How do the Chinese Communists create support in for their criminal regime? They pay a network of influencers to flood social media with propaganda messages.
It is information warfare.
From The Sydney Morning Herald:
“They are building up a group of foreigners who are ready at critical juncture points to stand up for China,” says Fergus Ryan, a researcher for the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI).
Eryk Bagshaw. “China paid this Australian influencer. He was told to pick a fight with Mack Horton”.
In this story, the foreign influencers are directed back at the Chinese people:
They are then transformed by Chinese state media into “objective observers of Western societies, maintaining the credibility of the state’s narrative within the confines of the Great Firewall”, Ryan says.
But, it is clear that buying influencers is cheap, and such people are hired for every audience that needs to be targeted. Consider the recent success of the terrorist group Hamas in soliciting international support. Combating false narratives and breaking people out of their echo chambers will be a difficult task. The Chinazis are ready to exploit the weaknesses in our systems and we need to at least realize how well organized they are in this effort. And then…