media psyops a look into how social
media
has been weaponized for psychological
warfare
with yours truly be a scilab
before i get started here's a little bit
about me
i'm 14 years old i was the youngest
speaker at hope
which stands for hackers on planet earth
i am a four-time speaker at defcon
i have also spoken internationally on
election security at death camp
in romania i'm a maker and a hacker in
my election hacking from the roots
asylum
was highlighted at a congressional
hearing on election security
let's start off with the definition and
then a little history
psyops is short for psychological
warfare operations which are military
operations
usually aimed at influencing the enemy's
state of mind
through non-combative means techniques
used by military
police and political forces to influence
the beliefs
emotions and behavior of citizens
at the end of the day it's all marketing
but instead of a product they are
selling you an ideal
now for some history it was the year
329 bc and alexander the great was
conquering empires all around he quickly
took over
large parts of europe and the middle
east
as his armies kept taking over more and
more land
the number of soldiers he had started to
dwindle
causing alex to wonder if he could keep
all his new found territory to himself
that's when alexander the great had a
brilliant idea
that would intimidate the enemy without
needing to do much work at all
after conquering a new city alexander
had his armies leave behind large pieces
of armor
that would fit a seven foot tall giant
when the enemy soldiers passed by they
would see massive chest plates
helmets and boots this surely
intimidated the opponents
making them wonder if they could ever
win a battle against alexander the
great's
army of giants around the same time
genghis khan also proved that the power
of intimidation
can go a long way before attacking a
city
he would send messengers ahead to tell
of the horrible huge army
that was coming to attack as this
presumably
huge army came into view all you could
see is a
massive dust storm coming your way
this wasn't caused by the number of
soldiers in the army
but rather by rocks and heavy objects
that the horses dragged along behind
them
creating the illusion of a large army
his archers also shot arrows that would
whistle in the air
further intimidating the enemy
now we will jump ahead to war one and
world war ii
back in 1914 the germans were the first
to send pamphlets to the enemy troops
after observing how well these tactics
worked the united states decided to jump
in
and make some propaganda of their own
these leaflets had topics such as
how great the american troops were
performing and how poorly the german
troops were doing
each nation also used psyops on their
own citizens
sometimes leading them to believe that
they were winning
even if that fact may not be true
the german military also used radio
messages to state that the troops wives
were sleeping with
other men while they were at war so they
should surrender
and go home right away each nation used
propaganda on their own citizens as well
they did this in order to get them to
enlist in the military
or to have them send money and supplies
to help the troops
in vietnam war the u.s military played a
soundtrack
called ghost tape number 10 in the
vietnamese jungles at night to persuade
the troops to surrender
u.s forces hoped that the operation
codenamed wandering seoul would weaken
the morale of the viet cong
and prey on the fears of many vietnamese
the vietnamese culture includes beliefs
and rituals
that show respect for the dead they
believe if a person
is not properly buried they will wander
the earth as a
wandering soul in the gulf war
psychological tactics were very
successful
because they threatened consequences to
those who did not abide
by the coalition's rules the american
military also promised
the iraqi troops that no harm would come
to them
and they would be treated very well if
they surrendered
these messages were delivered by air
dropping pamphlets and by radio
as it was one of the few options the
soldiers in the field had to distract
themselves from the war
many iraqi troops surrendered holding
that pamphlet
the arabs also tried some psyops tactics
on the u.s forces
using a broadcaster by the name of
baghdad betty
she told the soldiers that while they
were out at war their wives were at home
sleeping with celebrities such as mel
gibson
tom cruise and bart simpson
this illustrates why you need to do
research on your target audience
before launching a campaign you may be
wondering
how can a tiny piece of paper or radio
message make a soldier
give up all he has already sacrificed
and
how can warning messages intimidate
entire armies
to answer these questions let's take a
deeper look
into each of the prior examples before
any psyops attack is used on an enemy
they're usually tired hungry stressed
and
even depressed this makes them even more
susceptible to psychological
manipulation
all propaganda typically ties into one
or more of the seven deadly sins
lust gluttony pride sloth wrath
greed and envy these seven sins
are the greatest desires known to
humankind
so avoiding these feelings in such a
horrible condition
is virtually impossible additionally
