is a particular form of propaganda composed of a false story disguised as news On social media this becomes particularly dangerous because of the viral spread of sensationalized fake news stories A prime example of fake news and social media came from the most shared news stories on Facebook during the 2016 US presidential election The source of the fake news was a supposedly patriotic American news blog called “End the Fed ” a website run by Romanian businessperson Ovidiu Drobota One story stating that the pope endorsed Donald Trump for president received over one million shares on Facebook alone not to mention shares on Twitter 21 Other fake news stories from that site and others received more shares in late 2016 than did traditional mainstream news sources see figure 4 22 It is important to recognize that more people were exposed to those fake news stories than what is reflected in the “shares” data In some cases people would just see the story in a Facebook or Twitter feed in many cases people actively sought out news from those sources which are fiction at best and foreign propaganda at worst Over time those fake news sources become trusted sources for some people As people learn to trust those sources legitimate news outlets become less trustworthy A 2016 poll by Gallup showed American trust in mass media is at an all-time low 23 60 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare Number of Engagements 15 million MAINSTREAM NEWS 12 million 9 million 8 7 million 6 million 7 3 million 3 million FAKE NEWS Feb –April May–July 2016 Aug –Nov 8 Figure 4 Total Facebook engagements for top 20 election stories When news is tailorable to one’s taste and new stories are popping up around the world every second mainstream journalists have to change their methods to compete with other sources of news Therefore if social media is becoming a source for spreading news and information journalists will try to keep up by using social media to spread their stories and to acquire information first According to an Indiana University School of Journalism study the most common use of social media for journalists is to check for breaking news 24 As a result mainstream journalists tend to use tweets as a legitimate source especially when there is a lack of more valid or confirmed sources 25 Overreliance on social media for breaking news can become problematic in the midst of an ongoing information operation If an adversary takes control of a trend on Twitter the trend is likely to be noticed by mainstream media journalists who may provide legitimacy to a false story—essentially turning fake news into real news This is the initial setup for how social media became extremely influential via an adversary’s propaganda IS and Russia successfully manipulated social media particularly Twitter Although they had different objectives the tools and techniques were similar Both foreign actors used command of the trend to spread propaganda that influenced the emotions opinions and behavior of US citizens in a manner antithetical to US interests In essence IS and Russia hijacked social media through propaganda narratives true believers cyber warriors and a bot network Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 61 Jarred Prier Hijacking Social Media—the Case of IS IS could be considered either a large terrorist organization or a very fragile state with a weak army However the perception of IS varies To believers IS is a religious caliphate but much of the rest of the world assumes it is a terrorist group that represents a perversion of faith IS managed to master the art of manipulation because a single message simultaneously targeted potential allies and foes alike Its use of social media is a case study in effective propaganda techniques that bolstered recruiting increased brand recognition and spread terror with minimal effort It quickly became the first organization to use social media effectively to achieve its goals Although IS may use terrorism as a tactic the organization behaves differently than any other terrorist organization in the world 26 The differences are apparent in every aspect from operations to recruiting to governing The last factor is the key discriminator As a descendant of al-Qaeda in Iraq the group struggled to find its way after the death of leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in 2006 under the leadership of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi the group has established clear lines of authority taxation and educational systems trade markets even policing and a judiciary covering civil criminal and religious complaints 27 Gaining and holding land is just a part of what IS believes is the destiny of the organization and its followers Certainly the desire is to create a caliphate 28 but its ultimate purpose is more apocalyptic in nature IS seeks to usher in the end of the world 29 Its members believe that their actions will bring the forces of the world to attack their caliphate and result in the imminent defeat of the infidel army in the Syrian town of Dabiq thus triggering the end of the world and the final purge of evil 30 IS is a revolutionary force with doomsday cult beliefs 31 To advance the organization’s objectives IS used messages that served to spread its propaganda on social media to a broad audience that fit within a narrative of strength for the supporter and a narrative of terror for the adversary In other words IS cyber warriors combined propaganda with command of the trend to accomplish three things with one message First they demonstrated the weakness and incompetence of the international community to fight them online and on the battlefield Second they injected terror into the mainstream media Finally and most importantly they recruited new fighters to join them on the battlefield in Iraq and Syria—and online 62 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare Islamic State Commanding the Trend Through a combination of ingenious marketing and cyber mastery IS bolstered its message around the world First the group refined IS branding The organization projects a very specific image to the world that affects the viewer differently based on beliefs To a follower the images that are shared via social media demonstrate strength and power To the nonfollower the images are grotesque and horrifying In other words no matter what IS puts out in social media the result is a win for the organization because the same message successfully targets two different groups The amplification of those messages by creating trends on Twitter is guaranteed to get further attention once the tweet falls into the mainstream media Thus IS is capable of using relatively small numbers of Twitter users see table 1 to project an aura of strength The method for expanding the reach of a single IS tweet or hashtag involves a network of legitimate retweets combined with bots and unwitting Twitter users While IS does maintain a strong network of true believers the numbers are relatively small and spread thinly across the Middle East Therefore IS must game the system and rig Twitter for a message to go viral One high-tech method for creating a bot network was a mobile app called “Dawn of Glad Tidings ” The app designed by IS cyber warriors provides updates on IS activities and spiritual guidance to the user When users download the app they create an account that links to their Twitter account which then gives the app generous permissions allowing the app to tweet using that user’s account 32 The app then retweets on behalf of the user when a master account sends an ISbranded tweet Over time the hashtag generates enough tweets to start localized trends Once the trend surfaces it is broadcast over trend-monitoring networks like the Arabic Twitter account @ActiveHashtags 33 That causes the hashtag to gather more attention across the region and then be retweeted by real followers and other bot accounts The final step in the process is when the trend goes global Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 63 Jarred Prier Table 1 Snapshot of Islamic State Twitter activity Twitter-related activity studied Related statistics Estimated number of overt IS Twitter accounts 46 000 Number of “bot” accounts 6 216 Average number of tweets per day per user 7 3 Average number of followers 1 004 Most common year accounts created 2014 Top languages Top locations Arabic 73% English 