State-Funded ‘Anti-Disinformation’ Campaign Flagged Americans as Foreign Shills: Twitter Files

The logo of the U.S. social networking website Twitter, on a smart-phone screen in Lille, northern France, on Sept. 4, 2019. Denis Charlet/AFP via Getty Images

A state-funded group got thousands of ordinary American users of Twitter flagged and banned as spreaders of “foreign” disinformation, according to the latest installment of “Twitter Files” released on Thursday by independent journalist Matt Taibbi.

The flawed “anti-disinformation” blacklist campaign was led by the Global Engagement Center (GEC), a lesser-known unit within the State Department. Established in 2017 as a part of the Obama administration’s shift in national security strategy, GEC is tasked to work with government agencies like the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, National Security Agency, CIA, and Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency to “counter the messaging and diminish the influence of international terrorist organizations.”

Over the past years, the GEC has bred a “sprawling complex” of “disinformation studies labs” at prominent colleges and think tanks, according to Taibbi. Among those GEC-funded entities is the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab), which said in 2021 it suspected 40,000 Twitter accounts of being “paid employees or possibly volunteers” of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the current ruling party of India.

“Attached you will find a spreadsheet of around 40k twitter [sic] accounts that our researchers suspect are engaging in inauthentic behaviour in support of BJP and Hindu nationalism more broadly,” Andy Garvin, an analyst and senior fellow at DFRLab, wrote in a June 2021 email to Twitter.

That list, however, was full of everyday conservative Americans. Many of them apparently have no connection whatsoever to India or BJP or the religious-nationalist agenda it promotes.

“I have no connection to any Hindu folks ... Just a Reagan Republican here in CT,” user “Bobby Hailstone” told Taibbi.

“A Hindu nationalist? I’ve never even been out of this country. Let alone the state of NJ,” wrote another user, “Lady_DI816.”

In response to Garvin’s email, Twitter’s then-integrity chief Yoel Roth wrote that he “spot-checked a number of these accounts” to find that virtually all of them appeared to be real people. Taibbi said this might explain why many of the accounts on the “India list” have survived to this day.

The GEC also provided Twitter with a spreadsheet of 5,500 users believed to be “Chinese accounts” engaged in “state-backed coordinated manipulation.” This list also contained many accounts apparently not associated with China or the Chinese communist regime.

According to screenshots of chats Taibbi shared, Twitter executives were frustrated to find on the “Chinese list” CNN employees based abroad.

“Not exactly Anderson’s besties, but CNN assets if you will,” Twitter’s Patrick Conlon joked, referring to CNN anchor Anderson Cooper.

“Really really important to highlight this—what a total crock,” commented Roth.

In another email screenshot, the GEC asked Twitter to review 499 accounts suspected of spreading foreign disinformation, for reasons that include using the hashtag #IraniansDebateWithBiden and communicating on Signal, an encrypted messaging mobile application.

According to the most recent publicly available budget audit report by the State Department, the GEC received approximately $98.7 million in 2018, including $78.7 million in funds set aside by Congress and $20 million transferred from the Pentagon. The report suggests that the GEC used the money to fund at least 39 different organizations, but only three of them were unredacted.

The Atlantic Council didn’t respond to a request for comment. Meanwhile, a State Department spokesperson said in a statement that the GEC “does not and has never attempted to moderate content on social media platforms.”

“The GEC’s mandate is to coordinate with other federal agencies to direct, lead, synchronize and coordinate the efforts of the U.S. government to understand the sources and trends in foreign attempts to spread disinformation and propaganda globally.”

Taibbi, along with independent journalist Michael Shellenberger, has been in the spotlight for publishing internal discussions among Twitter’s previous leadership, many of which involved decisions to censor certain information at the request of government agencies. The two will be testifying about their findings before the House Judiciary Committee on March 9.