Notes

 

 1. THE WAR BEGINS

1 “It was an extraordinary”: George Orwell, Homage to Catalonia (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2015), 33.

1 “Be sure to tune in”: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), “Be sure to tune in and watch Donald Trump on Late Night with David Letterman as he presents the Top Ten List tonight!,” Twitter, May 4, 2009, 11:54 A.M., https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1698308935.

1 18 million users: “US Twitter Usage Surpasses Earlier Estimates,” eMarketer, September 14, 2009, https://www.emarketer.com/Article/US-Twitter-Usage-Surpasses-Earlier-Estimates/1007271.

2 surged to a record: Maggie Shiels, “Web Slows After Jackson’s Death,” BBC News, June 26, 2009, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8120324.stm.

2 $1.2 billion: Russ Buettner and Charles V. Bagli, “How Donald Trump Bankrupted His Atlantic City Casinos, but Still Earned Millions,” New York Times, June 11, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/12/nyregion/donald-trump-atlantic-city.html.

2 banished him: Andrew Bary, “More Troubles in Trump Land,” Barron’s, April 30, 2011, https://www.barrons.com/articles/SB50001424052970203579804576285341283000706?mg=prod/accounts-barrons.

2 75th most watched: Steve Johnson, “Donald Trump a ‘Reality Star Genius’? TV Ratings Tell Different Story,” Chicago Tribune, February 2, 2016, http://www.chicagotribune.com/entertainment/tv/ct-donald-trump-not-a-reality-star-genius-20160201-column.html.

2 ratings were plummeting: “Final 2009–10 Broadcast Primetime Show Average Viewership,” TV by the Numbers, June 16, 2010, http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/broadcast/final-2009-10-broadcast-primetime-show-average-viewership/54336/.

2 beneath his shock-blond: Ashley Feinberg, “Is Donald Trump’s Hair a $60,000 Weave? A Gawker Investigation [Updated],” Gawker, May 24, 2016, http://gawker.com/is-donald-trump-s-hair-a-60-000-weave-a-gawker-invest-1777581357.

2 “Don’t be afraid”: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), “‘Don’t be afraid of being unique—it’s like being afraid of your best self.’—Donald J. Trump http://tinyurl.com/pqpfvm,” Twitter, May 17, 2009, 8:00 A.M., https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/1826225450.

2 Trump’s Twitter messages: In 2009, 59 messages; in 2010, 142; in 2011, 774; and in 2012, 3,531. Trump Twitter Archive, http://www.trumptwitterarchive.com/archive.

2 soon reached into: David Robinson, “Text Analysis of Trump’s Tweets Confirms He Writes Only the (Angrier) Android Half,” Variance Explained (blog), August 9, 2016, http://varianceexplained.org/r/trump-tweets/.

3 Trump issued screeds: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), “What a convenient mistake: @BarackObama issued a statement for Kwanza but failed to issue one for Christmas,” Twitter, December 28, 2011, 8:02 A.M., https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/152056935712169984.

3 whom he’d praised: Friga Garza, “Remember When Donald Trump Said ‘I Really Like’ President Obama in 2009?,” Complex, July 13, 2015, http://www.complex.com/pop-culture/2015/07/donald-trump-i-really-like-obama.

3 directing his Twitter followers: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), “Busy doing phoners this week with Neil Cavuto, Wolf Blitzer, Fox & Friends, and Larry Kudlow . . . check out http://shouldtrumprun.com/,” Twitter, January 21, 2011, 9:20 A.M., https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/28502098983260160.

3 “Let’s take a closer look”: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), “Let’s take a closer look at that birth certificate. @BarackObama was described in 2003 as being ‘born in Kenya,’” Twitter, May 18, 2012, 12:31 P.M., https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/203568571148800001.

3 tiny bursts of dopamine: Amy B. Wang, “Former Facebook VP Says Social Media Is Destroying Society with ‘Dopamine-Driven Feedback Loops,’” Washington Post, December 12, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/12/12/former-facebook-vp-says-social-media-is-destroying-society-with-dopamine-driven-feedback-loops/?utm_term=.7fab7098c0aa.

3 some 15,000 tweets: Compiled from Trump’s use of “Twitter for Android.” See Trump Twitter Archive, http://www.trumptwitterarchive.com/archive.

3 nine-tenths of Americans: Bruce Mehlman, “Washington Update: The Race Gets Real,” Mehlman Castagnetti Rosen & Thomas, mailer to clients and friends, April 15, 2016.

4 300 million active users: Lara O’Reilly, “Twitter Beats on Revenue and Earnings but Confirms Layoffs,” Business Insider, October 27, 2016, http://www.businessinsider.com/twitter-q3-earnings-2016-10.