18% French 6% “Islamic State ” Syria Iraq Saudi Arabiaa Source J M Berger and Jonathon Morgan “The ISIS Twitter Census ” Brookings Institute accessed 20 March 2015 https www brookings edu research the-isis-twitter-census-defining-and-describing-the-population-of-isis-supporters-on-twitter a Based on location-enabled users and self-defined account locations Worldwide trends on Twitter have been a boon for IS Creating and hijacking trends garnered attention for the group that would otherwise have gone unnoticed on social media The peak of IS trend hijacking was during the World Cup in 2014—as one of the world’s most popular sporting events it was no surprise that the hashtag #WorldCup2014 trended globally on Twitter nonstop during the tournament At one point though nearly every tweet under this hashtag had something to do with IS instead of soccer The network of IS supporters and bot accounts hijacked the trend Because people were using the hashtag to discuss the matches and advertisers were using the trend for marketing Twitter struggled to stop the trend and the subsequent IS propaganda effort In fact IS cyber warriors and true believers foiled most of the early attempts by Twitter to stop IS from using their platform to spread propaganda Twitter’s initial reaction was to suspend accounts that violated the user terms of the agreement The result was creative user names by IS supporters for example a user named @jihadISIS42 was created after @jihadISIS41 was suspended which was set up after @jihadISIS40 was suspended 34 Each new account demonstrated a deep dedication to the cause that when combined with the seemingly significant presence on social media presented the group as dominating social media In the case of #WorldCup2014 IS took command of the trend by hijacking using the opportunity to push recruiting messages and making 64 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare terror threats against the tournament venues in Brazil Additionally the co-opted hashtag often directed users to other hashtags in what was ultimately a successful attempt to generate worldwide trends of other IS-related themes One successful hashtag-creation effort was #StevensHeadinObamasHands which included memes of President Barack Obama and IS-held American journalist Steven Sotloff The implication was that the president of the United States did not care to or was powerless to stop the murder of an American citizen Once again IS appeared to be disproportionately powerful because of the command of the trend Due to the organization’s aggressive communications strategy and branding the IS social media presence consistently outperforms similar jihadist groups in the region that have the same number of or more followers 35 Unlike al-Qaeda which largely limited its online activity to websites IS wanted to communicate with a broader audience—it wants to communicate directly to the whole world In addition to spreading terror threats the appearance of the group as a powerful state appealed to a group of true believers who turned to IS as new recruits to fight in Iraq and Syria IS used social media from 2014 to 2016 to demonstrate power sow fear in the international audience and recruit the true believers All the while they used the true believers following on social media to boost their trends on social media However the group currently finds itself altering its modus operandi due to the recent loss of territories in Iraq and Syria combined with a spate of successful terrorist-style attacks in Europe The ongoing worry for counterterrorism experts is finally beginning to come to fruition the recruit staying home to fight instead of joining IS overseas After years of maintaining a significant presence on social media IS is using Twitter less now for official communication The reasoning is likely twofold First the group has lost territory in Iraq and Syria and is adjusting its strategies Second Twitter has removed over 600 000 IS-related accounts consisting of bots cyber warriors and true believers 36 Additionally Twitter has adjusted the program to find terror-related videos memes and photos soon after an account from the IS network posts the propaganda The reasons IS seemed so powerful is that when viewed through the lens of terrorist groups it advertised using weaponized social media campaigns Its intense social media presence ghastly videos massive Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 65 Jarred Prier recruiting and victories against Iraqi security forces made IS seem disproportionately stronger than it was In summation IS serves as a model for any nonstate group attempting to use social media for cyber coercion Table 2 summarizes its use of the four requirements to gain command of the trend based on the analysis within this case study Table 2 Islamic State case study analysis Requirement Example Propaganda narratives 1   IS is strong everyone else is weak 2   True believers should join the cause True believers Muslims believing in the caliphate of al-Baghdadi Cyber warriors Propaganda makers video editors app programmers recruiters spiritual leaders using low- and high-tech tools to advertise IS on social media Bot network Unwitting victims of spiritual-guidance app “Dawn of Glad Tidings” At the same time IS was weaponizing Twitter Russia was using it to simultaneously cause confusion and garner support for its invasion of Crimea Soon Russia’s command of the trend would be used to target the United States 2016 presidential election Russia Masters of Manipulation Russia is no stranger to information warfare The original technique of Soviet actors was through aktivnyye meropriyatiya active measures and dezinformatsiya disinformation According to a 1987 State Department report on Soviet information warfare “active measures are distinct both from espionage and counterintelligence and from traditional diplomatic and informational activities The goal of active measures is to influence opinions and or actions of individuals governments and or publics ”37 In other words Soviet agents would try to weave propaganda into an existing narrative to smear countries or individual candidates Active measures are designed as retired KGB General Oleg Kalugin once explained “to drive wedges in the Western community alliances of all sorts particularly NATO to sow discord among allies to weaken the United States in the eyes of the people in Europe Asia Africa Latin America and thus to prepare ground in case the war really occurs ” Editor translator and analyst of Russian Federation trends Michael Weiss says 66 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare “The most common subcategory of active measures is dezinformatsiya or disinformation feverish if believable lies cooked up by Moscow Centre and planted in friendly media outlets to make democratic nations look sinister ”38 The techniques Russia uses today are similar to those they used during the Cold War but dissemination is more widespread through social media Recently the Russian minister of defense acknowledged the existence of their cyber warriors in a speech to the Russian parliament announcing that Russia formed a new branch of the military consisting of information warfare troops 39 The Internet Research Agency as it was called in 2015 now seems to be the information warfare branch he openly admitted to This army of professional trolls’ mission is to fight online The Russian trolls have a variety of state resources at their disposal including a vast intelligence network to assist their cyber warriors The additional tools available to Russia also include RT Russia Today and Sputnik the Kremlin-financed television news networks broadcasting in multiple languages around the world Before the trolls begin their activities on social media the cyber warrior hackers first provide hacked information to Wikileaks which according to CIA director Mike Pompeo is a “non-state hostile intelligence service abetted by state actors like Russia ”40 In intelligence terms WikiLeaks operates as a “cutout” for Russian intelligence operations—a place to spread intelligence information through an outside organization—similar to the Soviets’ use of universities to publish propaganda studies in the 1980s 41 The trolls then take command of the trend to spread the hacked information on Twitter referencing WikiLeaks and links to RT news within their tweets These Russian efforts would be