The IRA relied heavily on local news media: 30 percent of all links led to local news websites, such as Kansas-based station KSNT or regional website cleveland.com, amounting to five times more local news content than junk news content. By comparison, politically interested users had 1.9 percent of links point to local news sources and random users had only 0.3 percent of links going to local news sources.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\nImpostor accounts<\/h3>\n
The researchers add that some IRA accounts also pretended to be local news outlets. They used Twitter handles such as “Atlanta_Online” or “KansasDailyNews” and tweeted heavily about the region they pretended to be located in, sharing links to articles from real local news outlets. These fake local news outlet Twitter handles were responsible for the vast majority of the IRA’s local news sharing: 80 percent of all local media content came from just 27 accounts. Many of their tweets talked about “Trump,” “Clinton,” or “#politics,” meaning that these local news sources were at least in part used to spread news about the presidential race.<\/p>\n
In addition, another set of IRA accounts masqueraded as left or right partisans, the SMaPP study found. It examined the tweeting behavior of 14 IRA accounts that pretended to be white conservative Americans\u2014using Twitter handles such as “USA_Gunslinger” or “SouthLoneStar”\u2014and eight IRA accounts posing as left-leaning partisans, usually pretending to be African-Americans, with screen names like “BlackToLive” or “TrayneshaCole.”<\/p>\n
These partisan accounts also shared local news, but were quite polarizing in their framing: while both sides often tweeted about the police, crime, and minorities, the right-leaning accounts tended to focus on crimes minorities committed and support law enforcement, while the left-leaning accounts emphasized crimes against minorities and police brutality.<\/p>\n
Despite the invasive nature of the IRA’s efforts, the group’s efficacy is uncertain.<\/p>\n
“While the IRA activity seems to reveal a degree of sophistication about American politics in terms of its use local news sources, the accounts look decidedly less sophisticated in terms of geographical targeting, at least in so far as the 2016 presidential election is concerned,” the researchers write. “The troll farm tweeted most of the local news content from outlets based in Kansas, California, and Missouri\u2014none of which were considered swing states in 2016.”<\/p>\n
The findings and larger analysis appear in a SMaPP Data Report available on the SMaPP Lab website.<\/p>\n
Source: New York University<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Internet Research Agency, a Russia-based group of Internet trolls, relied on local news more […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":1913982,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[8212,242,7896],"class_list":["post-1913922","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-society-culture","tag-elections","tag-internet","tag-journalism","university-new-york-university"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nRussian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016 - 糖心视频<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Russian trolls trying to manipulate the 2016 US presidential election shared way more local news than they did purely fake content.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Russian trolls trying to manipulate the 2016 US presidential election shared way more local news than they did purely fake content.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"糖心视频\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/糖心视频\/143906865226\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2018-11-19T19:58:01+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2018-11-19T20:02:42+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"915\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"James Devitt-NYU\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@糖心视频News\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@糖心视频News\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"James Devitt-NYU\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"5 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"James Devitt-NYU\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/person\/ad1fd4996ca519ab49dfce07c4e9f74e\"},\"headline\":\"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-11-19T19:58:01+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-11-19T20:02:42+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/\"},\"wordCount\":933,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"elections\",\"Internet\",\"journalism\"],\"articleSection\":[\"Society and Culture\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/\",\"name\":\"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016 - 糖心视频\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2018-11-19T19:58:01+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2018-11-19T20:02:42+00:00\",\"description\":\"Russian trolls trying to manipulate the 2016 US presidential election shared way more local news than they did purely fake content.\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg\",\"width\":1600,\"height\":915,\"caption\":\"(Credit: Getty Images)\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/\",\"name\":\"糖心视频\",\"description\":\"Research news from top universities.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#organization\",\"name\":\"糖心视频\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/logo-2018.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/logo-2018.png\",\"width\":332,\"height\":105,\"caption\":\"糖心视频\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/糖心视频\/143906865226\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/糖心视频News\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/person\/ad1fd4996ca519ab49dfce07c4e9f74e\",\"name\":\"James Devitt-NYU\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/12b4d1eed3dabd16b1be36754b3efa42?s=96&d=mm&r=pg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/12b4d1eed3dabd16b1be36754b3efa42?s=96&d=mm&r=pg\",\"caption\":\"James Devitt-NYU\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/author\/nyu-devitt\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016 - 糖心视频","description":"Russian trolls trying to manipulate the 2016 US presidential election shared way more local news than they did purely fake content.","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016","og_description":"Russian trolls trying to manipulate the 2016 US presidential election shared way more local news than they did purely fake content.","og_url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/","og_site_name":"糖心视频","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/糖心视频\/143906865226","article_published_time":"2018-11-19T19:58:01+00:00","article_modified_time":"2018-11-19T20:02:42+00:00","og_image":[{"width":1600,"height":915,"url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"James Devitt-NYU","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@糖心视频News","twitter_site":"@糖心视频News","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"James Devitt-NYU","Est. reading time":"5 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/"},"author":{"name":"James Devitt-NYU","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/person\/ad1fd4996ca519ab49dfce07c4e9f74e"},"headline":"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016","datePublished":"2018-11-19T19:58:01+00:00","dateModified":"2018-11-19T20:02:42+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/"},"wordCount":933,"commentCount":0,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg","keywords":["elections","Internet","journalism"],"articleSection":["Society and Culture"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/","url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/","name":"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016 - 糖心视频","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg","datePublished":"2018-11-19T19:58:01+00:00","dateModified":"2018-11-19T20:02:42+00:00","description":"Russian trolls trying to manipulate the 2016 US presidential election shared way more local news than they did purely fake content.","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/hand-on-keyboard_1600.jpg","width":1600,"height":915,"caption":"(Credit: Getty Images)"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/russian-trolls-local-news-1913922\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Russian trolls relied on local news over fake stories in 2016"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/","name":"糖心视频","description":"Research news from top universities.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#organization","name":"糖心视频","url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/logo-2018.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/logo-2018.png","width":332,"height":105,"caption":"糖心视频"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/pages\/糖心视频\/143906865226","https:\/\/x.com\/糖心视频News"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/person\/ad1fd4996ca519ab49dfce07c4e9f74e","name":"James Devitt-NYU","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/12b4d1eed3dabd16b1be36754b3efa42?s=96&d=mm&r=pg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/12b4d1eed3dabd16b1be36754b3efa42?s=96&d=mm&r=pg","caption":"James Devitt-NYU"},"url":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/author\/nyu-devitt\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1913922","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1913922"}],"version-history":[{"count":11,"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1913922\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1914232,"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1913922\/revisions\/1914232"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1913982"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1913922"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1913922"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.futurity.org\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1913922"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}