You won't be able to find news of China's protests if you look at the country's larger cities on social media. Analysts have noticed a surge in bot peddling porn and gambling around these queries just as demonstrations flared in Beijing and other cities over the past three days in response to China's "zero- COVID" policies. Local activists who use a virtual private network to avoid the Chinese government's censorship of domestic social networks are making it harder to track the rallies. The communications team has been dissolved and no official comment has been made. The Washington Post reported that an employee of the company told a researcher that they are working to resolve the problem. It was easier to find information about the protests by Sunday. According to a former staffer, government-linked accounts have previously been used to attack individual accounts or small groups. Thread: Search for Beijing/Shanghai/other cities in Chinese on Twitter and you'll mostly see ads for escorts/porn/gambling, drowning out legitimate search results. Data analysis in this thread suggests that there has been a *significant* uptick in these spam tweets. pic.twitter.com/Ao46g2ILzf
In the wake of the apartment fire, the protests grew. Critics said the Chinese government's strict COVID-19 lock down measures contributed to deaths. Concerns about inadequate COVID safety measures were among the issues that led to protests. The street action is rare in its intensity, with some protesters calling for the resignation of the president and other members of the Communist Party. If those demands are not met, they could lead to prison time.
Musk's job cuts may have made things worse. The core moderation group was the only one left after the elimination of the anti-propaganda team. China's attempts to undermine Hong Kong protests took days to be curbed by the social networking site. It's not known how much support the anti-misinformation unit will get.
Musk's stance on bots is challenged. The social network was accused of hiding the true number of fake accounts. If Twitter isn't as well-equipped to deal with the threat, fake users may be more of a problem.
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