impossible without an existing network of American true believers willing to spread the message The Russian trolls and the bot accounts amplified the voices of the true believers in addition to inserting propaganda into that network Then the combined effects of Russian and American Twitter accounts took command of the trend to spread disinformation across networks The cyber trolls produced several hoaxes in the United States and Europe like the Louisiana hoax according to Adrian Chen in his article “The Agency” in the New York Times Magazine 42 Protests of police departments throughout the United States during the summer of 2015 provided several opportunities to manipulate narratives via social media and it is likely Russian trolls hijacked some of the Black Lives Matter–related Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 67 Jarred Prier trends to spread disinformation and accuse journalists of failing to cover important issues 43 The Russian trolls said the idea was to spread fear discrediting institutions—especially American media—while making President Obama look powerless and Russian president Vladimir Putin more favorable 44 Several hijacked hashtags in 2015 attempted to discredit the Obama administration while spreading racist memes and hoaxes aimed at the African American community In other words the Russian trolls seemed to target multiple groups to generate anger and create chaos One particularly effective Twitter hoax occurred as racial unrest fell on the University of Missouri campus that fall #PrayforMizzou On the night of 11 November 2015 #PrayforMizzou began trending on Twitter 45 The trend was a result of protests at the University of Missouri campus over racial issues however “news” slowly started developing within the hashtag that altered the meaning and soon shot the hashtag to the top of the trend list The news was that the KKK was marching through Columbia and the Mizzou campus One user display name “Jermaine” @Fanfan1911 warned residents “The cops are marching with the KKK They beat up my little brother Watch out ” Jermaine’s tweet included a picture of a black child with a severely bruised face it was retweeted hundreds of times Additionally Jermaine and a handful of other users continued tweeting and retweeting images and stories of KKK and neo-Nazis in Columbia chastising the media for not covering the racists creating havoc on campus Looking at Jermaine’s followers and the followers of his followers one could observe that the original tweeters all followed and retweeted each other Those users also seemed to be retweeted automatically by approximately 70 bots These bots also used the trend-distribution technique which used all of the trending hashtags at that time within their tweets not just #PrayforMizzou Spaced evenly and with retweets of real people who were observing the Mizzou hashtag the numbers quickly escalated to thousands of tweets within a few minutes The plot was smoothly executed and evaded the algorithms Twitter designed to catch bot tweeting mainly because the Mizzou hashtag was being used outside of that attack The narrative was set as the trend was hijacked and the hoax was underway 68 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare The rapidly spreading image of a bruised little boy was generating legitimate outrage across the country and around the world However a quick Google image search for “bruised black child” revealed the picture that “Jermaine” attached to the tweet was a picture of an African American child who was beaten by police in Ohio over one year earlier The image and the narrative were part of a larger plot to spread fear and distrust It worked The University of Missouri student body president tweeted a warning to stay off the streets and lock doors because “KKK members were confirmed on campus ” National news networks broke their coverage to get a local feed from camera crews roaming Columbia and the campus looking for signs of violence As journalists continued to search for signs of Klan members anchors read tweets describing shootings stabbings and cross burnings In the end the stories were all false Shortly after the disinformation campaign at Mizzou @Fanfan1911 changed his display name from Jermaine to “FanFan” and the profile picture of a young black male changed to the image of a German iron cross The next few months FanFan’s tweets were all in German and consisted of spreading rumors about Syrian refugees Russian active measures in Europe around this time were widely reported and the account that previously tweeted disinformation regarding Mizzou now focused on messages that were anti-Islamic anti–European Union and anti-German Chancellor Angela Merkel His tweets reached a crescendo after reports of women being raped on New Year’s Eve 2016 Some of the reports were false including a high-profile case of a 13-year-old ethnic-Russian girl living in Berlin who falsely claimed that she was abducted and raped by refugees 46 Once again Russian propaganda dominated the narrative 47 Similar to previous disinformation campaigns on Twitter the Russians trolls were able to spread the information because of an underlying fear and an existing narrative that they were able to exploit The trolls used trend-hijacking techniques in concurrence with reporting by Russian state-funded television network Russia Today To attempt to generate more attention to the Russian anti-Merkel narrative in European media Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov accused German authorities of a “politically correct cover-up” in the case of the Russian teen 48 Because of the Russian propaganda push the anti-immigration narrative began spreading across traditional European media 49 In fact a magazine in Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 69 Jarred Prier Poland devoted an entire issue to the topic of Muslim immigration with a disturbing cover photo entitled “Islamic Rape of Europe ”50 In addition to the German tweets FanFan began tweeting in English again in the spring of 2016 His tweets and the tweets of other Russian trolls were spreading in America The narrative they spread was developing a symbiotic relationship with American right-wing news organizations like Breitbart and its followers on social media—a group of true believers in the Russian propaganda narrative Additionally the troll network already seeded various social media platforms with pages designed for spreading disinformation 51 Seemingly patriotic American Facebook pages linked articles to RT legitimate American news sources advocating a right-leaning perspective Breitbart right-wing conspiracy sites like InfoWars and non-factual “news” sites like the Conservative Tribune and Gateway Pundit The Facebook pages also linked to Russia-run sites with nothing but false news stories Based on anti-Obama sentiment the Facebook pages were popular among conservative users but not getting broad exposure Before 2016 Russian active measures were also used in European elections most notably the “Brexit” campaign One European expert on Russia quoted in the Atlantic article “War Goes Viral” summarized Putin’s intent as “not to make you love Putin” instead “the aim is to make you disbelieve anything A disbelieving fragile unconscious audience is much easier to manipulate ”52 Active measures enable manipulation Smearing political candidates hacking the spread of disinformation and hoaxes all contribute to a breakdown of public trust in institutions As the 2016 US presidential campaign began in earnest much of the online animosity was now directed at Obama’s potential successor Hillary Clinton She became a rallying cry for Trump supporters and a force-multiplying tool for the Russian trolls Influencing the 2016 Presidential Election According to the Office of Director of National Intelligence ODNI Report on Russian Influence during the 2016 presidential election “Moscow’s influence campaign followed a messaging strategy that blends covert intelligence operations—such as cyber activity—with overt efforts by Russian Government agencies state funded media third-party intermediaries and paid social media users or ‘trolls ’ ”53 In the case of the 2016 election Russian propaganda easily meshed with right-wing 70 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare networks known as the “alt-right” and also with supporters of Senator Bernie Sanders in the left wing of the Democratic