Full Comment - TikTok terror： How Hamas successfully hijacked your social media

00:00:00.000 since october 7th we've seen an explosion of anti-semitism online we've talked about this

00:00:12.860 before on the full comment podcast hello welcome to the full comment podcast my name is brian lily

00:00:17.940 your host and today we're going to talk to an expert in how social media platforms are used

00:00:24.040 harnessed to spread information spread disinformation but also to organize it's something

00:00:30.980 incredible to see that within moments of hamas launching their terrorist attack on israel on

00:00:36.140 october 7th that there were professional looking posters and images and graphics and messages to

00:00:45.100 be shared and they were shared around the world they were shared quickly this seems like a

00:00:51.140 grassroots effort but to me as someone who's been around politics been around campaigns it

00:00:56.140 definitely doesn't seem that way whether we're talking the online world or the protests we're

00:01:00.340 seeing in streets campuses and elsewhere teller cohen montemayor is uh with cyber well it's an

00:01:07.760 organization out of tel aviv that deals in the digital world she has a background in high tech

00:01:14.860 she has a background in academic research and as with most israelis in the israeli defense forces

00:01:21.080 she joins me now from tel aviv thanks for the time teller thank you so much for having me brian great

00:01:26.660 to be here so give us a better sense of of what cyber well does and and why you got it started before

00:01:33.720 we get into how it applies to what's going on now give give me your elevator pitch on cyber well

00:01:38.920 sure cyber well is the first ever open database of online anti-semitism monitoring in multiple languages

00:01:47.020 across the major social media platforms we launched in may 2022 with an added value not only of creating

00:01:54.140 transparency around the issue of online anti-semitism but also analyzing how this online anti-semitism

00:02:01.500 actually violates the community standards or digital policies of the social media platforms themselves

00:02:08.700 so as i mentioned we launched in may 2022 and kind of our first proof of concept was when we had that

00:02:15.760 october 2022 kanye west meltdown when he started attacking the jewish community online we were able

00:02:22.020 to create real-time high-level compliance alerts for the social media platforms that we monitor facebook

00:02:27.700 instagram tiktok youtube and twitter to really guide their content moderators but also the platforms

00:02:35.440 themselves on how they could be doing a better job of enforcing their own rules and removing this

00:02:40.760 content at scale so since we've launched this very high-level digital compliance solution for online

00:02:47.840 anti-semitism we've been onboarded as a trusted partner of metal so covering facebook instagram and

00:02:54.360 threads and also tiktok we also shared data directly with x what was formerly known as twitter and google

00:03:02.080 youtube uh what's unique about cyberwell aside from the digital policy compliance piece is that we're

00:03:08.260 also monitoring in multiple languages so we're monitoring online anti-semitism in both english and

00:03:13.480 arabic and so when i say there was an explosion on october 7th pretty much simultaneous with the

00:03:22.880 invasion would i be incorrect or did you notice that as well that's absolutely correct cyberwell

00:03:30.540 tracked an 86 percent increase in online anti-semitism following the october 7th attacks so nearly a

00:03:37.340 doubling of anti-semitic content online with a very clear trend in open calls to violence against jews

00:03:45.380 and israelis following the october 7th attacks uh specifically in our arabic data set we saw that 61

00:03:51.820 percent of the verified anti-semitic content was open calls to violence against jews and israelis which

00:03:58.300 was a departure from what we were used to seeing in the weeks following which was kind of more classic

00:04:03.400 anti-semitism stereotypes about jewish power uh jews controlling the media jews controlling the

00:04:09.060 government things that we that's what we were typically seeing and on october 7th there was just

00:04:13.900 this very clear shift of open calls to violence uh and mobilization to action of violence in the streets

00:04:20.420 that was coming from the online spaces and i think that october 7th was very unique in the sense that

00:04:26.780 it was kind of the it was kind of the instance of the largest level of hijacking of social media

00:04:33.780 platforms by a terrorist group that we have seen to date hamas was able to hijack the social media

00:04:40.400 platforms and perpetuate their terrorism far beyond the point of time and space of the attack itself

00:04:46.220 leaving the entire israeli society in the grips of psychological terror and many jews around the world

00:04:51.640 uh as well i think it made it very clear that the issue of unbridled social media operations with

00:04:58.200 not effective um safety measures and not effective content removal is really a matter of national

00:05:05.820 security uh you say specifically hamas do you believe that hamas was coordinating this that they