they play on the strong human emotions
of anger
fear and hate these emotions are
also the easiest to stir up in an
individual
with that in mind let's look back on
alexander the great
and why he left behind those large
pieces of armor
remember back then the average height
was
much shorter than people today picture
yourself
as one of the soldiers tracking down
alexander's army
and finding giant pieces of armor that
are twice the size of yours
that would definitely strike fear in
your heart
genghis khan used the power of false
numbers to his
advantage as he stormed through cities
and towns
this time imagine yourself as a soldier
in a city near a dusty plain that goes
on
as far as the eye can see suddenly
you hear the sounds of what you believe
to be thousands of horse hooves in the
distance
a huge cloud of dust appears as you
watch your
certain doom approaching practically
engulfing your seemingly tiny army by
comparison
again fear was the emotion used here
in the times of war 1 and world war ii
you would see propaganda
everywhere in your town coming in forms
such as
posters billboards newspaper ads and
pamphlets
these posters included sayings such as i
want you
for the us army which plays on pride in
this one
he volunteered for the submarine service
which plays on lust that covers things
back home
but what about campaigns on the front
lines
because of the british blockade getting
food to germany was
virtually impossible leaving the german
troops with
little rations this gave the british the
idea to send leaflets
with pictures of their soldiers eating
great food and smiling brightly
many men went to sleep hungry that night
while still holding that paper in hand
this is a perfect example of the use of
gluttony
in a psyops campaign now
picture yourself as a vietnamese soldier
walking through a dark damp jungle in
the middle of the night
you're tired hungry and just want to go
back home to your family
who you haven't seen in weeks when
suddenly
you hear the sound of your fellow
soldiers who have died
their souls wandering through the jungle
forever
in the eerie sounds of buddhist funeral
music
screaming crying and the sounds of
ghosts and spirits
let's take a listen
[Music]
um
[Music]
at the time of the gulf war the u.s sent
pamphlets out to the arabian soldiers
telling them that if they surrendered
they would treat them
very well and no harm would come these
pamphlets were designed
with the help of cooperative iraqi
prisoners of war
they advise to avoid using the color red
and to feature soldiers with bowls of
fruit
including bananas bananas are a delicacy
to the arabians
this played on the sins of greed and
gluttony
back then they put propaganda wherever a
large
number of people would see it every day
like posters at a grocery store
or an ad in a newspaper these days what
is a widely used means of sharing
opinions and information
that's right social media eighty-two
percent of u.s citizens
have a social media profile most likely
you have one too propaganda used to be a
blunt tool
and had to be tailored to appeal to a
large general audience
with social media ads can be targeted
directly to a specific audience
making it more likely for someone to
engage with the adversary's idea
there are many social media outlets but
we will be focusing on two of the big
ones
facebook and twitter have you ever
noticed that your social media ads seem
to be targeting
you the other day you are looking up
cupcake recipes
and suddenly your facebook feed is
recommending
the baking topic and ads for mixers
that is because the algorithm is
targeting you
by tracking your likes searches who you
follow and who you interact with
you also have a digital fingerprint that
ties
all your devices searches apps and
pretty much
everything you do online together
facebook and twitter
know you better than you know yourself
the data from the algorithm
helps them recommend topics and more
importantly
they can target advertising directly to
you
this very accurate targeting is why
social media has been the preferred
delivery method
for modern psyops if you have already
done some research in modern psyops
then this name will be no stranger to
you
cambridge analytica cambridge analytica
was a political consulting firm that
used large data sets
to target and change the minds of voters
though the parent company was located in
great britain
they saw a big opportunity in the united
states
back in 2016 consultants working for
donald trump's presidential campaign
sought out cambridge analytica to help
him and his campaign team
win the 2016 presidential election
trump's campaign spent over 44 million
dollars to run
5.9 million facebook ads at its peak
cambridge analytica was spending over
one million dollars a day
on facebook ads alone meanwhile
hillary's campaign spent 28 million
on only 66 000 ads
how are these ads so successful for
trump
it all starts with facebook personality
surveys
jane bambauer professor of law at the
university of arizona best describes how
these surveys started out
in 2014 alexander kogan a young
professor at cambridge university
made a personality quiz called this is
your digital life
that attempted to categorize the people
who took it into a set of psychological
profiles almost everyone who took the
quiz agreed to let him