Party Hillary Clinton had been a target of conservative groups since she first came into the national spotlight as first lady in the 1990s 54 Thus groups on the left and right presented strong opposition to her candidacy in 2016 which meant Russian trolls already had a narrative to build upon and a network of true believers on social media to spread their propaganda In a September 2016 speech Clinton described half of candidate Trump’s supporters as “deplorables ” She went on to say that the other half of Trump’s supporters were just people who felt the system had left them behind who needed support and empathy Clearly she was not referring to all of Trump’s supporters as deplorable but the narrative quickly changed after social media users began referring to themselves as “Deplorable” in their screen names Before the “basket of deplorables” comment the trolls primarily used an algorithm to rapidly respond to a tweet from Donald Trump Those tweets were prominently displayed directly under Trump’s tweet if a user clicked on the original Those users became powerful voices with large followings Trump himself frequently retweeted many of those users 55 However after the Clinton speech a “people search” on Twitter for “deplorable” was all one needed to suddenly gain a network of followers numbering between 3 000 and 70 000 Once again FanFan’s name changed—this time to “Deplorable Lucy”—and the profile picture became a white middle-aged female with a Trump logo at the bottom of the picture The FanFan follower count went from just over 1 000 to 11 000 within a few days His original network from the Mizzou and European campaigns changed as well tracing his follower trail again led to the same groups of people in the same network and they were all now defined by the “Deplorable” brand In short they were now completely in unison with a vast network of other Russian trolls actual American citizens and bot accounts from both countries on Twitter With a large network consisting of Russian trolls true believers and bots it suddenly became easier to get topics trending with a barrage of tweets The Russian trolls could employ the previously used tactics of bot tweets and hashtag hijacking but now they had the capability to create trends Besides creating trends the trolls could relay strategy under the radar using Twitter That is to say a message could be delivered in the form of a picture that did not include any words The lack of words would Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 71 Jarred Prier spread the message to the followers in a timeline but retweets would not develop any trends—only that network of followers or someone actively observing the network saw the messages Often anonymous users discussed the tactics behind the trend creation on the social media site 4Chan or on the bulletin board called “ pol ” and subsequently coordinated the trend within the Deplorable Network on Twitter The most effective trends derived from this strategy came in the days following the release of the “Access Hollywood” tape from 2005 in which Trump had made vulgar remarks 56 The Deplorable Network distributed the corresponding strategy throughout the network to drown out negative attention to Trump on Twitter Coinciding with the implementation of the strategy to mask anti-Trump comments on Twitter WikiLeaks began releasing Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta’s stolen emails 57 The emails themselves revealed nothing truly controversial but the narrative that the trending hashtag created was powerful First the issue of hacked emails developed into a narrative conflating Podesta’s emails to the issue of Clinton’s use of a private email server while she was secretary of state The Clinton server was likely never hacked but the problem of email loomed over her candidacy Secondly the Podesta email narrative took routine issues and made them seem scandalous The most common theme bring discredit to the mainstream media Podesta like any campaign manager in modern politics communicated with members of the press Emails communicating with reporters were distributed via trending tweets with links to fake news websites The fake news distorted the stolen emails into conspiracies of media “rigging” of the election to support Hillary Clinton The corruption narrative also plagued the Democratic National Committee DNC which experienced a hack earlier in the year by Russian sources and revealed by WikiLeaks 58 A month after the election a man drove from his home in North Carolina to Washington DC to uncover the truth behind another news story he read online He arrived at Comet Ping-Pong a pizza restaurant with an AR-15 prepared to free children from an underground child sex trafficking ring in the restaurant After searching the store he found no children The story was a hoax One of the emails stolen from John Podesta was an invitation to a party at the home of a friend that promised good pizza from Comet Ping Pong and a pool to entertain the kids Fake news sites reported the email as code for a pedophilic sex party it 72 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare was widely distributed via the trending #PodestaEmail hashtag and an associated new hashtag #PizzaGate The #PizzaGate hoax along with all of the other false and quasi-false narratives became common within right-wing media as another indication of the immorality of Clinton and her staff Often the mainstream media would latch onto a story with unsavory backgrounds and false pretenses thus giving more credibility to all of the fake news however the narrative from the #PizzaGate hoax followed the common propaganda narrative that the media was trying to cover up the truth and that the government failed to investigate the crimes Ultimately that is what drove the man to inquire into the fake news for himself 59 Finally the stolen emails went beyond sharing on social media The trend became so sensational that traditional media outlets chose to cover the Podesta email story which gave credibility to the fake news and the associated online conspiracy theories promulgated by the Deplorable Network The WikiLeaks release of the Podesta emails was the peak of Russian command of the trend during the 2016 election Nearly every day #PodestaEmail trended as a new batch of supposedly scandalous hacked emails made their way into the mainstream press By analyzing the followers of a suspected Russian troll a picture emerges regarding the structure of the network that was active during the 2016 election The core group in the Deplorable Network consisted of Russian trolls and popular American right-wing accounts like Jack Posobiec Mike Cernovich and InfoWars editor Paul Joseph Watson The Network also consisted of two bot accounts while the remaining nodes are individual accounts likely consisting of human-managed accounts In total the Deplorable Network was approximately 200 000 Twitter accounts consisting of Russian trolls true believers and bots Based on my analysis the bot network appeared to be between 16 000 and 34 000 accounts 60 The cohesiveness of the group indicates how a coordinated effort can create a trend in a way that a less cohesive network could not accomplish To conduct cyberattacks using social media as information warfare an organization must have a vast network of bot accounts to take command of the trend With unknown factors like the impact of fake news the true results of the Russian influence operation will likely never be known As Ellul said experiments undertaken to gauge the effectiveness of propaganda will never work because the tests “cannot reproduce the real propaganda situation ”61 The concept itself Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 73 Jarred Prier is marred by the fact that much of the social media support Trump received was through real American true believers tweeting However two numbers will stand out from the 2016 election 2 8 million and 80 000 Hillary Clinton won the popular vote by 2 8 million votes and Donald Trump won the electoral vote via a combination of just over 80 000 votes in three key states One could easily make the case—as many on the left have done—that Clinton lost because of the Russian influence 62 Conversely one could also argue she was destined to lose because of a botched campaign combined with a growing sense of disenchantment with the American political system However one cannot dispute the