4 “I am honered”: Daniel Politi, “Trump Deletes One of First Tweets as President After Writing He Is ‘Honered’ to Serve,” The Slatest (blog), Slate, January 21, 2017, http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/01/21/trump_deletes_tweet_after_writing_he_is_honered_to_serve.html.

4 dusty pickup trucks: Matthew Mosk, Brian Ross, and Alex Hosenball, “US Officials Ask How ISIS Got So Many Toyota Trucks,” ABC News, October 6, 2015, http://abcnews.go.com/International/us-officials-isis-toyota-trucks/story?id=34266539.

5 boosting the invaders’ messages: J. M. Berger, “How ISIS Games Twitter,” The Atlantic, June 16, 2014, http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/06/isis-iraq-twitter-social-media-strategy/372856/.

5 top-trending hashtag: Ibid.

5 three-quarters of Iraqis: Ghayth Ali Jarad, “The Potential of Developing Iraq Smartphone Market as an Emerging and Lucrative Market,” British Journal of Marketing Studies 2, no. 2 (2014): 37–42, http://www.eajournals.org/wp-content/uploads/The-potential-of-developing-Iraq-smartphone-market-as-an-emerging-and-lucrative-market.pdf.

5 nearly 4 million: “Iraq Internet Users,” Internet Live Stats, accessed March 15, 2018, http://www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users/iraq/.

5 metropolis of 1.8 million: Mustafa Habib, “Did They or Didn’t They? Iraqi Army Did Not Desert Mosul, They Were Ordered to Leave,” Niqash, http://www.niqash.org/en/articles/security/3461/.

6 25,000-strong garrison: Ned Parker, Isabel Coles, and Raheem Salman, “Special Report: How Mosul Fell—An Iraqi General Disputes Baghdad’s Story,” Reuters, October 14, 2014, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-mideast-crisis-gharawi-special-report-idUSKCN0I30Z820141014.

6 the roughly 10,000: Ibid.

6 Thousands of soldiers: Habib, “Did They or Didn’t They?”

6 Humvees: Nick Robins-Early, “Iraqi Prime Minister Says ISIS Seized 2,300 Humvees When It Took Mosul,” Huffington Post, June 1, 2015, http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/01/iraq-isis-humvees_n_7487254.html.

6 M1A1 battle tanks: Richard Sisk, “ISIS Captures Hundreds of U.S. Vehicles and Tanks in Ramadi from Iraqis,” Military.com, http://www.military.com/daily-news/2015/05/20/isis-captures-hundreds-of-us-vehicles-and-tanks-in-ramadi-from-i.html.

6 half dozen Black Hawk helicopters: “Terror’s New Headquarters,” The Economist, June 14, 2014, http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21604160-iraqs-second-city-has-fallen-group-wants-create-state-which-wage-jihad.

7 5 million soldiers: Hugh Schofield, “The WW2 Soldiers France Has Forgotten,” BBC News, June 4, 2015, http://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-32956736.

7 60 massive fortresses: “Maginot Line,” History.com, 2009, http://www.history.com/topics/world-war-ii/maginot-line.

7 precise new battle plans: Robert O. Paxton, “It Wasn’t Just Morale,” New York Review of Books, February 15, 2007, http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2007/02/15/it-wasnt-just-morale/.

8 “Many instructions”: Marc Bloch, Strange Defeat (Stellar Books, 2013), 132.

8 by one of us: See P. W. Singer and Allan Friedman, Cybersecurity and Cyberwar: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press, 2014).

9 30,000 foreigners: Martin Chulov, Jamie Grierson, and Jon Swaine, “Isis Faces Exodus of Foreign Fighters as Its ‘Caliphate’ Crumbles,” The Guardian, April 26, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/26/isis-exodus-foreign-fighters-caliphate-crumbles.

9 more than a dozen: Tim Lister et al., “ISIS Goes Global: 143 Attacks in 29 Countries Have Killed 2,043,” CNN, February 12, 2018, http://www.cnn.com/2015/12/17/world/mapping-isis-attacks-around-the-world/index.html.

9 more frightened of terrorism: Andrew McGill, “Americans Are More Worried About Terrorism Than They Were After 9/11,” The Atlantic, September 8, 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/american-terrorism-fears-september-11/499004/.

9 “Twitter wars”: “Israel and Hamas Wage Twitter War over Gaza Conflict,” BBC News, November 15, 2012, http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-20339546.

9 influenced the targets: Thomas Zeitzoff, “Does Social Media Influence Conflict? Evidence from the 2012 Gaza Conflict,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 62, no. 1 (2016): 35.