access not only their public account
information
all of it including every like
but also the profiles of their friends
that's how a few hundred thousand survey
takers
grew into a database of 87 million
people and even though only those
few hundred thousand took the
personality quiz
that mapped their psychometric profile
the researcher could use their results
to build a statistical model
that could then predict the psychometric
profiles of the
other 86 million facebook users
the profiles were then provided to the
researchers company
cambridge analytica which used them as
assets to try to get political
consulting clients
like donald trump in 2015
facebook changed its policies to
restrict
how third-party companies collect
information from facebook
users by the time the change was
implemented
cambridge analytica had already received
the data
cambridge analytica used facebook
personality surveys
to sort people into a few main
categories
the survey coupled with other facebook
data they were able to collect
created what is known as an ocean score
ocean also known as the big five stands
for
openness conscientiousness extroversion
agreeableness and neuroticism
depending on your ocean score they would
determine
if you are persuadable who is someone
whose political views
could easily be changed they would then
target
all their ads at the persuadables they
didn't worry about
all the persuadables across the country
they
only focused on the swing states florida
wisconsin pennsylvania and michigan
they knew if they flipped these few
states they would win
the election one example of an
ad campaign that cambridge analytica
created was the crooked hillary campaign
the logo included handcuffs as the o's
in crooked their slogan was lock her
up their art department would create
many uncredited images and post them to
facebook
people who received these ads would not
only like and share the ad
but would screenshot it and share it to
other social media platforms
effectively free advertising cambridge
analytica
created the spark and social media
became the flame
ending with the explosive 2016
election results it is likely we will
never
again have free and fair elections where
candidates are chosen
by their platform and ideas instead of
lies and fake advertising
as you can see these ads use childish
bullying tactics such as
name calling as well as playing on wrath
fear and pride cambridge was at its
high point following the 2016 elections
when whistleblowers like britney kaiser
and chris wiley decided to take a stand
against the company after pleading
guilty for taking people's personal data
and refusing to give it back
the company declared bankruptcy and shut
down for good
but this can't be the end of the story
what happened to all that data
i'm sure it wasn't simply deleted
after seeing how powerful that company
was it should come as
no surprise that their business closing
opened up the new era of
disinformation for hire cambridge
analytica
showed that there was big money to be
made in disinformation
since then dozens of private firms have
popped up in a space
previously occupied solely by
governments
social media has offered the tools to
sow disinformation at a scale to affect
anything from a small local government
election
to spreading disinformation about
coveted vaccines
or even upsetting a country's election
this can be seen today as
spanish-language
anti-vaccine ads are pushed on facebook
and going back to cambridge analytica
they were able to flip the elections
in trinidad and tobago they were hired
by
the majority indian united national
congress party
to defeat the incumbent people's
national movement
which primarily attracts
afro-trinbagonian
voters they researched both audiences
and decided to target the young voters
they knew the young indian unc voters
would do what their parents told them to
do and they would go out
and vote for the unc so they focused
their efforts on the afro-trinbagonian
voters
creating a campaign called do so to
increase
apathy towards voting and politics in
general
encouraging them not to vote did this
tactic
work yes it did the united national
congress party
won the election in case you are
thinking this is recent news
this happened back in 2010 meaning that
this sort of election manipulation
has been going on for a long time
besides creating campaigns
and posting to social media these
private firms
offer the ultimate power in a
disinformation campaign
deniability governments and political
figures
can contract these disinformation
companies
to do their dirty work making it very
difficult to trace it back to the source
content farms produce thousands of
legitimate looking accounts
complete with an untraceable unique
profile picture
and a posting history as well legitimate
user data
can be purchased on the dark web to
further assist in targeting
this disinformation the bonus is real
people spread
these conspiracies and lies by sharing
and reposting on multiple platforms
giving a
huge return on a relatively small
investment
if you tell a lie big enough and keep
repeating it
people will eventually come to believe
it
donald trump has been doing this even
before
he was out of office he told his
constituents that if he
didn't win the election it was ripped