00:05:14.280 were running a digital war room of sorts i think that hamas leveraged and exploited the vulnerabilities

00:05:22.180 of the social media platforms that didn't even need a war room uh infamously there were instances of

00:05:28.100 hamas taking the phones of families whose homes they infiltrated and then subsequently either kidnapped or

00:05:35.960 executed and actually live streaming that terrorism directly onto the family's personal social media accounts

00:05:44.020 specifically uh on facebook there was also a lot of live streaming um using either telegram or x uh

00:05:52.600 specifically and tiktok it's not necessary to use a war room when we're all running around with phones

00:05:59.120 that have these social media platforms that are in inadequately monitoring violent content online

00:06:07.200 you don't need a war room uh to perpetuate your propaganda during a terrorist attack that's what they

00:06:12.720 prove to everybody that's how they hijack these social media platforms and then the echo chamber effect of

00:06:18.080 people who are celebrating this terrorist attack and who are hamas apologists just perpetuated that even

00:06:24.200 further what was shocking for us to see is that immediately following this large-scale live streaming of a

00:06:31.540 horrific attack there was a purposeful october 7th denial campaign that started on october 8th

00:06:39.720 10th and 11th very quickly trying to excuse cover up or even deny that the horrific events of october 7th

00:06:50.480 took place in the way that they did that was um i'm trying to remember the name of the minister within

00:06:57.940 the hamas government he was formerly in in russia it'll come to me in a moment but uh he has been

00:07:04.360 described by the washington post as the biggest spreader of disinformation on this denialism that

00:07:11.000 the attacks happened or that the rapes happened or that certain aspects of the the terror attacks

00:07:17.140 happened and you know he was hosted by a group here in canada named samadun they held an online forum with

00:07:27.660 him samadun by the way i'm sure you're aware of them but for people that don't uh this is an

00:07:33.340 organization that is banned in several countries but operates here in canada their international

00:07:38.940 organizer is an american woman based in vancouver she was just arrested for praising the october 7th

00:07:46.040 attacks in public and and praising those who carried out the attacks um so they held a an online session

00:07:56.120 with this minister from the hamas government who has been at the forefront of this uh tell me how these

00:08:03.040 these networks i mean as you observe it how do these networks operate in are they sharing information

00:08:09.880 is it coming from one central place are they just all people on the same wavelength who've been involved

00:08:16.540 in issues like boycott divest and sanction for so long that it uh you know it was easy pickings for

00:08:23.920 them to jump in on this right so the minister actually participated in october 7th denial after

00:08:30.780 the bds network that you're referring to online already started creating very viral um october 7th

00:08:39.340 denial content so he got to that messaging after they already realized that the especially the rape

00:08:46.600 and sexual violence that occurred on october 7th in the hands of hamas that that was going to backfire

00:08:52.380 on hamas and it was going to hurt quote unquote the palestinian cause so they started creating

00:08:57.180 that type of denial content far before the minister actually got there so they're almost like

00:09:01.980 the western uh ear or the western lens that is gauging how to best package apologize and legitimize

00:09:11.700 the actions of october 7th for hamas um and i do think that it is very connected to just how long they have

00:09:19.600 been involved in the bds movement um and as you mentioned somebody and i think it's also the

00:09:26.380 inability of western governments to really look at the bds movement for what it was you mentioned

00:09:31.560 charlotte cates um in canada and somebody doing somebody doing is connected to the pflp which is a

00:09:38.140 designated terror organization the fact that it's still allowed to operating in canada uh is kind of

00:09:43.480 beyond me both as an israeli and an american it's beyond me as well and by the way the the hamas

00:09:49.360 official is uh dr bassam name uh that's who charlotte case hosted an event with um and uh you know i'm i'm

00:09:57.600 hoping she's deported and she becomes uh and the americans problem now uh your government in the united

00:10:02.960 states can deal with her uh well if she's if she's busy apologizing for terrorists uh either online or

00:10:09.000 offline they'll definitely be able to deal with her swift blade so you you think that a group like sam

00:10:14.060 is just been i mean they they've been running uh webinars and events calling for the release of so-called

00:10:23.020 political prisoners they're terrorists uh many of them there there's no question that many of them who

00:10:29.500 they name and profile uh committed terrorist acts murders bombings all of it and and so they've been

00:10:37.700 involved in this for a long time they are hardcore they're beyond just saying oh my university should

00:10:43.040 divest itself of investments in in israel they call for the release of terrorists so it's just one of