10 portable cellphone towers: Ben Kesling and Ali A. Nabhan, “Iraqi Forces Seek Help by Restoring Mosul Cellphone Service,” Wall Street Journal, November 1, 2016, https://www.wsj.com/articles/iraqis-seek-help-in-mosul-by-restoring-cell-phone-service-1478030760?tesla=y.

10 grinning selfies: Iraqi PMU English (@pmu_english), “#Iraqi soldiers taking #selfies as an #ISIS suicide truck is detonated during their mission to liberate #Mosul from #ISIS. #selfiewars,” Twitter, October 20, 2016, 3:38 P.M. (tweet deleted).

10 #FreeMosul: Kurdistan Regional Government, “Mosul Liberation Operation Starts—Statement by Kurdistan Region General Command of Peshmerga Forces,” news release, October 17, 2016, http://cabinet.gov.krd/a/d.aspx?s=040000&l=12&a=55018.

10 pretend ISIS propagandists: Patrick Tucker, “How Special Operators Trained for Psychological Warfare Before the Mosul Fight,” Defense One, November 14, 2016, http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2016/11/how-special-operators-trained-Psychological-warfare-mosul-fight/133166/.

10 shot down a drone: Iraqi News, “#Iraqi forces bring down #ISIS drone near #Mosul,” Facebook, November 2, 2016, November 2, 2016, https://www.facebook.com/IraqNews/posts/1497246236957690?comment_id=1497262060289441&comment_tracking=%7B%22tn%22%3A%22R0%22%7D.

10 livestreamed the whole thing: Hemin Lihony, “Rudaw: A Pioneer in War Coverage Through Livestream,” Rudaw, October 19, 2016, http://www.rudaw.net/english/opinion/19102016.

10 tens of thousands: Ibid.

11 “I helped rescue them”: Hannah Lynch, “Twitter-Sourced Rescue Ops Saving Civilian Lives in Mosul,” Rudaw, March 16, 2017, http://www.rudaw.net/english/middleeast/iraq/160320172.

12 He’d made disparaging: Jeff Mayes, “Germel Dossie Now Charged with Murder for Allegedly Shooting Clifton Frye over Facebook Posts,” Chicago Sun-Times, June 30, 2015, http://homicides.suntimes.com/2015/06/30/germel-dossie-now-charged-with-murder-for-allegedly-shooting-clifton-frye-over-facebook-posts/.

12 killed by gang violence: Madison Park, “Chicago Police Count Fewer Murders in 2017, but Still 650 People Were Killed,” CNN, January 1, 2018, https://www.cnn.com/2018/01/01/us/chicago-murders-2017-statistics/index.html.

12 “settling personal scores”: Larry Yellen, “‘Cyberbanging’: Personal Attacks Online Contributing to Chicago Gang Violence,” Fox 32, October 20, 2015, http://www.fox32chicago.com/news/chicago-at-the-tipping-point/36651505-story.

12 “cybertag” and “cyberbang”: “Gangs Rely on Social Media to Communicate,” UPI, January 27, 2012, http://www.upi.com/Science_News/Technology/2012/01/27/Gangs-rely-on-social-media-to-communicate/61461327673197/.

12 The “cyber” version: Annie Sweeney, “Gangs Increasingly Challenge Rivals Online with Postings, Videos,” Chicago Tribune, August 17, 2015, http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/breaking/ct-gangs-violence-internet-banging-met-20150814-story.html.

13 Digital sociologists describe: Eric Gordon and Adriana de Souza e Silva, Net Locality: Why Location Matters in a Networked World (Wiley-Blackwell, 2011), 3.

13 The difference in being online: Sweeney, “Gangs Increasingly Challenge Rivals Online.”

13 80 percent of the fights: Ben Austen, “Public Enemies: Social Media Is Fueling Gang Wars in Chicago,” Wired, September 17, 2013, https://www.wired.com/2013/09/gangs-of-social-media/.

13 regional variants: Sweeney, “Gangs Increasingly Challenge Rivals Online.”

13 “I’m going to catch you”: Ibid.

13 “haters ten miles north”: Austen, “Public Enemies.”

13 allows any individual: Sweeney, “Gangs Increasingly Challenge Rivals Online.”

14 “your dead boy’s candles”: Ibid.

14 “causing people to die”: Kim Brunhuber, “L.A. Gangs Using Social Media to Terrorize Communities,” CBC News, August 8, 2015, http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/l-a-gangs-using-social-media-to-terrorize-communities-1.3181678.

14 shareable music videos: Manuel Roig-Franzia, “Mexican Drug Cartels Leave a Bloody Trail on YouTube,” Washington Post, April 9, 2007, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/08/AR2007040801005.html.

