Global Security and Intelligence Studies Volume 5, Number 1, Spring / Summer 2020 | Page 59

Discovering Influence Operations on Twitch.tv: A Preliminary Coding Framework
military, economic, and other capabilities
in peacetime, crisis, conflict, and
post-conflict to foster attitudes, behaviors,
or decisions by foreign target audiences
that further [a country’s] interests
and objectives” (RAND 2009, xii). The
advent of the internet magnified the
ability and reach of individuals and organizations
to coordinate IFOs. Given
its low cost and high effectiveness, Internet-based
IFOs have become a permanent
addition to the peacetime and
wartime toolkits of state and non-state
actors (Collins 2018; FireEye Intelligence
2018; Insikt Group 2019; RAND
2016; Stanford Internet Observatory
2019; Twitter 2019; Zakrzewski 2019).
The introduction of bots— automated
computer programs that execute
preprogrammed instructions—makes
IFO distribution even easier. These bots
mimic human users and can interact
with other users and computer systems,
rapidly creating trends and disseminating
messages (Prier 2017). As evidenced
by the US 2016 election, bots can have
far-reaching impacts on public opinion
(Howard et al. 2018).
The combination of increased
at-home use of the internet, the introduction
of social media as a social
connector and news aggregator, bot
development, and increased interest in
the effectiveness of IFOs by state and
non-state actors has caused the exponential
growth of disinformation and
IFOs (Sander, 2019). In early 2006, approximately
53 percent of adults used
the internet at home, and 10% used social
media (NTIA 2018; Pew Research
Center 2019); these numbers grew to 72
percent and 69 percent, respectively, by
early 2018 (NTIA 2018; Pew Research
Center 2019)—increasing internet a-
vailability has increased target audience
volume.
Foreign powers are conducting
IFOs on platforms used by younger
people, such as Reddit and Instagram
(Reddit 2019; Roose 2018). Among
these platforms, Twitch.tv has risen in
popularity. Twitch is an extremely popular
streaming service, second only to
Netflix and ranked the 30th most popular
site in the world by Alexa’s web rating
(Iqbal 2019). Streamers on Twitch
provide a live video feed that is viewed
by users. It currently hosts 2.2 million
daily broadcasters and 15 million daily
users, and the platform’s audience
continues to grow (Iqbal 2019). Videogames
are primarily streamed, but
other categories—such as sports and
politics—are popular as well. Users who
create a profile are able to follow content
creators, add friends, and discuss
the live stream with other users. Users
can communicate with the host streamer
and other users through a chat window
embedded on a stream’s page (see
Figure 1). The chat window is of a limited
size, and will only show a maximum
of 26 individual one-line comments.
Stream chats tend to fall into three categories:
empty streams, where no users
comment in the chat; conversational
streams, where users comment at a
speed that allow for users to respond to
each other and hold conversations; and
rapid-posting streams, where users post
so quickly that a given comment is displayed
for mere seconds before being
replaced by newer comments.
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