00:10:50.540 the existing networks that jumped in even before dr name did from hamas to start uh pushing the

00:10:58.300 denialism sure i think what's important to understand though and in terms of what's what's different about

00:11:04.040 the world that we live in today it really is the way that people have access uh to information and

00:11:09.620 specifically through algorithm dissemination machines like the social media platforms so

00:11:15.540 aside from the the dna or the background of semi do and if we look at the denial narrative why is

00:11:21.540 october 7th denial uh such a potent form of modern anti-semitism much like holocaust revisionism or

00:11:29.160 holocaust denial is because october 7th attacks and any emergent situation there are there's new

00:11:35.660 information coming out all of the time there's also deeply shocking information i can tell you as

00:11:40.460 somebody who is involved in um vetting and going through some of this content this very very graphic

00:11:46.580 content in the first week um following the attack you know you're almost primed to disbelieve the

00:11:53.360 level of barbarism that occurred on that day we don't want to believe that that level of

00:11:58.640 and humanity and evil is possible what's unique about what happens on social media platforms

00:12:04.140 is that they have a built-in algorithm or system that's also meant to draw your attention to

00:12:11.020 conspiracy theories and the october 7th denial campaign uh is is a conspiracy theory in and of

00:12:17.840 itself because it's not only saying that for example the most popular sub-narrative in the october 7th

00:12:24.260 denial is uh that sexual violence and rape never occurred the second most popular is actually to say

00:12:30.100 that israel did it israel was behind the october 7th denial attacks sorry the october 7th attacks

00:12:37.280 of hamas so what then the picture that you're painting for somebody who is trying to learn about this

00:12:43.200 situation and wouldn't know better is that there's something larger going on here and there's some

00:12:48.200 kind of conspiracy theory and i just want to say that denial of october 7th or the holocaust or any

00:12:55.360 mass atrocity that's committed against jews purposefully why is that kind of a framework

00:13:01.580 for anti-semitic belief because you're saying that if october 7th never happens the subtext is that

00:13:09.020 jewish life but more importantly jewish death is not important that the jews are lying about this

00:13:15.360 specific event so all jews are liars somebody who believes that conspiracy theory will then say well

00:13:20.560 if they're all lying how is it that we're all speaking about this well because jews or in this

00:13:25.460 case israel are actually controlling the media and controlling the world stage and the reason that

00:13:30.280 they're controlling it is actually to get something out of it they're meant to profit from this atrocity

00:13:34.800 in this case israel getting us aid and carte blanche to do whatever it wants in gaza so you've

00:13:40.840 essentially brought the believer of this conspiracy theory through every station of anti-semitic thought

00:13:46.440 and that's why it's such a potent kind of modern conspiracy form of anti-semitic belief and what i

00:13:54.780 want to point out is that it's not just that this content exists on social media platforms let's look

00:13:59.900 at the level of engagement in a deep dive that cyberwall did on october 7th denial only 300 verified

00:14:06.720 examples within the first month after the october 7th attacked reach over 25 million views online

00:14:14.160 so it's not just that this content is out there but that it's getting a viral level of exposure high

00:14:20.900 level of engagement exposure and we've seen hesitance on the part of the social media platforms

00:14:26.040 to just come out and say that october 7th denial is prohibited content meanwhile they have digital

00:14:32.720 policies on the books about holocaust denial that's prohibited content sandy hope school shooting

00:14:37.820 denial that happened in the united states that's prohibited content rwandan genocide denial that's

00:14:42.600 prohibited content why would you prohibit this content to begin with because the truth about what is

00:14:47.500 happening matters it shapes the way that people perceive the world and how they will be called to

00:14:54.240 action to respond to that the bds movement is leveraging the inefficiencies of social media

00:15:01.380 platforms to actually perpetuate the october 7th denial campaign and recently given the explosion of the

00:15:09.080 campus mayhem we've even seen the same accounts that were promoting october 7th denial which again

00:15:15.040 are civilian accounts now saying that the perpetrators of calls to terror and violence on the u.s campuses

00:15:23.580 are actually zionist agents that the jews are lying that this is actually being orchestrated by them

00:15:30.140 that soros is an agent of israel because he's actually the one who's funding many of these bds groups so

00:15:36.960 you're just seeing the same denial narrative now being recycled to also excuse and justify the violence that

00:15:46.720 you're seeing against jews on college campuses today i've um i've covered many protests and