fact that Russia launched a massive cyberwarfare campaign to influence the 2016 presidential election 63 For the most part the Russian trolls became savvier with their techniques as they adapted to the influence operation in the United States However some users like FanFan were sloppy with their tradecraft and were obvious to anyone monitoring The trolls were occasionally sloppy with their IP address locations as well Following the first presidential debate the #TrumpWon hashtag quickly became the number one trend globally Using the TrendMap application one quickly noticed that the worldwide hashtag seemed to originate in Saint Petersburg Russia Russian trolls gave obvious support to Donald Trump and proved that using social media could create chaos on a massive scale discredit any politician and divide American society Adrian Chen the New York Times reporter who originally uncovered the troll network in Saint Petersburg in 2015 went back to Russia in the summer of 2016 Russian activists he interviewed claimed that the purpose of the trolls “was not to brainwash readers but to overwhelm social media with a flood of fake content seeding doubt and paranoia and destroying the possibility of using the Internet as a democratic space ”64 The troll farm used similar techniques to drown out anti-Putin trends on Russian social media in addition to pumping out disinformation to the United States A Congressional Research Service Study summarized the Russian troll operation succinctly in a January 2017 report “Cyber tools were also used by Russia to create psychological effects in the American population The likely collateral effects of these activities include compromising the fidelity of information sowing discord and doubt in the 74 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare American public about the validity of intelligence community reports and prompting questions about the democratic process itself ”65 For Russia information warfare is a specialized type of war and modern tools make social media the weapon According to a former Obama administration senior official Russians regard the information sphere as a domain of warfare on a sliding scale of conflict that always exists between the US and Russia 66 This perspective was on display during a Russian national security conference “Infoforum 2016 ” Andrey Krutskih a senior Kremlin advisor compared Russia’s information warfare to a nuclear bomb which would “allow Russia to talk to Americans as equals ” in the same way that Soviet testing of the atomic bomb did in 1949 67 Table 3 Russia case study analysis in 2016 election Types Examples Propaganda narratives •  Anything discrediting to Hillary Clinton •  News media hides information •  Politicians are rigging the system •  Global elite trying to destroy the world •  Globalism is taking jobs and destroying cultures •  Refugees are terrorists •  Russian foreign policy is strong on antiterrorism •  Democrats and some Republicans want WWIII with Russia True believers Alt-right some Bernie Sanders supporters followers of InfoWars and Breitbart 4Chan and pol users Cyber warriors Hackers and professional trolls Bot network Large sophisticated network that leveraged cyber warriors and true believer accounts to create the “Deplorable Network ” From 2015 to 2016 Russian trolling modus operandi took a logical path from small stories designed to create panic and sow seeds of doubt to a social media machine that IS could only imagine In warfare strategy narrative manipulation through social media cyber operations is the current embodiment of taking the fight directly to the people The 2016 election proved that using social media to influence political outcomes as opposed to violence or Cold War–like posturing is a highly effective strategy in modern information warfare—a strategy that will likely continue as technology continues to develop and adapt to the evergrowing social media landscape as more actors gain the ability to take command of the trend Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 75 Jarred Prier The Future of Weaponized Social Media Smear campaigns have been around since the beginning of politics but this article illustrated novel techniques recently employed by a terrorist group and foreign state actor with each attack gaining popularity and credibility after trending on Twitter The attacks often under the guise of a “whistleblower” campaign make routine political actions seem scandalous Additionally WikiLeaks advertises that it has never published anything requiring retraction because everything it posts is supposedly authentic stolen material Just like the Podesta email releases several politicians and business leaders around the world have fallen victim to this type of attack Recall the 2015 North Korean hacking of Sony Studios Lost in the explosive nature of the hacking story is that the fallout at the company was not because of the hacking itself but from the release of embarrassing emails from Sony senior management as well as the salaries of every employee at Sony The uproar over the content of the emails dominated social media often fed by salacious stories like the RT headline “Leaked Sony emails exhibit wealthy elite’s maneuvering to get child into Ivy League school ” Ultimately Sony fired a senior executive because of the content of her emails 68 In another example from May 2017 nine gigabytes of email stolen from French presidential candidate Emmanuel Macron’s campaign were released online and verified by WikiLeaks Subsequently the hashtag #MacronLeaks trended to number one worldwide It was an influence operation resembling the #PodestaEmail campaign with a supporting cast of some of the same actors During the weeks preceding the French election many accounts within the Deplorable Network changed their names to support Macron’s opponent Marine LePen These accounts mostly tweet in English and still engage in American political topics as well as French issues 69 Some of the accounts also tweet in French and a new network of French-tweeting bot accounts uses the same methods as the Deplorable Network to take command of the trend In his book Out of the Mountains David Kilcullen describes a future comprising large coastal urban areas filled with potential threats all connected 70 The implications of his prediction are twofold First networks of malicious nonstate actors can band together to hijack social media using a template similar to IS Although these groups may not have the power to create global trends they can certainly create chaos 76 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare with smaller numbers by hijacking trends and creating local trends With minimal resources a small group can create a bot network to amplify its message Second scores of people with exposure to social media are vulnerable to online propaganda efforts In this regard state actors can use the Russian playbook Russia will likely continue to dominate this new battlespace It has intelligence assets hackers cyber warrior trolls massive bot networks state-owned news networks with global reach and established networks within the countries Russia seeks to attack via social media Most importantly the Russians have a history of spreading propaganda After the 2016 elections in the United States Russian trolls again worked toward influencing European elections Currently Russian trolls are active in France the Balkans and the Czech Republic using active measures and coercive social media messages 71 It is clear that other countries are attempting to build capabilities to match the Russian cyber troll influence Already Turkey Iran and Venezuela are noted as having bot networks and cyber warriors similar to Russian trolls 72 With these other states a popular use for the trolls in the social media battlespace is to stoke nationalism and control the narrative within their own borders For example the fake Twitter followers of Venezuelan president Nicolás Maduro number so many that he is now the “third-most-retweeted public figure in the world behind only the king of Saudi Arabia and the pope ”73 With a large enough bot network states can also control messages outside of social media using similar techniques Manipulating search engines is called “search engine optimization ” which uses bot accounts to increase the number of clicks to a particular web page after performing a search The search engine algorithm