14 dueling Instagram posts: Alasdair Baverstock, “Narcos at (Instagram) War! From Guns and Girls to Big Cats and Big Piles of Cash, El Chapo’s Sons Spark Social Media Battles Between Mexican Cartel Members Showing Off Their Sickening Wealth,” Daily Mail, September 15, 2015, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3226232/Narcos-Instagram-war-guns-girls-big-cats-big-piles-cash-El-Chapo-s-sons-spark-social-media-battles-Mexican-cartel-members-showing-sickening-wealth.html.

14 El Salvadoran drug gangs: Robert Muggah and Steven Dudley, “Digital Tough Guys,” Foreign Affairs, November 2, 2015, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/el-salvador/2015-11-02/digital-tough-guys.

14 fragile 2016 peace: Charlotte Mitchell, “Colombia: Fragile Peace a Year After FARC Referendum,” Al Jazeera, October 2, 2017, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2017/10/colombia-fragile-peace-year-farc-referendum-171002065629390.html.

14 rifles for smartphones: Ramón Campos Iriarte, “The Revolution Will Be Whatsapped,” Mobilisation Lab, August 15, 2017, https://mobilisationlab.org/colombia-path-revolution-whatsapp/.

15 “with data plans”: Ibid.

15 first “social media president”: “Rappler, Twitter Launch #PresidentDuterte Emoji,” Rappler, July 1, 2016, https://www.rappler.com/technology/social-media/138238-president-duterte-twitter-emoji-hashflag.

15 a custom emoji: Ibid.

15 a brutal crackdown: Adrian Chen, “When a Populist Demagogue Takes Power,” The New Yorker, November 21, 2016, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/11/21/when-a-populist-demagogue-takes-power.

15 discrediting journalists: Lauren Etter, “What Happens When the Government Uses Facebook as a Weapon?,” Bloomberg Businessweek, December 7, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-12-07/how-rodrigo-duterte-turned-facebook-into-a-weapon-with-a-little-help-from-facebook.

15 sowed false stories: Maria A. Ressa, “Propaganda War: Weaponizing the Internet,” Rappler, October 3, 2016, https://www.rappler.com/nation/148007-propaganda-war-weaponizing-internet.

15 more than 12,000 people: “Philippines: Duterte’s ‘Drug War’ Claims 12,000+ Lives,” Human Rights Watch, January 18, 2018, https://www.hrw.org/news/2018/01/18/philippines-dutertes-drug-war-claims-12000-lives.

15 Israelis and the Palestinian Authority: Hayes Brown, “So It Looks Like the Israelis and Palestinians Have Taken Their Beef to Twitter,” BuzzFeed, April 5, 2016, https://www.buzzfeed.com/hayesbrown/so-it-looks-like-the-israelis-and-palestinians-have-taken-th?utm_term=.rbRkqQAqZ2#.bpyjaROaGN.

16 dueling “Facebook militias”: Francisco Perez, “Graphic Campaign Puts Violence in Kashmir in Social Media Fore,” Deutsche Welle, July 26, 2016, http://www.dw.com/en/graphic-campaign-puts-violence-in-kashmir-in-social-media-fore/a-19428356.

16 launching online “expeditions”: Anne Henochowicz, “Minitrue: Trolling Tsai Ing-Wen Beyond the Great Firewall,” China Digital Times, January 22, 2016, https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/01/minitrue-trolling-tsai-ing-wen-beyond-great-firewall/.

16 constantly pushing: Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian and Fergus Ryan, “‘Stop Boasting and Fight,’” Tea Leaf Nation (blog), Foreign Policy, October 27, 2015, https://foreignpolicy.com/2015/10/27/china-south-china-sea-nationalism-united-states-navy-lassen/.

16 Attending a U.S. military: Chinese crisis simulation, Washington, DC, 2016.

16 limiting leaders’ options: Roundtable (not for attribution), Washington, DC, 2016. See also Center for Strategic and International Studies, “Global Security Forum 2013: A Simulated Crisis in East Asia” (Washington, DC, November 6, 2013).

17 “continuation of political intercourse”: Carl von Clausewitz, On War, ed. and trans. Michael Howard and Peter Paret (Princeton University Press, 2008), 605.

17 “In essentials”: Ibid.

17 “into the subsequent peace”: Ibid.

18 act of force: Joseph L. Strange and Richard Iron, “Center of Gravity: What Clausewitz Really Meant” (report, National Defense University, Washington, DC, 2004), http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a520980.pdf.

18 “center of gravity”: Clausewitz, On War, 184.

18 “The moral elements”: Ibid.

18 6.5 million tons: “General Statistics Vietnam War,” 103 Field Battery RAA, http://www.103fieldbatteryraa.net/documents/74.html.

18 killed tens of thousands: Tom Valentine, “How Many People Died in the Vietnam War?,” Vietnam War, April 11, 2014, http://thevietnamwar.info/how-many-people-died-in-the-vietnam-war/.

