posted in Technology
Drone strikes didn’t take out a Russian bot farm, but we were primed to believe it
www.motherjones.com/politics/2026/10/ukraine-drone-strike-yandex-russian-bot-farm-right-wing-maga-afd-reform-uk-conspiracy-theory-viral-rumor/Replying to @purrtastic@lemmy.nz
The second problem, however, was that the ultra-specific claims about less activity in certain areas—MAGA, pro-Kremlin bot accounts, and AfD—had absolutely no basis in fact.
“We see no “dramatic drop” in traffic of Kremlin-aligned human trolls-for-hire targeting Russian domestic users (which we have been tracking for years),” wrote Antibot4Navalny, a group of anonymous researchers who track and respond to Russian disinformation.
Emphasis added.
“The party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.” — George Orwell.
Replying to @db2@lemmy.world
Can you please provide evidence that shows that AfD engagement and traffic was not out of the ordinary during the start of the blackout? I am not saying that this was or wasn’t the case but I haven’t seen any evidence yet either way. So which evidence am I supposed to reject for the party?
Replying to @Jiral@lemmy.world
Were you not on any of the platforms they target? Youtube alone became drastically less problematic in content and comments. That’s the evidence they want you to deny, it happened and it was really obviously different.
Replying to @db2@lemmy.world
My Youtube is heavily sanitised and I avoid the horrendous search function. It barely finds what you are looking for anyway and is full of minimal effort slop and propaganda. If the latter decreased I could not say. I am not a masochist.
Replying to @Jiral@lemmy.world
Mine is as well, but that’s never stopped youtube from trying to push far right/manosphere/conspiracy theory garbage at me I then have to block and remove from my history. Until the Russian data centers got blown up when it stopped like someone turned off a faucet.