Twitter Takes Down Beijing-Backed Influence Operation Pushing Coronavirus Messages

🐦Twitter on Thursday said it removed more than 170,000 accounts tied to a Beijing-backed influence operation that deceptively spread messages favorable to the Chinese government, including about the coronavirus.

The company suspended a core network of 23,750 highly active accounts, as well as a larger network of about 150,000 “amplifier” accounts used to boost the core accounts’ content.

🐦Twitter, along with researchers who analyzed the accounts, said the network was largely an echo chamber of fake accounts without much further traction.

The company also removed two smaller state-backed operations which it attributed to Russia and Turkey, both focused on domestic audiences.

🐦Twitter said the Chinese network had links to an earlier state-backed operation dismantled last year by 🐦Twitter, Facebook <FB.O> and Google’s YouTube <GOOGL.O> that had been pushing misleading narratives about political dynamics in Hong Kong.

The new operation likewise focused heavily on Hong Kong, but also promoted messages about the coronavirus pandemic, exiled Chinese billionaire Guo Wengui and Taiwan, the researchers said.

Renee DiResta, at the Stanford Internet Observatory, said the network’s coronavirus activity ramped up in late January, as the outbreak spread beyond China, and spiked in March.