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H
ardly a day goes by without media,
and sometimes government, claims
that Russia has been utilising social
media tools to spread fake news and
misinformation to influence everything from
elections, mining approvals and even Brexit.
But Russia is just the tip of the iceberg
for this issue with regular misinformation
campaigns and attacks observed worldwide
from activists, political and business rivalry,
and even kids looking for kicks. But how hard
is it to spread this sort of misinformation?
Well it appears to be very easy indeed with
easily available tools and services which
actors can buy or rent as needed to get up
and running quickly. The barrier to entry is
very low indeed.
This means that, for example, Twitter
accounts can suddenly come out of nowhere
and attract tens of thousands of followers
and retweets in a matter of hours associated
with particular misinformation campaigns.
For example, in October 2016 an
ideologically motivated hacktivist group
called Anonymous Poland published
documents it claimed it had stolen from
a breach of the Bradley Foundation, a US
charity. Over the ensuing week almost
15,000 nearly identical tweets posted by
approximately 12,000 Twitter accounts,
featuring links to tweets about the
Anonymous Poland breach, were identified.
Disinformation campaigns can take many
forms; however, they generally follow three
distinct stages: 1) Creation, 2) Publication
and 3) Circulation. For each stage, there are
countless online tools, software and platforms
to allow attackers to create credible and
effective disinformation campaigns.
In recent years, there has been a growth in
toolkits and services designed to propagate
the spread of misinformation – available
for just $7 – that are aimed specifically at
causing financial and reputational damage
for companies and governments.
There is a myriad of drivers that will affect
how disinformation campaigns evolve
in the upcoming years. Based on the
drivers and assumptions shown below,
it’s almost certain that disinformation will
continue; the geopolitical situation shows
www.intelligentcio.com
Rick Holland, VP Strategy, Digital Shadows
“
FAKE NEWS AND
DISINFORMATION
IS NOT A NEW
PHENOMENON,
AND IT WILL NOT
BE GOING AWAY
ANYTIME SOON.
no signs of easing, and there is plenty
of sociocultural unease to exploit. While
there will be continued efforts to remove
suspicious content from social media sites,
the low barriers to entry and innovation
of threat actors will lead to an increase
in disinformation. Moreover, this is not
just a risk for political parties in 2018;
disinformation affects businesses and
individuals too.
So how do we combat this sort of threat?
There are some steps businesses can take to
lessen the risk of disinformation impacting
their businesses. These include:
INTELLIGENTCIO
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