18 loved to laugh: Harold Graves, War on the Short Wave (Foreign Policy Association, 1941), 26.

19 Twitter cofounder: David Streitfeld, “‘The Internet Is Broken’: @ev Is Trying to Salvage It,” New York Times, May 20, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/20/technology/evan-williams-medium-twitter-internet.html.

20 some light treason: Michael D. Shear and Adam Goldman, “Michael Flynn Pleads Guilty to Lying to the F.B.I. and Will Cooperate with Russia Inquiry,” New York Times, December 1, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/12/01/us/politics/michael-flynn-guilty-russia-investigation.html.

 

 2. EVERY WIRE A NERVE

24 “You ask what I am?”: Ray Bradbury, “I Sing the Body Electric!,” in I Sing the Body Electric! Stories by Ray Radbury (Random House, 1969).

24 “What is Internet”: “1994: ‘Today Show’: ‘What Is the Internet, Anyway?,’” YouTube video, 01:26, uploaded by Jason Miklacic, January 28, 2015, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlJku_CSyNg.

24 Roughly half the world’s: Assuming 7.6 billion. “Current World Population,” Worldometers, accessed March 16, 2018, http://www.worldometers.info/world-population/.

24 never stop being online: Andrew Perrin and Jingjing Jiang, “About a Quarter of U.S. Adults Say They Are ‘Almost Constantly’ Online,” FactTank (blog), Pew Research Center, March 14, 2018, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/12/08/one-fifth-of-americans-report-going-online-almost-constantly/.

25 “In a few years”: J.C.R. Licklider and Robert W. Taylor, “The Computer as a Communication Device,” Science and Technology, April 1968, http://urd.let.rug.nl/~welling/cc/licklider-taylor%5B1%5D.pdf.

26 Intergalactic Computer Network: Ibid.

26 “surely the boon”: Ibid.

26 “Every particle”: John Archibald Wheeler, “It from Bit,” quoted in James Gleick, The Information: A History, a Theory, a Flood (Pantheon, 2011), 356.

26 “competitor to ourselves”: Johnny Ryan, A History of the Internet and the Digital Future (Reaktion Books, 2010), loc. 207, Kindle.

27 350 miles: Ibid., loc. 489.

28 two Bibles a year: Max Roser, “Books,” published online at OurWorldInData.org, 2015, retrieved from https://ourworldindata.org/data/media-communication/books/, accessed March 16, 2018, https://web.archive.org/web/20160412190622/https://ourworldindata.org/data/media-communication/books/.

28 first invented in China: Johanna Neuman, Lights, Camera, War: Is Media Technology Driving International Politics? (St. Martin’s, 1996), 55.

28 his mass-produced Bibles: Ibid.

28 resorted to printing: Clay Shirky, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations (New York: Penguin, 2008), 68..

28 some 200 million: Eltjo Buringh and Jan Luiten van Zanden, “Charting the ‘Rise of the West’: Manuscripts and Printed Books in Europe, a Long-Term Perspective from the Sixth Through Eighteenth Centuries” (unpublished paper, n.d.), https://socialhistory.org/sites/default/files/docs/projects/books500-1800.pdf.

28 sold 300,000 copies: Johanna Neuman, “The Media’s Impact on International Affairs, Then and Now,” SAIS Review 16, no. 1 (1996): 109–23.

28 collection of “news advice”: Johannes Weber, “Straßburg, 1605: The Origins of the Newspaper in Europe,” German History 24 (2006): 387–412.

29 “Mrs. Silence Dogood”: “The Birth of Silence Dogood,” Massachusetts Historical Society, https://www.masshist.org/online/silence_dogood/essay.php?entry_id=203.

29 26.2-mile distance: “The History of the Marathon,” Exercise the Right to Read, http://www.exercisetherighttoread.org/historyofmarathon.pdf.

29 “Nikomen!”: Plutarch, “De Gloria Atheniensium,” in Moralia, vol. 4, trans. F. C. Babbitt (Loeb Classical Library Edition, 1936), http://penelope.uchicago.edu/Thayer/E/Roman/Texts/Plutarch/Moralia/De_gloria_Atheniensium*.html.

29 “bursting his heart”: Robert Browning, “Pheidippides,” PoemHunter.com, https://www.poemhunter.com/poem/pheidippides-2/.

29 fifty miles per day: A. M. Ramsay, “The Speed of the Roman Imperial Post,” Journal of Roman Studies 15, no. 1 (1925): 60–74.

29 meaning “far writer”: Tom Standage, The Victorian Internet: The Remarkable Story of the Telegraph and the Nineteenth Century’s On-Line Pioneers (Walker, 2014), 9, e-book.

