Washington shows the morals of a clumsy spammer

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Rakuen Growlithe
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Washington shows the morals of a clumsy spammer

#1

Post by Rakuen Growlithe »

The title comes from a quote by Jeff Jarvis on the story but I think it makes a good title. The US military is working on creating a spy programme called Operation Ernest Voice (OEV) where they manipulate social media sites in order to promote specific views.

The programme is meant "to counter extremist ideology and propaganda, and to ensure that credible voices in the region are heard."
That's noble enough, extremist ideology is a huge problem and we should combat propaganda that promotes such destructive views but the programme fails morally by itself being nothing more than propaganda. How can you claim to be "first with the truth" when you are presenting that truth through a lie?

Effectively all the military is doing is creating a large number of sock-puppet accounts, with one serviceman able to control about 10 at a time. This would allow them to create the illusion of an opinion having a much broader support base than it actually does and so influence people's choices. The problem is that this isn't even close to ethical. Most sites have rules against creating multiple accounts and people have even faced prosecution for making sock-puppets.

These problems are not lost on the military who says that they will not "target U.S. audiences, and we [will] not conduct these activities on sites owned by U.S. companies." But, apparently, the ideals that lead to treating their own citizens in such a way do not extend the same rights citizens of other countries. Even with their assurances how much trust can you put in their words when they are actively seeking to deceive? I wouldn't put much trust in someone who promised not to lie to me while I watched them lie easily to someone else.

This goes back to the idea of idea of internet anonymity. It is good inasmuch as it allows people protection when giving a minority view but it should not be abused in such a way as to deliberately seek to deceive people. I support countering extremist ideology but I believe that should be done in an honest way through discussion, not through the covert manipulation of data.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/20 ... l-networks
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/201 ... -psycholo/
"If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind."
~John Stuart Mill~

“Give me the liberty to know, to utter, and to argue freely according to conscience, above all liberties.”
~John Milton~
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