4. U.S. Operations through Twitter
A number of IRA employees assigned to the Translator Department served as Twitter specialists. Harm to Ongoing Matter
The IRA Twitter operations involved two strategies. First, IRA specialists operated certain Twitter accounts to create individual U.S. personas, Harm of Ongoing Matter 64 Separately, the IRA operated a network of automated Twitter accounts
(commonly referred to as a bot network) that enabled the IRA to amplify existing content
on Twitter.
a. Individualized Accounts
Harm to Ongoing Matter
Footnote 61
See Facebook ID 1479936895656747 (United Muslims of America);
Facebook ID
l 157233400960126 (Don't Shoot);
Facebook ID 1601685693432389 Bein Patriotic;
Facebook ID
757183957716200 Secured Borders).
Harm to Ongoing Matter
Footnote 62 Social Media Influence in the 2016 US Election, Hearing Before the Senate Select Committee
on Intelligence, 115th Cong. 13 (11/1/ 17) (testimony of Colin Stretch, General Counsel of Facebook).
NOVEMBER 1, 2017
Facebook, Google, and Twitter Executives on Russia Election Interference (click here)
The Senate Intelligence Committee held a hearing on Russia and social media influence in the 2016 election. Officials from Facebook, Twitter and Google testified about what their companies were doing to protect users after the 2016 election from misleading and malicious content. They shared what they have learned about the number of Russian-based fake accounts and the impact and reach of posts from those accounts on other users. Senators admonished the witnesses and their companies for not doing enough to understand the scope of the problem and said they needed to do more to prevent the dissemination of malicious content on their platforms.
Footnote 63 Harm to Ongoing Matter
Footnote 64 Harm to Ongoing Matter
Footnote 65 Harm to Ongoing Matter
The IRA operated individualized Twitter accounts similar to the operation of its Facebook
accounts, by continuously posting original content to the accounts while also communicating with
U.S. Twitter users directly (through public tweeting or Twitter's private messaging).
The IRA used many of these accounts to attempt to influence U.S. audiences on the
election. Individualized accounts used to influence the U.S. presidential election included
@TEN_ GOP ( described above);
@jenn _ abrams ( claiming to be a Virginian Trump supporter with
70,000 followers);
@Pamela_Moore13 (claiming to be a Texan Trump supporter with 70,000
followers); and
@America:__Ist_ (an anti-immigration persona with 24,000 followers).
67
In May
2016, the IRA created the Twitter account @march_for_trump, which promoted IRA-organized
rallies in support of the Trump Campaign (described below).
68
Using these accounts and others, the IRA provoked reactions from users and the media. Multiple
IRA-posted tweets gained popularity.70 U.S. media outlets also quoted tweets from IRA-controlled
accounts and attributed them to the reactions of real U.S. persons.71 Similarly, numerous high profile U.S. persons, including former Ambassador Michael McFaul (click here),
72 Roger Stone (click here),73 SeanHannity (click here),74 and Michael Flynn Jr. (click here),75 retweetcd or responded to tweets posted to these IRA controlled accounts. Multiple individuals affiliated with the Trump Campaign also promoted IRA
tweets (discussed below).
Footnote 66 Harm to Ongoing Matter
Footnote 67 Other individualized accounts included @MissouriNewsUS (an account with 3,800 followers
that posted pro-Sanders and anti-Clinton material).
68 See @march_for_trump, 5/30/16 Tweet (first post from account).
69 Harm to Ongoing Matter
70 For example, one IRA account tweeted, "To those people, who hate the Confederate flag. Did
you know that the flag and the war wasn't about slavery, it was all about money." The tweet received over
40,000 responses. @Jenn_Abrams 4/24/17 (2:37 p.m.) Tweet.
71 Josephine Lukito & Chris Wells, Most Major Outlets Have Used Russian Tweets as Sources f Sor
Partisan Opinion:Study, Columbia Journalism Review (Mar. 8, 2018) (click here) ; see also Twitter Steps Up to Explain
#NewYorkValues to Ted Cruz, Washington Post (Jan. 15, 2016) (citing IRA tweet) (click here) ; People Are Slamming
the CIA/or Claiming Russia Tried to Help Donald Trump, U.S. News & World Report (Dec. 12, 2016) (click here for Guardian report.) (click here for an article on the proof)
b. IRA Botnet Activities
A bot is an autonomous program on a network (especially the Internet) that can interact with computer systems or users, especially one designed to respond or behave like a player in an adventure game.
A botnet is a number of Internet-connected devices, (click here) each of which is running one or more bots. Botnetscan be used to perform distributed denial-of-service attack (DDoS attack), steal data, send spam, and allows the attacker to access the device and its connection.
Harm to Ongoing Matter
In January 2018, Twitter publicly identified 3,814 Twitter accounts associated with the
IRA.79 According to Twitter, in the ten weeks before the 2016 U.S. presidential election, these
accounts posted approximately 175,993 tweets, "approximately 8.4% of which were election- ·related."80 Twitter also announced that it had notified approximately 1.4 million people who
Twitter believed may have been in contact with an IRA-controlled account. 81
72 @Mcfaul 4/30/16 Tweet (responding to tweet by @Jenn_Abrams).
73 @RogerJStoneJr 5/30/16 Tweet (retweeting @Pamela_Moorel3); @RogerJStoneJr 4/26/16
Tweet (same).
74 @seanhannity 6/21/17 Tweet (retweeting @Pamela_ Moore 13).
75 @mflynnJR 6/22/17 Tweet ("RT@Jenn_Abrams: This is what happens when you add the voice
over of an old documentary about mental illness onto video of SJWs ... ").
'
76 A botnet refers to a network of private computers or accounts controlled as a group to send
specific automated messages. On the Twitter network, botnets can be used to promote and republish
("retweet") specific tweets or hashtags in order for them to gain larger audiences.
77 Harm to Ongoing Matter
78 Harm to Ongoing Matter
79 Eli Rosenberg, Twitter to Tell 677,000 Users they Were Had by the Russians. Some Signs Showthe Problem Continues, Washington Post (Jan. 19, 2019).
Continued in next entry