00:15:53.480 uh in in-person violent protests and one of the things that always happens is i will watch someone

00:16:00.400 throw a molotov cocktail or a smoke bomb from the protest side not the police side and and and then

00:16:08.200 they will immediately claim well that was a false flag that was an agent provocateur that was a plant by

00:16:13.320 the police and it sounds like it's the same tactics that are being used online but what fascinated me about

00:16:20.120 what you said there on the path that people follow as they get in on denialism is i i didn't realize

00:16:29.020 how far of a circle it is that it brings them around to saying that uh israel is doing this just to get

00:16:38.160 carte blanche in gaza i mean i i've been joking uh with uh several of my jewish friends that this

00:16:45.620 this should blow apart the idea that jews control the media and control all the information in the

00:16:50.640 world because if that were the case you're doing a really bad job about it and everyone has a laugh

00:16:55.480 but if you believe that then you're you're going to ignore the fact that jews and israel are being

00:17:01.220 vilified everywhere and just say that this is part of the plot everything becomes part of the plot

00:17:07.840 yes absolutely it brings people full circle to really continue to participate in the dehumanization

00:17:17.760 and hostility of jews it also adds another level as a conspiracy theory which is mistrust of governments

00:17:25.100 institutions and law enforcement which is part of the other violent response that we're seeing

00:17:31.160 to the campus mayhem now uh in the united states and i want to also say that there are major

00:17:38.920 institutions in the media and traditional media that are also participating in this same october 7th

00:17:44.880 denial and kind of conspiratory response to horrific terrorist attack for example uh the israeli

00:17:51.780 government did something that they typically don't do which was that they were sharing very graphic

00:17:56.240 images of those who were killed on october 7th by hamas including uh two incinerated infants who were

00:18:03.640 perceivably decapitated and they shared that um photo with the world and al jazeera immediately tweeted

00:18:10.620 out that this is an ai generated image al jazeera is one of the most influential uh middle eastern news

00:18:17.680 sources and we've seen that this same kind of denial uh packaging any information coming out about

00:18:25.660 october 7th as a conspiracy theory or as propaganda is a belief now widely held by most of those engaging

00:18:33.140 in anti-israel demonstrations even susan sarandon if she was stopped on the street and she was there's

00:18:39.380 a video of this she says that rape never happened okay well when when uh the israeli government shared

00:18:46.960 those photos of the babies um my friend ben shapiro shared it online and because people know i know ben

00:18:54.120 they came to me and they i i had people who do not watch al jazeera who are sympathetic to israel

00:19:02.220 saying to me why did shapiro have to share those fake images those are ai images there you go they

00:19:08.120 thought that he was wrong yes there you go there you go yeah they they thought that he was wrong but

00:19:13.700 they didn't they didn't pull that out of anywhere they saw that discourse online because it was something

00:19:18.700 that was being uh shared by widely followed uh sources and we've also seen following october 7th

00:19:26.160 that many uh accounts who were looking to grow their following actually started participating more

00:19:33.660 actively in anti-israel and anti-semitic discourse jackson hinkle is one of such accounts who had

00:19:39.960 thousands maybe 2 000 followers prior to october 7th started participating and sharing uh anti-israel

00:19:46.900 rhetoric october 7th denial and blatant anti-semitism and has now grown his following to over 2 million

00:19:52.600 this again on a systematic level should tell us that there's some kind of high level of engagement

00:19:58.640 from this content that's being shared on the algorithms of the social media platforms themselves

00:20:04.120 so if we look at this we need to understand that the systems of our social media platforms which

00:20:10.400 actually make up over half of the worldwide internet activity and are used by under 30 year olds anywhere

00:20:16.280 between 40 to 100 hours a week increasingly so as a news source are major systems of influence of

00:20:24.640 perception and also of hate of normalizing hate and these systems were not only hijacked by hamas

00:20:31.700 but in turn were hijacked by hamas apologists and anti-western ideologues to then promote

00:20:40.900 anti-semitism and overall mistrust and distrust of western democracies all right i i want to dive

00:20:49.140 deeper into where the real problems are when we come back and how this is all being utilized by the uh

00:20:56.840 the spread of these campus protests across north america but we have to take a quick break and we'll talk

00:21:02.020 about that when we come back talor one of the things that you know you're talking about how uh

00:21:10.560 widespread social media use is and and yet i still hear other people say despite the fact that as you

00:21:17.520 just pointed out social media traffic is about half of all internet traffic that it is a new source

