Researchers say Chinese online influence targets US voters

By Christopher Bing and Katie Paul

(Reuters) – A Chinese social media influencer organization is impersonating U.S. voters, denigrating U.S. politicians and spreading polarizing messages ahead of the United States presidential election on Nov. 5, new research by intelligence firm Graphika shows.

The campaign is part of a well-known Chinese state-linked operation known by analysts as “spamouflage” or “Dragonbridge,” in which a mixture of spam and targeted propaganda is distributed online.

Spamouflage has been active since at least 2017, but has increased its activities as the elections approach, according to experts. The campaign uses thousands of accounts on more than 50 websites, forums and social media platforms.

“The most important takeaway from this report,” said Jack Stubbs, who leads Graphika's research team, “is that Spamouflage has become more aggressive in its efforts to infiltrate and influence U.S. political conversations.”

“This is important because it shows that Chinese influence operations against the United States are evolving, using increasingly sophisticated deception and directly targeting these organic but hypersensitive cracks in society,” Stubbs added.

In one example highlighted by Graphika, the Chinese operation posed as American anti-war activists. Using multiple accounts on X, the agents created memes calling Trump a “con,” showing him in an orange prison uniform, and calling Biden a “coward.”

Another account asked in broken English: “Is the current America still our America?” Liu Pengyu, a spokesman for the Chinese embassy in Washington, said: “China has no intention of interfering in the US election and will not do so. We hope that the US side will not make China an issue in the election.”

Facebook had previously attributed the campaign to Chinese law enforcement authorities, calling it the “largest known cross-platform covert influence operation in the world.”

Spamouflage's messages do not appear to favor one side of the political spectrum – Democrats or Republicans – but rather aim to amplify existing criticism of American society and government.

In the past, the group had limited success in targeting real Americans, but that changed in mid-2023, when agents increasingly began targeting genuine supporters of former President Donald Trump, according to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, which has conducted its own research into spamming.

TRACKING INFLUENCE EVENTS

Graphika identified 15 spam accounts on social media platform X and one account on TikTok, all of which claimed to be U.S. citizens or media companies. It also highlighted additional profiles associated with these accounts on YouTube and Instagram that had already been suspended at the time the report was completed.

X did not respond to a request for comment.

A YouTube spokesperson said: “The channel reported by Graphika has already been identified and shut down as part of our investigation into coordinated influence operations and had very few views at the time of its removal.”

The TikTok account, called Harlan Report, has been one of the group's most successful assets, posting a single video in July that garnered 1.5 million views.

That video, which was removed from TikTok last week, mocked a news conference Biden gave at NATO's 75th anniversary summit in which he stumbled over a speech. Like similar social media posts that were widely shared at the time, it mistranscribed Biden's words to suggest he made a sexual reference, according to a Reuters fact-check.

A Reuters review of the Harlan Report account on TikTok found that it posted its first video in May. Other recent videos from the account have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times, including one shared last week showing CNN panelists discussing the network's interview with Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris.

A TikTok spokesperson said the company permanently suspended the Harlan Report account for violating community guidelines.

Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram, confirmed that it had removed spammouflage activity from its platforms in two places as part of its ongoing response to the campaign. Neither of them resonated with authentic audiences, a Meta spokesperson said.

The US government is investigating foreign attempts to interfere in the election.

In July, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence released a report on election interference, which concluded that China is “taking a more cautious approach to this U.S. presidential election… and is unlikely to intend to influence the outcome.” However, “we are tracking efforts to influence the U.S. public on a broader scale.”

(Reporting by Christopher Bing and Katie Paul; additional reporting by Sheila Dang and Kenrick Cai; editing by Stephen Coates and Mark Porter)