conditioning his followers to rise up if
he did not win the election
once the election results were certified
and joe biden
was declared the winner trump started
claiming the election
was rigged stirring up wrath in his
followers
leading to the january 6 attack on the
capital
trump still tells the lie that the
election was rigged
despite the total lack of evidence yet
his followers believe it the underlying
message to his followers
is if you don't win something it's
because it was stolen from you cambridge
analytica
wasn't the only one persuading voters in
the us
russian actors also used social media to
cause havoc
and divide the country why in the world
would russia do this
unlike cambridge analytica they are not
out to gain money
but rather power soviet premier
khrushchev
said we do not have to invade the united
states
we will destroy you from within that is
exactly what russia
is doing dividing the country so it
destroys itself from within
i wonder why everyone tries to gain
power by
belittling others instead of bettering
themselves
if the world was in friendly competition
with each other
we could have made so much more progress
as a society
the russian actors created facebook
accounts and groups
as well as twitter bots all
impersonating us citizens
and organized groups one example of this
is south united as you can see here
this ad was paid for in rubles
people follow these accounts and like
and repost the content
one of the ad tools at facebook allows
you to send
ads to friends and people who also
follow
and then you can pick from thousands of
different keywords
the russians also make fake news
websites that appear to be real news
sources but are actually fake when
bob goes on facebook and reads an
article on how
hillary is crooked he's probably not
going to check the source
or compare to other sites to see if this
information is true
he will however like comment
and repost this article so that all his
friends can do the same
and so on and so forth the younger
audience may be thinking
yeah of course it's fake i can tell but
you have to understand that the older
audience was brought up
believing all new sources are fully fact
checked
they have applied this belief to all
modern delivery platforms
after all facebook is where i connect
with family and friends
why would facebook lie to me anyway
this news article must be real because
the site it's on
looks real turns out this
newspaper's mailing address is in a
shopping mall between the orange julius
and the piercing pagoda there's
also a building in washington dc full of
mailboxes
this gives any blogger living in his
parents basement
the ability to list a legitimate
sounding physical address
on the bottom of his new site an
interesting fact is that the russians
target both sides
not just one like cambridge did
this way they can divide and conquer in
the u.s
russian influence reached 126 million
people through facebook alone
they created fake black lives matter
memes and when you clicked on them
you were taken to pages that invited you
to a protest
at the same time they were targeting
adversary groups
like blue lives matter with similar fake
pages
inviting them to a protest at the same
location
on the same day the russian government
is organizing
face-to-face protests in order to get us
to fight with each other
and divide the country so far
we have talked about facebook but when
you think about political discussions
your mind goes straight to twitter
just like facebook twitter is used by
russians and
other groups to sow disinformation to
the american populace
they are using many of the same
techniques that are used on facebook
one big problem with twitter is the low
bar for entry
this allows groups to use tools that
create many bot accounts
very quickly these accounts then go
and tweet the same things once the bot
gets
caught and blocked they simply create a
new batch of accounts
the twitter bots also between
other bots tweets as is shown in this
beautiful graphic by daniel gallagher
it's just like turtlebots all the way
down i hope
some of you got that reference going
back to the seven sins and lust
these bot accounts frequently feature
beautiful young woman
because the target audience is primarily
male voters
take this account for example
these photos were stolen off a columbian
instagram influencers account
today you got some history some
psychology
and a heavy dose of reality but
what can you do here are a few examples
of how you can protect yourself against
social media psyops
one install an ad blocker this way
you only get feed and not targeted
information
one i highly recommend is the pie hole
which blocks ads on an entire network
two don't take any online quizzes or
surveys
i know it's tempting to find out what
flavor of ice cream you are
but it's best not to give out personal
information
as simple and minor as it may seem three
when reading an article check the
sources and who wrote it
always compare it to other articles from
trusted sites
and last but not least four always make
sure to fact
check everything you see and read
never base your opinion on just one
thing and learn what both sides have to
say before making an opinion
i hope everyone learned something today
and i will see you all in person soon
peace out