29 Morse spent years: Tom Wheeler, “The First Wired President,” Opinionator (blog), New York Times, May 24, 2012, https://opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/05/24/the-first-wired-president/?_r=0.

30 650,000 miles of wire: Standage, The Victorian Internet, 102.

30 “ten million hands”: Neuman, Lights, Camera, War, 30.

30 “the peacemaker of the age”: Standage, The Victorian Internet, 186.

30 “diffuse religion”: Nigel Linge, “The Trans-Atlantic Telegraph Cable 150th Anniversary Celebration, 1858–2008,” University of Salford, http://www.cntr.salford.ac.uk/comms/transatlanticstory.php.

31 “It gives you”: Standage, The Victorian Internet, 153.

31 yellow-colored comics: J. Hoberman, “When the Yellow Press Got Color,” NYR Daily (blog), New York Review of Books, December 31, 2013, http://www.nybooks.com/daily/2013/12/31/early-comics-society-is-nix/.

31 “You furnish the pictures”: Neuman, Lights, Camera, War, 43.

31 “No Fake War News”: Adrienne LaFrance, “How the Fake News Crisis of 1896 Explains Trump,” The Atlantic, January 19, 2017, https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/01/the-fake-news-crisis-120-years-ago/513710/?utm_source=feed.

31 number to call: “This Day in History: 1877, Hayes Has First Phone Installed in White House,” History.com, http://www.history.com/this-day-in-history/hayes-has-first-phone-installed-in-white-house.

32 first to build: Anthony Brown, Great Ideas in Communication (D. White, 1969), 141.

32 aggressively peddled it: Marc Raboy, Marconi: The Man Who Networked the World (Oxford University Press, 2016), 423.

32 played “O Holy Night”: Neuman, Lights, Camera, War, 137.

32 20 million radio listeners: Ibid., 139.

32 just ten minutes: Ibid., 140.

32 four-fifths of American households: Ibid., 149.

32 divert the news: Ibid., 151.

32 “It would not”: Joseph Goebbels, “The Radio as the Eighth Great Power,” in Signals of the New Era: 25 Selected Speeches by Dr. Joseph Goebbels (Munich: Zentralverlag der NSDAP, 1938).

33 nearly a thousand: Neuman, Lights, Camera, War, 148.

33 “propagandistic casus belli”: Roy Godson and James J. Wirtz, Strategic Denial and Deception: The Twenty-First Century Challenge (Transaction, 2011), 100.

33 “Around the world”: Donald M. Bishop, “Classic Quotable: Robert D. Leigh on the Aims of Broadcasting During World War II (1944),” Public Diplomacy Council, http://www.publicdiplomacycouncil.org/commentaries/10-13-15/classic-quotable-robert-d-leigh-aims-broadcasting-during-world-war-ii-1944 (page deleted).

33 ventriloquist’s dummy: Andrew Liszewski, “TVs in the 1920s Had Bottle Cap–Sized Screens, with Just 30 Lines of Resolution,” Gizmodo, January 16, 2017, http://gizmodo.com/in-1929-tvs-had-bottle-cap-sized-screens-with-just-30-l-1791250849?utm_campaign=socialflow_gizmodo_twitter&utm_source=gizmodo_twitter&utm_medium=socialflow.

33 nine of ten American homes: Jordan Winthrop, The Americans (McDougal Littell, 1996), 798.

34 “the most trusted man”: “Final Words: Cronkite’s Vietnam Commentary,” All Things Considered, NPR, July 18, 2009, http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=106775685.

34 “I’ve lost Middle America”: Louis Menand, “Seeing It Now,” The New Yorker, July 9, 2012, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2012/07/09/seeing-it-now.

35 fifteen university computer labs: Ryan, A History of the Internet, loc. 490.

35 its first international connection: Ibid., loc. 613.

36 The “@” symbol: Ian Peter, “The History of Email,” NetHistory, http://www.nethistory.info/History%20of%20the%20Internet/email.html.

36 The email subject: Judy Malloy, “The Origins of Social Media,” in Social Media Archeology and Poetics, edited by Judy Malloy (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2016), 10.

36 “we had a social medium”: Vint Cerf, phone interview with authors, May 23, 2016.

36 Yumyum: Ibid.

37 a good stress test: Ryan, A History of the Internet, loc. 1446.

37 the humble emoticon: “Original Bboard Thread in Which :-) Was Proposed,” Carnegie Mellon University School of Computer Science, http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~sef/Orig-Smiley.htm.

37 old and familiar things: This is not an uncommon phenomenon. See Andrew Chadwick, The Hybrid Media System (New York: Oxford University Press, 2017).

37 70 institutions: Ryan, A History of the Internet, loc. 1673.