00:21:23.600 for younger uh people that you've still got people say well you just ignore it it's only social media

00:21:29.760 it doesn't matter it clearly does it absolutely does uh as i mentioned over how as you mentioned

00:21:36.760 over half of the worldwide internet activity for under 30 year olds and increasingly the teenage crowd

00:21:42.520 these platforms are being used anywhere from 40 to 100 hours a week and increasingly so as a news source

00:21:50.020 but more importantly when you look at such a complex issue like israel palestine conflict or more

00:21:56.520 specifically just as jewish neighbors you know we're a small amount of the world population i think

00:22:02.040 that people are more likely to learn about jews and israel on social media than they are likely to

00:22:07.600 meet a jew in their life uh and so in that sense the way that anti-semitism is being normalized in our

00:22:14.720 online spaces uh and that israel rooted anti-semitism and conspiracy theories are being normalized and

00:22:22.160 platformed by social media platforms and getting high levels of engagement this can absolutely be

00:22:28.200 the primary source of information on which somebody would learn about a jew or about israel for that matter

00:22:36.940 so they're highly influential platforms i think that we haven't understood the extent um not only in terms

00:22:45.380 of the way that we're sharing information and our beliefs about our democracies our values and our governments

00:22:50.120 but even psychologically we haven't understood the extent of what social media uh is to us as a society

00:22:57.860 as a humanity we haven't understood it to the fullest extent and to be frank with you um i think that the

00:23:03.680 government's hesitance to come in and regulate this in a very systematic way is really hurting us

00:23:11.740 and might hurt us again with the imminent rollout of chat gpt and generative ai platforms

00:23:19.280 because these platforms which are now going to be relied on in the future as major decision-making models

00:23:26.940 not only on an individual level but on a banking level on a consulting level and even on a government level

00:23:33.740 they're all being fed by online data and we know that we're in the midst of a surge in online

00:23:42.480 online anti-semitism i'm deeply concerned that the chat gpt like platforms and generative ai platforms

00:23:50.300 are actually going to be the next major platformer of jew hatred but on a decision-making level for their

00:23:57.540 highest institutions well we we saw how poorly uh the google uh generative uh ai was working when they

00:24:08.420 released it and it people would say show me a founding father for the united states and you know

00:24:15.060 it was not showing you george washington uh the pope was a uh a south asian woman uh you know and this was

00:24:24.340 done because of the political bent of people who had set it up and they had to pull that and say we need

00:24:32.160 to fix this well imagine that not being fixed and going forward and not just giving people images but

00:24:38.420 giving them information that is fundamentally incorrect that's that's horrific i i want to ask

00:24:44.600 you which uh social media platform gives you the most pause for concern and i'll ask within this context

00:24:52.560 um when did a trip to israel back in january i ended up in jerusalem in the office of uh minister uh

00:25:02.480 amahai chickley who had just his office had just done a study on social media uh was about to be

00:25:09.400 released while they were there they shared it with us and in a couple of things that stood out for us

00:25:15.300 he said he was he's bothered by the anti-semitism and and misinformation on uh twitter or

00:25:22.540 x uh but that he was particularly worried about tiktok because of its impact on the gen z crowd

00:25:30.740 and their data showed and perhaps it came from you uh half an hour a day on tiktok increases your

00:25:39.200 chance of being an anti-semit by 17 well that specific study with i'm familiar with it didn't

00:25:44.880 come from cyber well and i think when people look at social media platforms and addressing many of the

00:25:50.320 social ills that come from social media platforms it's very easy even in the anti-semitism world to

00:25:55.360 say give me the worst platform who's doing the worst job and i think that that's a mistake because

00:26:00.540 every social media platform can do much better on fighting online anti-semitism and each platform

00:26:06.880 kind of struggles with its own challenges and i'll be happy to go into a little bit more detail about

00:26:11.260 that so as i mentioned we're a trusted partner of both meta and tiktok and i want to say openly here

00:26:17.620 that tiktok has actually been one of the most cooperative and transparent platforms to work

00:26:22.720 with i think that they're a younger platform and they're much more open to actually making changes

00:26:28.240 at the platform to do a better job of fighting online anti-semitism that being said they have

00:26:33.920 something called a very aggressive confirmation bias algorithm so if you're engaging in anti-semitic or

00:26:40.360 anti-israel content on tiktok you are much more likely to have that suggested to you

00:26:45.600 in a very aggressive and repetitive way than you are on other platforms if you'll talk to people