then prioritizes that page in response to subsequent searches using the same keyword A Google search for “ODNI Report” is illustrative in March 2017 the top Google results were RT articles lambasting the intelligence assessment that named the Russian government as the perpetrators behind the 2016 election interference Techniques like search engine optimization and command of the trend will become common in future wars to sow discord and spread false information with the aim of causing the other side to change its course of action These online weapons should frighten every leader in a democracy Perhaps most frightening is the Oxford Internet Institute Unit for Propaganda discovery that “hundreds of thousands of ‘sleeper bots’ exist Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 77 Jarred Prier on Twitter ”74 These bots are accounts that are active but have not yet started tweeting Researchers do not know who owns the accounts or what will trigger them The ease of use and large numbers of active bots and sleeper bots indicate a high likelihood of social media continuing to be used for propaganda especially as more and more state and nonstate organizations realize the impact they can make on an adversary Thus far the United States response has been relatively weak For one the US government does not prioritize information operations the way it once did during the Cold War When President Eisenhower started the United States Information Agency USIA the objective was to compete with Soviet propaganda around the world The mission statement of USIA clarified its role “The purpose of the United States Information Agency shall be to submit evidence to peoples of other nations by means of communication techniques that the objectives and policies of the United States are in harmony with and will advance their legitimate aspirations for freedom progress and peace ”75 Knowing what we know now about Russian disinformation active measures USIA was never truly equipped to fight an information war The agency became a public diplomacy platform with a positive message rather than a Soviet-style campaign of negative smear tactics Accordingly several questions arose should USIA spread propaganda Should it seek out and attempt to remove negative publicity about the US Should it slander opponents Most importantly should it do any or all of these things when the American public could be influenced by a message intended for an international audience 76 Those problems persist today because the government lacks a centralized information authority since the mission of USIA was relegated to the Department of State Several failed attempts to counter IS on Twitter show the US government’s weakness when trying to use social media as a weapon One example is the Center for Strategic Counterterrorism Communications created in 2010 which started the program “Think Again Turn Away ” The State department awarded a $575 046 contract to a Virginia-based consulting firm to manage the project 77 The intent was to curb the appeal of IS by creating a counternarrative to the IS message on social media Unfortunately the Twitter campaign had undesirable consequences after the account sent tweets arguing the finer points of the Islamic faith with IS sympathizers Rita Katz best summarized the failure “In order to counter a problem one must first study it 78 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare before adopting a solution Had the people behind ‘Think Again Turn Away’ understood jihadists’ mindsets and reasons for their behavior they would have known that their project of counter-messaging would not only be a waste of taxpayer money but ultimately be counterproductive ”78 In the end the “Think Again Turn Away” campaign was almost comical as it could not communicate effectively with any audience and severely discounted the importance of its message Jacques Ellul noted that democracies were prone to having problems with outward communication through propaganda Because democracies rely on presenting an image of fairness and truth “propaganda made by democracies is ineffective paralyzed mediocre ”79 The United States was ill equipped to combat Soviet active measures during the Cold War and it remains unable to compete using social media as an influence operation Unfortunately countering Russian influence operations has taken a partisan slant within the United States Many downplay the Russian role in the 2016 election while others appear to be so blinded by the Russian operation that they cannot see the underlying conditions that allowed for the spread of that narrative in the first place 80 With the two parties unable to reach a consensus on what happened or the impact of the operation they fail to realize that as technology improves and proliferates around the world disinformation campaigns and influence operations will become the norm The attack in a future information war could be toward either political party and come from any of the several countries attempting to build an online army in the mold of Russia’s trolls and bot network Conclusion In the 1987 book Truth Twisters Richard Deacon laments the future of independent thinking as computers “could become the most dangerous hypnotic influence in the future T he effect of a reliance on computerology of allowing oneself to be manipulated and controlled by it is certainly hypnotic in that the mind allows itself to accept whatever the computer tells it ”81 He believed that such technology could lead one to commit treason without realizing any manipulation Propaganda is a powerful tool and used effectively it has been proven to manipulate populations on a massive scale Using social media to take command of the trend makes the spread of propaganda easier than ever before for both state and nonstate actors Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 79 Jarred Prier Fortunately social media companies are taking steps to combat malicious use Facebook has been at the forefront of tech companies taking action to increase awareness of fake news and provide a process for removing the links from the website 82 Also although Facebook trends are less important to information warfare than Twitter trends the website has taken measures to ensure that humans are involved in making the trends list Furthermore Twitter has started discreetly removing unsavory trends within minutes of their rise in popularity However adversaries adapt and Twitter trolls have attempted to regain command of the trend by misspelling a previous trend once it is taken out of circulation Still even if the misspelled word regains a spot on the trend list the message is diminished The measures enacted by Facebook and Twitter are important for preventing future wars in the information domain However Twitter will also continue to have problems with trend hijacking and bot networks As demonstrated by #PrayforMizzou and #WorldCup2014 real events happening around the world will maintain popularity as well-intending users want to talk about the issues In reality removing the trends function could end the use of social media as a weapon but doing so could also devalue the usability of Twitter Rooting out bot accounts would have an equal effect since that would nearly eliminate the possibility of trend creation Unfortunately that would have an adverse impact on advertising firms that rely on Twitter to generate revenue for their products With social media companies balancing the interests of their businesses and the betterment of society other institutions must respond to the malicious use of social media In particular the credibility of our press has been put into question by social media influence campaigns— those groups should respond accordingly For instance news outlets should adopt social media policies for their employees that encourage the use of social media but discourage them from relying on Twitter as a source This will require a culture shift within the press and fortunately has gathered significant attention at universities researching the media’s role in the influence operation It is worth noting that the French press did not cover the content of the Macron leaks instead the journalists covered the hacking and influence operation without giving any credibility to the leaked information 80 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare Finally our elected officials must move past the partisan divide