Were there any Russian trolls or bot around?

In another thread about Brennan and company, a couple of our posters brought up a Russian trolls/Russian bot thing. I must have missed all those discussions in the old forum. Anyone care to bring me up to speed on this notion?

I have always thought that the Mods have done a great job policing the forum and had technical ways to seach out trolls and malcontents who abused the Forum. Just asking if anyone could shed light on this topic, or, is it a figment on an over emotional pipe dream?

Only serious discussions need apply.

Our mods do a great job indeed. I don’t know if there were non-human bots, but there are at least two OPs that I recall from posters with single digit counts, syntax full of mistakes that most native speakers don’t make. Both were extremely inflammatory, covering multiple unrelated subjects and culminating in warnings of civil war. Both were laughed at by all the posters who replied regardless of political affiliation.

I can’t describe it well without access to the posts but they were really obvious and trying too hard.

1 Like

There was a poster that I immediately identified as a troll from a foreign country, mostly for the reasons described above.

Supposedly it was confirmed via Facebook or Twitter that said poster was indeed a troll.

It’s not the bots we have to worried about. It’s the real live people who work for troll farms and who are actually highly educated in our language and mannerisms (some of these troll farms have large budgets expressly to teach the trolls to blend in).

2 Likes

There has been several trolls and malcontents kicked from the forum since 2005. Just recently libs have been raising the Russian Bot flag. Jayjay crackpots will always be around.

found em… the bots that sow discord and division through lies sent out to the public. Not sure of their nationality… but they are employed at NYT.

2 Likes

It’s not a “Russian bot flag”.

There are indeed large troll farms and bot activities financed by Russia. It’s confirmed. Not even close to a controversial accusation.

Another forum member insinuated I was a Russian troll during the campaign. I think that you may over dramatic on this, JayJay

Jayjay there will always be trolls, crackpots, and malcontents hang around. We just have to be alert and get the mods to neutralize them. I can see what you are sayin, though.

There is certainly a rush by some to label people as Russian bots or trolls. Sadly, the insane opinions we sometimes see from CEC poisoned conservatives are often hard to distinguish from people who are just paid to antagonize.

But yeah, these is definitely an ongoing attempt by outside forces to spread misinformation and discord in this country. It’s up to each and every person to be a little more diligent about what they accept as fact. especially in a political climate in which lying by this administration is basically the default response to any controversy.

This story was posted in the old forum.

You summed it up, Bro. Were there not and foreign agents working the forum?

A second version of what I posted above from Mother Jones.

Mother Jones is a great news source. :smile:

1 Like

I have absolutely no idea. In the grand scheme of things, I don’t think the Sean Hannity Political forum and it’s few hundred users likely ranked especially high on the list of social media targets to exploit. We definitely had/have our fair share of trolls who go out of their way not to approach issues from a perspective even approaching reality.

1 Like

How is someone making an accusation against you in any ways relevant to what I posted?

:point_up_2:

I have noticed that Hannity’s tweet responses are loaded with pro-Trump responses from obvious Russian/Ukrainian trolls.

Don’t know about direct troll/bot participation, but I do know of several instances of tweets or content from documented Russian troll accounts that were posted to the old forum.