00:26:51.220 on tiktok they may tell you that you know tiktok was an entertainment platform nobody thought that

00:26:56.660 it was going to the 30 second video or the one minute video was going to be used for citizen journalism

00:27:01.260 but objectively speaking that's what's being done right tiktok behind uh twitter actually the number

00:27:08.420 of people who cite tiktok as a major news source has doubled in the past two years so we have a very

00:27:14.220 aggressive confirmation bias going on there and we also have a very large user base of southeast asian

00:27:22.000 and a large user base of muslims so all of that information is driving the algorithm to suggest

00:27:27.480 more anti-israel content uh for sure on the other hand as i mentioned we talked about the october 7th

00:27:33.780 attacks the live streaming of the execution and kidnapping of a family directly to their personal

00:27:39.640 accounts that happened on facebook if you look at ajc's recent survey um of anti-semitism in america

00:27:47.320 facebook is actually the number one platform where jews report uh that they're likely to experience

00:27:52.880 online anti-semitism and then over on the x or twitter side of things when musk took over the platform in

00:27:59.640 october 2022 he kind of threw out the rule book on best practices for content moderation on the platform

00:28:08.580 uh that included doing things like now leaving up more hate speech and misinformation than before

00:28:16.120 and saying that he's going to do something along the lines of freedom of speech but not freedom of

00:28:20.520 reach essentially limiting the um amplification or limiting the scope of content that's likely to

00:28:28.180 violate policy but when cyber wall takes a look at how that's applied to online anti-semitism we see that

00:28:34.680 it's not applied in a systematic way specifically on october 7th denial we saw that there were certain

00:28:40.200 instances of that content being removed or restricted when it was coming from kind of nobody accounts but

00:28:46.220 the second that the same exact content was amplified by a verified account it was amplified beyond the

00:28:51.460 amount of users that they had so it was gaining more traction than the users that they had so each

00:28:56.460 platform really does come with its own set of challenges what unites them all is that they could be doing

00:29:03.280 a much better systematic job on it and the thing is it's important to remember and this is why cyber

00:29:09.640 well is so important in this space is that data and technology is really the key to solving uh this

00:29:15.960 issue i like to say that cyber well is kind of an online anti-semitism compliance officer for the social

00:29:22.000 media platforms because we have a deep understanding not only of their policies but how their teams work and

00:29:27.560 what data they need to actually remove this content at scale um and i have seen improvement so if we

00:29:34.280 looked at the rates of removal of anti-semitism from last year it was at about 20 25 percent once it was

00:29:41.980 reported by a user account saying hey here's anti-semitism online please remove it we've actually

00:29:47.060 seen that number uh increase in 2023 by 8.3 percent so now the average rate of removal across social media

00:29:54.980 platforms if online anti-semitism is reported is 32 percent with x actually leading that group at 39

00:30:02.800 percent rate of removal so i do see incremental uh improvement but i do believe that resources and

00:30:09.720 technology are the answer to this before october 7th almost all of the social media platforms reduced

00:30:17.040 their content moderators you have anywhere between 20 000 to 30 000 content moderators maybe 40 000

00:30:23.820 that are supposed to be handling all the toxic content on a given platform and another thing

00:30:28.980 that's really important for listeners to understand toxic content doesn't cover misinformation and

00:30:34.120 disinformation this is something that people don't understand but they should when misinformation and

00:30:39.460 disinformation is reported to a social media platform they're working with third-party fact checkers

00:30:44.920 so they'll send that information off to a fact checker typically it's a reuters or an ap-like organization

00:30:51.240 and that organization is under no obligation to even deal with the misinformation and disinformation

00:30:58.120 that it's sent to them and this is something we ran into with october 7th denial we were recording the

00:31:03.420 october 7th denial that we were seeing and it simply wasn't being picked up by the third-party fact

00:31:07.960 checkers right so you and this is true for any misinformation to disinformation campaign that's

00:31:13.880 anti-democratic literally the platforms aren't even responsible for removing this content themselves

00:31:19.520 as someone whose media outlet has been accused of misinformation and disinformation by the

00:31:27.860 government because we criticized their their policies and our content was immediately removed

00:31:33.540 i i i'm very hesitant on that and and i understand where you're coming from on that there is also the

00:31:42.560 fact that this can be weaponized um and it was by the trudeau government didn't like that we reported

00:31:49.580 one of their policies in a way that was less than flattering to them sure they had our content