of Russian influence in the 2016 election This involves two things first both parties must recognize what happened—neither minimizing nor overplaying Russian active measures Second and most importantly politicians must commit to not using active measures to their benefit Certainly the appeal of free negative advertising will make any politician think twice about using disinformation but the reality of a foreign influence operation damages more than just the other party it damages our democratic ideals Senator John McCain summarized this sentiment well at a CNN Town Hall “Have no doubt what the Russians tried to do to our election could have destroyed democracy That’s why we’ve got to pay a lot more attention to the Russians ”83 This was not the cyber war we were promised Predictions of a catastrophic cyberattack dominated policy discussion but few realized that social media could be used as a weapon against the minds of the population IS and Russia are models for this future war that uses social media to directly influence people As technology improves techniques are refined and internet connectivity continues to proliferate around the world this saying will ring true He who controls the trend will control the narrative— and ultimately the narrative controls the will of the people Notes 1   Elisabeth Bumiller and Thom Shanker “Panetta Warns of Dire Threat of Cyberattack on U S ” New York Times 11 October 2012 http www nytimes com 2012 10 12 world panetta-warns-of-dire-threat-of-cyberattack html mcubz 0 2   Jeremy Scott-Joynt “What Myspace Means to Murdoch ” BBC News Analysis 19 July 2005 http news bbc co uk 2 hi business 4697671 stm 3   Sitaram Asur Bernardo A Huberman Gabor Szabo and Chunyan Wang “Trends in Social Media Persistence and Decay” unpublished manuscript submitted to Cornell University Library arXiv 7 February 2011 1 https arxiv org abs 1102 1402 context physics 4   “Blog” is short for “web log ” A blog is a way to share your thoughts via the internet A microblog is a blog with a character limit to the text 5   Rani Molla “Social Studies Twitter vs Facebook ” Bloomberg Gadfly 12 February 2016 https www bloomberg com gadfly articles 2016-02-12 social-studies-comparing-twitter-with -facebook-in-charts 6   Carole Cadwalladr “Robert Mercer The Big Data Billionaire Waging War on the Mainstream Media ” Guardian 26 February 2017 https www theguardian com politics 2017 feb 26 robert-mercer-breitbart-war-on-media-steve-bannon-donald-trump-nigel-farage 7   Gabriel Weimann Terrorism in Cyberspace The Next Generation Washington DC Woodrow Wilson Center Press 2015 138 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 81 Jarred Prier 8   Alex Lubben “Twitter’s Users Are 15 Percent Robot but That’s Not Necessarily a Bad Thing ” VICE News 12 March 2017 https news vice com story twitters-users-are-15-percent -robot-but-thats-not-necessarily-a-bad-thing 9   Jacques Ellul Propaganda The Formation of Men’s Attitudes New York Knopf 1965 6 10   Eric Hoffer The True Believer Thoughts on the Nature of Mass Movements New York Harper and Row 1951 105 11   Thomas Rid Cyber War Will Not Take Place New York Oxford University Press 2013 132 12   Ellul 85 13   Daniel Kahneman Thinking Fast and Slow New York Farrar Straus and Giroux 2011 87 14   Christopher Paul and Miriam Matthews The Russian “Firehose of Falsehood” Propaganda Model RAND Report PE-198-OSD Santa Monica CA RAND 2016 4 https www rand org pubs perspectives PE198 html 15   Garth Jowett and Victoria O’Donnell Propaganda Persuasion 5th ed Thousand Oaks CA SAGE 2012 159 16  Katerina Eva Matsa and Kristine Lu “10 Facts about the Changing Digital News Landscape ” Pew Research Center 14 September 2016 http www pewresearch org fact -tank 2016 09 14 facts-about-the-changing-digital-news-landscape 17   Jowett and O’Donnell Propaganda Persuasion 300 18  Tom Hashemi “The Business of Ideas Is in Trouble Re-injecting Facts into a Posttruth World ” War on the Rocks 9 December 2016 https warontherocks com 2016 12 the -business-of-ideas-is-in-trouble-re-injecting-facts-into-a-post-truth-world 19   Asur Huberman Szabo and Wang “Trends in Social Media ” 1 20   Merriam-Webster Dictionary Online s v “lede ” accessed 10 October 2017 https www merriam-webster com dictionary lede “The introductory section of a news story that is intended to entice the reader to read the full story ” 21   Tess Townsend “The Bizarre Truth behind the Biggest Pro-Trump Facebook Hoaxes ” Inc com 21 November 2016 https www inc com tess-townsend ending-fed-trump-facebook html 22   Craig Silverman “This Analysis Shows How Viral Fake Election News Stories Outperformed Real News on Facebook ” BuzzFeed News 16 November 2016 https www buzzfeed com craigsilverman viral-fake-election-news-outperformed-real-news-on-facebook utm _term qwWdA0G8G# fcEv1Qono 23   Art Swift “Americans’ Trust in Mass Media Sinks to New Low ” Gallup 14 September 2016 http news gallup com poll 195542 americans-trust-mass-media-sinks-new-low aspx 24   Andrea Peterson “Three Charts that Explain how U S Journalists Use Social Media ” Washington Post 6 May 2014 https www washingtonpost com news the-switch wp 2014 05 06 three-charts-that-explain-how-u-s-journalists-use-social-media utm_term 9cdd82cb8fa7 25  Weimann Terrorism in Cyberspace 138 26   Audrey Kurth Cronin “ISIS Is Not a Terrorist Group ” Foreign Policy March April 2015 https www foreignaffairs com articles middle-east isis-not-terrorist-group 27   Stephen M Walt “ISIS as Revolutionary State ” Foreign Policy November December 2015 42 https www belfercenter org publication isis-revolutionary-state 28   Caliphate is defined as “a form of Islamic government led by a—a person considered a political and religious successor to the Islamic prophet Muhammad and a leader of the entire Muslim community Source Wadad Kadi and Aram A Shahin “Caliph caliphate ” in The Princeton Encyclopedia of Islamic Political Thought ed Gerhard Bowering Patricia Crone Wadad Kadi Devin J Stewart Muhammad Qasim Zaman and Mahan Mirza Princeton NJ Princeton University Press 2013 81–86 http www jstor org stable j ctt1r2g6m 8 29   Graeme Wood “What ISIS Really Wants ” Atlantic March 2015 3 https www theatlantic com magazine archive 2015 03 what-isis-really-wants 384980 82 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare 30   Dabiq is also the name of the ISIS magazine which is available electronically and spread via social media 31   Walt “ISIS as Revolutionary State ” 43 32   J M Berger “How ISIS Games Twitter ” Atlantic 16 June 2014 https www theatlantic com international archive 2014 06 isis-iraq-twitter-social-media-strategy 372856 33  Ibid 34   “Terrorist Use of Social Media Policy and Legal Challenges ” roundtable forum Washington DC Council on Foreign Relations 14 October 2015 35   Berger “How ISIS Games Twitter ” 36   Carleton English “Twitter Continues to Wage its Own War against ISIS ” New York Post 21 March 2017 http nypost com 2017 03 21 twitter-continues-to-wage-its-own-war-against-isis 37   United States Department of State report Soviet Influence Activities A Report on Active Measures and Propaganda 1986–87 Washington DC Bureau of Public Affairs 1987 viii 38   Natasha Bertrand “It Looks Like Russia Hired Internet Trolls to Pose as Pro-Trump Americans ” Business Insider 27 July 2016 http www businessinsider com russia-internet-trolls-and -donald-trump-2016-7 39   Vladimir Isachenkov “Russia Military Acknowledges New Branch Info Warfare Troops ” AP News 22 February 2017 https www apnews com 8b7532462dd0495d9f756c9ae7d2ff3c 40   Richard Gonzalez “CIA Director Pompeo Denounces WikiLeaks as ‘Hostile Intelligence Service ’ ” NPR 23 April 2017 http www npr org sections thetwo-way 2017 04 13 523849965 cia-director-pompeo-denounces-wikileaks-as-hostile-intelligence-service 41   Malcolm Nance The Plot to Hack America How Putin’s Cyberspies and WikiLeaks Tried to Steal the 2016 Election New York Skyhorse Publishing 2016 Kindle edition 1 839 42   Adrian Chen “The Agency ” New York Times Magazine 2 June 2015 https www nytimes com 2015 06 07 magazine the-agency html On 11 September 2014 the small town of St Mary Parish Louisiana was thrown briefly into a panic when residents began hearing reports through text social media and on local television stations that a nearby chemical plant fire was spreading toxic fumes that would soon endanger the whole town The entire narrative was based on falsified—but