38 AT&T said “no thanks”: Ibid., loc. 1645.

38 grew to nearly 160,000: Ibid., loc. 1778.

38 “Lay down thy packet”: Alex Scroxton, “CW@50: The Story of the Internet, and How It Changed the World,” Computer Weekly, July 2016, http://www.computerweekly.com/feature/CW50-The-story-of-the-internet-and-how-it-changed-the-world.

39 “information superhighway”: High Performance Computing Act of 1991, Pub. L. No. 102–194, 105 Stat. 1594 (1991).

39 NSFNET formally closed: Ryan, A History of the Internet, loc. 2367.

39 reached 360 million: “Internet Users,” Internet Live Stats, accessed March 16, 2018, http://www.internetlivestats.com/internet-users/.

39 worth $3 billion: Adam Lashinsky, “Netscape IPO 20-Year Anniversary: Read Fortune’s 2005 Oral History of the Birth of the Web,” Fortune, http://fortune.com/2015/08/09/remembering-netscape/.

40 “Google” symbolized: “Our Story: From the Garage to the Googleplex,” Google, https://www.google.com/about/our-story/.

40 Twelve thousand soldiers: David Ronfeldt et al., The Zapatista Social Netwar in Mexico (monograph, RAND, 1998), 2, https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/monograph_reports/1998/MR994.pdf.

41 more than 130 countries: Ibid., 117.

41 “a war on the internet”: Ibid., 4.

41 “rumor first reported”: “Scandalous Scoop Breaks Online,” BBC News, January 25, 1998, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/special_report/1998/clinton_scandal/50031.stm.

41 “comparable to”: Manuel Castells, The Information Age: Economy, Society and Culture, vol. 1, The Rise of the Networked Society, quoted in Paul DiMaggio et al., “Social Implications of the Internet,” Annual Review of Sociology 27 (2001): 309.

41 Bowie waxed philosophical: Matt Novak, “Watching David Bowie Argue with an Interviewer About the Future of the Internet Is Beautiful,” Paleofuture, January 10, 2017, https://paleofuture.gizmodo.com/watching-david-bowie-argue-with-an-interviewer-about-th-1791017656.

42 “The goal wasn’t”: Mark Zuckerberg, “Facebook Interview,” YouTube video, 04:49, uploaded by Derek Franzese, March 26, 2013, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=—APdD6vejI.

42 had built ZuckNet: Phillip Tracy, “Before Facebook, There Was ‘ZuckNet,’ the Chat Service 12-Year-Old Mark Zuckerberg Built for His Family,” The Daily Dot, https://www.dailydot.com/debug/mark-zuckerberg-messaging-service-zucknet/.

42 a bold, crude proclamation: Bari Schwartz, “Hot or Not? Website Briefly Judges Looks,” Harvard Crimson, November 4, 2003, http://www.thecrimson.com/article/2003/11/4/hot-or-not-website-briefly-judges/?page=single.

43 some 22,000 votes: Ibid.

43 20,000 students: Rachel Feintzeig, “Students Flock to Join College Online Facebook,” Daily Pennsylvanian, March 18, 2004, https://web.archive.org/web/20110825022008/ http://thedp.com/node/41990.

43 “I’ve been paralyzed”: Ibid.

44 3.5 million registered members: Julia Angwin, Stealing MySpace: Battle to Control the Most Popular Website in America (Random House, 2009), 52.

44 shortened to “blogs”: Tim Dowling, “Should We Ban the Word ‘Blog’?” Books (blog), The Guardian, March 22, 2007, https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2007/mar/22/shouldwebanthewordblog.

44 100 million active blogs: Jenna Wortham, “After 10 Years of Blogs, the Future’s Brighter Than Ever,” Wired, December 17, 2007, https://www.wired.com/2007/12/after-10-years-of-blogs-the-futures-brighter-than-ever/.

44 $2.5 trillion: Adjusted for inflation. David Kleinbard, “The $1.7 Trillion Dot.Com Lesson,” CNNMoney, November 9, 2000, http://cnnfn.cnn.com/2000/11/09/technology/overview/.

44 820 million: “Internet Users.”

44 50 percent each year: Jakob Nielsen, “Nielsen’s Law of Internet Bandwidth,” Nielsen Norman Group, April 5, 1998, https://www.nngroup.com/articles/law-of-bandwidth/.

45 voice of Salem: Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, IMDb, http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0115341/.

45 “Web 2.0”: Tim O’Reilly, “What Is Web 2.0: Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software,” O’Reilly (website), September 30, 2005, http://www.oreilly.com/pub/a/web2/archive/what-is-web-20.html.

45 more than 2 million articles: “Wikipedia Publishes 2-Millionth Article,” Reuters, September 12, 2007, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wikipedia-growth/wikipedia-publishes-2-millionth-articleidUSN1234286820070912.