00:31:54.380 downplayed and removed it's sure and i i think i think by the way it's dangerous and i i can i can

00:32:00.620 definitely hear that criticism and i can agree that it's dangerous but actually what you're pointing out

00:32:04.620 is that government intervention on the platforms is what's dangerous right so government intervention

00:32:12.360 on the platforms is what dangerous and i think that that's a legitimate criticism i think the way

00:32:16.580 to combat that is really transparent and effective systems that are actually not being done by the

00:32:24.300 government one of the issues here around the misinformation and disinformation treatment

00:32:28.560 on social media platforms is that it's a black box so on some level all of the social media platforms

00:32:35.360 say oh we don't touch misinformation the disinformation that's handled by our third party

00:32:40.540 fact checkers we're under no obligation to even pick up a misinfo disinfo report and deal with it and on

00:32:47.640 the other hand we do know that social media platforms actually do collaborate with the government on various

00:32:52.220 issues you pointed out the trudeau issue i know that there was the twitter files incident with hunter

00:32:57.160 biden that came out after musk took over the platform i really believe that the answer to all of these

00:33:03.240 dangers is really transparent and clear systems and effective regulation that the public is actually

00:33:09.860 very clued into and involved in but the other thing that i want to mention and i think that this is an

00:33:15.040 important point when we think about again the power of social media in this age it is important to

00:33:21.340 differentiate between free speech and paid speech right so what you pointed out is the government

00:33:29.400 intervening in your free speech because it's your criticism of the government that's a classic free

00:33:34.780 speech example but to be frank with you everything that a user would would engage in on a social media

00:33:40.960 platform is paid speech and by that i mean when you're creating content as a user on a social media

00:33:46.940 platform you're participating in a private commercial company that is charged by an algorithm to make

00:33:52.600 money by getting your attention and giving uh returns to advertisers so let's think about it this way

00:33:59.760 you may defend the rights of nazis to march in skokie illinois in the 70s in the united states because

00:34:06.820 that's their constitutional right but you probably wouldn't defend the idea that nazis should go ahead and

00:34:12.060 then march in disneyland why because disneyland is private property and it's a family environment

00:34:17.920 and i think that's how we need to start thinking about these social media platforms these social

00:34:22.580 media platforms over half of the worldwide internet activity increasingly younger and younger users on the

00:34:27.620 platforms it is not the same thing and should not be treated the same way as a hate channel or a porn

00:34:35.300 site right we're never going to get rid of porn on the internet but the porn will always stay in one

00:34:40.140 place on the internet it will be siloed effectively the same thing needs to happen with misinfo disinfo

00:34:45.600 and hate speech on major social media platforms you mentioned when speaking about tiktok a confirmation

00:34:53.120 bias algorithm and they're not alone in having that and as a publisher you know we have used that to our

00:35:00.540 advantage at times in building audiences that are interested in specific topics um i want to ask you how

00:35:08.080 something like biden's letter to america took off because while that happened on tiktok i could

00:35:15.360 actually understand you know if you understand the um the strengths and weaknesses of each social media

00:35:22.900 platform as a publisher which i do um and maybe we're getting too in the weeds for the audience

00:35:27.580 but i i can understand how you could make that take off on all the platforms but as someone that

00:35:33.740 watches this i'm sure you were aghast when you saw osama bin laden's letter to america take off

00:35:40.340 yeah absolutely so i think that what's important to understand about the online climate and this goes

00:35:45.540 not only to the bin laden's letter to america becoming a viral trend but even things like there's

00:35:51.820 a instagram influencer who literally rose to fame on instagram and tiktok by making pro houthi content

00:35:58.340 we're seeing a very pro-terrorism climate online literally a romanticization of terrorism and

00:36:08.440 terrorists online that then translates into real action and even protests for example on u.s college

00:36:16.740 campuses um this is something that i think again goes to this issue of there needs to be a check on

00:36:23.960 social media platforms especially when it comes to national security interests i think the pro-terror

00:36:28.900 climate that we're seeing online is very indicative of that and just so your listeners know as well

00:36:34.720 this is kind of we talk about getting too much in the weeds but the the decisions that happens that

00:36:40.340 on these platforms actually affect all of us so even meta right now got a recommendation from their

00:36:46.140 oversight board which is like the supreme court of meta to start normalizing and using allowing for the

00:36:53.160 the word shaheed meaning martyr to be used as a term of praise in conjunction with a known terror