very real looking—online news stories hashtag manipulation and mass texts SMS to various numbers with the local area code and dialing prefix The actual source for the news was not the chemical factory it was a nondescript building in St Petersburg Russia where an army of online cyber-warrior trolls seeks to distribute false information 43   Statement of Clint Watts Foreign Policy Research Institute fellow in “Disinformation A Primer in Russian Active Measures and Influence Campaigns ” testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee 115th Cong 1st sess 30 March 2017 https www intelligence senate gov sites default files documents os-cwatts-033017 pdf 44   Chen “The Agency ” 45   Because of the Adrian Chen article I observed particular tweeting patterns of certain individuals involved in a hoax on the campus of the University of Missouri that seemed to match the methods of the Russian trolls interviewed by Chen I mention only one particular user in this article but I also monitored a dozen or so accounts that contributed to that hoax Each account followed a pattern that also happened to align with noted Russian influence operations in Europe and eventually in the US presidential election I describe that transition in the article From those accounts I built a database of suspected Russian bot accounts to build a network map The Mizzou hoax was a trend hijacking effort launched by actors who later proved to match the Russian modus operandi of using cyber trolls originally observed by Adrian Chen and confirmed by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence ODNI report and Foreign Policy Research Institute fellow Clint Watts in his testimony before the Senate Intelligence Committee note 43 46   Nadine Schmidt and Tim Hume “Berlin Teen Admits Fabricating Migrant Gang-Rape Story Official Says ” CNN 1 February 2016 http www cnn com 2016 02 01 europe germany -teen-migrant-rape-false index html Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 83 Jarred Prier 47   Judy Dempsey “Russia’s Manipulation of Germany’s Refugee Problems ” Carnegie Europe 28 January 2016 http carnegieeurope eu strategiceurope fa 62611 48   Schmidt and Hume “Berlin Teen Admits Fabricating Migrant Gang-Rape Story ” 49   Barbara Tasch “ ‘The Aim Is to Weaken the West’ The Inside Story of How Russian Propagandists Are Waging War on Europe ” Business Insider 2 February 2017 http www businessinsider com russia-propaganda-campaign-weakening-europe-2017-1 r UK IR T 50  Harriet Sherwood “Polish Magazine’s ‘Islamic Rape of Europe’ Cover Sparks Outrage ” 18 February 2016 https www theguardian com world 2016 feb 18 polish-magazinesislamic-of-europe-cover-sparks-outrage 51   Chen “The Agency ” 52   Robinson Meyer “War Goes Viral How Social Media Is Being Weaponized across the World ” Atlantic 18 October 2016 https www theatlantic com magazine archive 2016 11 war-goes-viral 501125 53   Office of the Director of National Intelligence ODNI Intelligence Community Assessment Report Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections 6 January 2017 ii https www dni gov files documents ICA_2017_01 pdf 54   Hanna Rosin “Among the Hillary Haters ” Atlantic 1 March 2015 63 https www theatlantic com magazine archive 2015 03 among-the-hillary-haters 384976 55   K Thor Jensen “Inside Donald Trump’s Twitter-Bot Fan Club ” New York Magazine 15 June 2016 http nymag com selectall 2016 06 inside-donald-trumps-twitter-bot-fan -club html 56  David A Farenthold “Trump Recorded Having Extremely Lewd Conversation about Women in 2005 ” Washington Post 8 October 2016 https www washingtonpost com politics trump-recorded-having-extremely-lewd-conversation-about-women-in -2005 2016 10 07 3b9ce776-8cb4-11e6-bf8a-3d26847eeed4_story html 57   “The Podesta Emails ” Politico LiveBlog accessed 6 December 2016 http www politico com live-blog-updates 2016 10 john-podesta-hillary-clinton-emails-wikileaks-000011 58   ODNI Report 2 59   Faiz Siddiqui and Susan Svrluga “N C Man Told Police He Went to D C Pizzeria with Gun to Investigate Conspiracy Theory ” Washington Post 5 December 2017 https www washingtonpost com news local wp 2016 12 04 d-c-police-respond-to-report-of-a -man-with-a-gun-at-comet-ping-pong-restaurant utm_term c33057f66007 60   This count is based on analysis of the followers of followers of suspected troll accounts and bots The study was conducted 15 March 2016 The number of accounts appears to have reduced dramatically since May following the French election implying that Twitter suspended some of the accounts Unfortunately software limitations prevent this analysis from being more accurate Additionally it is nearly impossible to derive the exact number of Russian accounts from that network using my available resources 61  Ellul Propaganda 6 62   Many on the left have mischaracterized the attack as “Russian hacking of the election ” which has in turn conflated the issue of the John Podesta email theft with a hacking of the actual election systems To be clear there is no evidence of any sort of hack on any ballotcounting systems only evidence outlined in this paper of two hacks Democratic National Committee and Podesta combined with an influence information operation 63   ODNI Report 1 64   Adrian Chen “The Real Paranoia-Inducing Purpose of Russian Hacks ” New Yorker 27 July 2016 https www newyorker com news news-desk the-real-paranoia-inducing-purpose -of-russian-hacks 65   Catherine Theohary and Cory Welt “Russia and the U S Presidential Election ” CRS Report no IN10635 Washington DC Congressional Research Service 2017 84 Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 Commanding the Trend Social Media as Information Warfare 66   David Ignatius “Russia’s Radical New Strategy for Information Warfare ” Washington Post 18 January 2017 https www washingtonpost com blogs post-partisan wp 2017 01 18 russias-radical-new-strategy-for-information-warfare utm_term da53e31d7aaa 67  Ibid 68  “Ex-Sony Chief Amy Pascal Acknowledges She Was Fired ” NBCNews com 12 February 2015 https www nbcnews com storyline sony-hack ex-sony-chief-amy-pascal -acknowledges-she-was-fired-n305281 69   The political left in the United States seems to have a large group of bot accounts forming around the “Resist” movement It is unclear whether those accounts are foreign cyber warriors or bots but external actors can certainly feed off the underlying narratives and tap into existing networks of true believers 70   David Kilcullen Out of the Mountains The Coming Age of the Urban Guerrilla New York Oxford University Press 2013 231 71   Anthony Faiola “As Cold War Turns to Information War a New Fake News Police Combats Disinformation ” Washington Post 22 January 2017 https www washingtonpost com world europe as-cold-war-turns-to-information-war-a-new-fake-news-police 2017 01 18 9bf49ff6-d80e-11e6-a0e6-d502d6751bc8_story html utm_term 7c99cc2fadd5 72   Meyer “War Goes Viral ” 73  Ibid 74   Cadwalladr “Robert Mercer The Big Data ” 1 8 75   Malcolm Mitchell Propaganda Polls and Public Opinion Are the People Manipulated Englewood Cliffs NJ Prentice-Hall 1977 12 76   Ibid 13 77   Rebecca Carroll “The State Department Is Fighting with ISIL on Twitter ” Defense One 25 June 2014 http www defenseone com technology 2014 06 state-department-fighting -isil-twitter 87286 78   Rita Katz “The State Department’s Twitter War with ISIS Is Embarrassing ” Time 16 September 2014 http time com 3387065 isis-twitter-war-state-department 79  Ellul Propaganda 241 80   Adrian Chen “The Propaganda about Russian Propaganda ” New Yorker 1 December 2016 https www newyorker com news news-desk the-propaganda-about-russian-propaganda 81   Richard Deacon The Truth Twisters London Macdonald 1987 95 82   Michelle Castillo “Facebook Found Fake Accounts Leaking Stolen Info to Sway Presidential Election ” CNBC com 27 April 2017 https www cnbc com 2017 04 27 facebookfound-efforts-to-sway-presidential-election-elect-trump html 83   Eric Bradner “At CNN Town Hall McCain and Graham Give Their View of Trump’s Presidency so Far ” CNN 2 March 2017 http www cnn com 2017 03 01 politics john-mccain-lindsey-graham-town-hall index html Disclaimer The views and opinions expressed or implied in SSQ are those of the authors and are not officially sanctioned by any agency or department of the US government We encourage you to send comments to strategicstudiesquarterly@us af mil Strategic Studies Quarterly  ♦  Winter 2017 85