00:37:00.720 organization or a terrorist up until now meta has taken the word shaheed and when that appears next to a

00:37:08.160 known terror organization or terrorist they have removed it because it's highly likely to be praising

00:37:12.780 terrorism comes along the supreme court of meta that has a whole lot of explanation about why shaheed

00:37:19.340 doesn't always mean martyr it could mean witness it could mean the name of god in islam but what for

00:37:27.020 sure is true is that if it appears next to a terror organization or terrorists then it's praising that

00:37:32.280 action and literally nada at the end of this month now has to respond to the recommendation to leave that

00:37:38.920 content up so we're seeing two very bizarre things happen we have a very clearly pro-terrorist

00:37:44.900 and pro-terrorism climate online that is translating into our streets meanwhile there are politically

00:37:52.260 correct decision makers that are making decisions that are governing these platforms and kind of allowing

00:37:57.960 this pro-terror climate to actually um continue and on the online anti-semitism side of this we didn't

00:38:06.720 only see it um when it comes to pro-terror content that was calling on uh specifically glorifying

00:38:13.260 abu beida who is the spokesperson of hamas the hamas media spokesperson and having young gen zers quote

00:38:20.880 him literally on their tiktoks that are you know one video is talking about graduation the next crew the

00:38:26.920 next video is quoting abu beida um they wear his image on shirts on cell phone cases everything here in

00:38:34.820 toronto it's yes it's unreal so all of this content and influence that's going through the social media

00:38:41.620 platforms to me it seems like it is manifesting itself in these student protests that have popped up

00:38:50.120 across the united states now popping up across canada uh in two ways one it allows them to organize

00:38:56.660 two you've got a willing and open um public that's buying into it and so the organizers are one thing but

00:39:07.120 then you've got all these people who are just now open to this idea that they may not have thought

00:39:11.920 about before yeah absolutely and it's not only open to the idea again it's a passionate glorification

00:39:17.060 and heroification of these terrorists right charlotte cates from semi-dune who you mentioned at the

00:39:23.960 beginning of this conversation is a fantastic example of that but it's now iconicizing terror

00:39:31.560 terror organizations terror actions and normalizing them as some kind of resistance or struggle against

00:39:39.620 the man right or struggle against oppression when in fact these are radical islamic terrorists who would

00:39:47.880 like nothing more than to bring the same barbarism and terrorism to western democracies as well and that's

00:39:55.820 because they're backed by iran their proxies of iran who say very openly that this is our ultimate goal

00:40:02.160 death to israel death to america and death to america is now something that has reached the american

00:40:09.140 streets is being openly said at uh protests in in michigan uh glory to our martyrs is now being said

00:40:17.040 at protests on campus so i wish it was just the idea that people may be open i'm more concerned about

00:40:23.840 the fact that people are passionately engaged around these issues and when i see these uh american

00:40:31.900 students who wouldn't know better and who are being arrested by police for unlawful um activity they are

00:40:40.360 in shock they are in absolute shock that this is happening to them and the thing that we need to

00:40:46.340 really address kind of going forward i don't think that we should just leave this event as oh this was you

00:40:52.640 know a temporary moment of widespread mania and people being really ignorant and stupid no these

00:41:00.980 people just had a traumatic emotional moment and they were arrested for going and backing an idea that

00:41:06.200 was a stupid idea it's up to us as a society and i think partially to our governments to have really

00:41:11.960 frank discussions about what happened and to the universities to actually do some deprogramming because

00:41:18.000 what you're seeing is the result of programming and brainwashing between the anti-semitism in the

00:41:25.420 humanities departments at these campuses and social media platforms it's the perfect storm

00:41:30.400 being brainwashed for over a decade and that's not going to go away and it's not going to stop with

00:41:35.740 hostility against jews and i think that that's really important to pay attention to talor thank you very

00:41:41.220 much for your time and for the work that you do at cyber well thank you so much for having me brian

00:41:45.840 full comment is a post media podcast my name is brian lily your host this episode was produced by

00:41:52.980 andre prue theme music by bryce hall kevin libin is the executive producer remember you can subscribe

00:41:58.460 on apple podcast spotify amazon music wherever you get your podcast help us out by giving us a rating

00:42:04.880 leaving us a review and telling your friends about us thanks for listening until next time i'm brian lily

00:42:11.220 you

Full Comment - May 13, 2024

TikTok terror： How Hamas successfully hijacked your social media

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