45 3 million users: Gary Rivlin, “Wallflower at the Web Party,” New York Times, October 15, 2006, http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/15/business/yourmoney/15friend.html?_r=1&mtrref=en.wikipedia.org.

46 more than a million active accounts: Ami Sedghi, “Facebook: 10 Years of Social Networking, in Numbers,” The Guardian, February 4, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/2014/feb/04/facebook-in-numbers-statistics.

46 58 million users: Ibid.

46 “300 million stories a day”: Tom Loftus, “Mark Zuckerberg’s Best Quotes,” Digits (blog), Wall Street Journal, February 1, 2012, http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2012/02/01/mark-zuckerbergs-best-quotes/.

46 2 billion users: Kaya Yurieff, “Facebook Hits 2 Billion Monthly Users,” CNNMoney, June 27, 2017, http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/27/technology/facebook-2-billion-users/index.html.

46 He would show off: Sarah Perez, “Mark Zuckerberg Meets Pope Francis, Gives Him a Drone,” TechCrunch, August 29, 2016, https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/29/mark-zuckerberg-meets-pope-francis-gives-him-a-drone/.

46 arbitrate the pleas: Vitaly Shevchenko, “Ukrainians Petition Facebook Against ‘Russian Trolls,’” BBC News, May 13, 2015, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-32720965.

47 “Apple is reinventing”: Mic Wright, “The Original iPhone Announcement Annotated: Steve Jobs’ Genius Meets Genius,” The Next Web, September 9, 2015, https://thenextweb.com/apple/2015/09/09/genius-annotated-with-genius/.

47 $10,000: John F. Clark, “History of Mobile Applications,” http://www.uky.edu/~jclark/mas490apps/History%20of%20Mobile%20Apps.pdf.

47 as far back as 1997: Abdulrauf M. Ahmad, “The World’s First ‘Smartphone’ Was Launched on 1997,” LinkedIn, April 9, 2016, https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/worlds-first-smartphone-launched-1997-abdulrauf-m-ahmad.

47 Only 200 were produced: Ibid.

47 the list of features: Wright, “The Original iPhone Announcement Annotated.”

47 making the entire internet: Taylor Martin, “The Evolution of the Smartphone,” Pocketnow, July 28, 2014, http://pocketnow.com/2014/07/28/the-evolution-of-the-smartphone.

47 smartphone could be used: Mehul Rajput, “Tracing the History and Evolution of Mobile Apps,” Tech.Co, November 27, 2015, https://tech.co/mobile-app-history-evolution-2015-11.

48 2.5 million such apps: “Number of Apps Available in Leading App Stores as of March 2017,” Statista, accessed March 17, 2018, https://www.statista.com/statistics/276623/number-of-apps-available-in-leading-app-stores/.

48 Google’s Android operating system: Kent German, “A Brief History of Android Phones,” CNET, August 2, 2011, https://www.cnet.com/news/a-brief-history-of-android-phones/.

48 there were some 2 billion: “Ericsson Mobility Report” (Ericsson, November 2017), https://www.ericsson.com/assets/local/mobility-report/documents/2017/ericsson-mobility-report-november-2017.pdf.

48 reach 8 billion: Ibid.

48 three-quarters of Americans: “Smartphones Are More Common in Europe, U.S., Less So in Developing Countries,” Pew Research Center, February 23, 2016, http://www.pewglobal.org/2016/02/22/smartphone-ownership-and-internet-usage-continues-to-climb-in-emerging-economies/2-23-2016-10-31-58-am-2/.

48 long since replaced televisions: “Daily Dose: Smartphones Have Become a Staple of the U.S. Media Diet,” Nielsen, April 21, 2016, http://www.nielsen.com/us/en/insights/news/2016/daily-dose-smartphones-have-become-a-staple-of-the-us-media-diet.html.

48 “The definition was”: David Sarno, “Twitter Creator Jack Dorsey Illuminates the Site’s Founding Document. Part 1,” Technology (blog), Los Angeles Times, February 18, 2009, http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2009/02/twitter-creator.html.

48 5,000 tweets per day: Claudine Beaumont, “Twitter Users Send 50 Million Tweets Per Day,” The Telegraph, February 23, 2010, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/twitter/7297541/Twitter-users-send-50-million-tweets-per-day.html.

48 50 million: Ibid.

49 500 million: “Twitter Usage Statistics,” Internet Live Stats, accessed March 17, 2018, http://www.internetlivestats.com/twitter-statistics/.

49 Journalists took to using: Benjamin Mullin, “Report: Journalists Are Largest, Most Active Verified Group on Twitter,” Poynter, May 26, 2015, https://www.poynter.org/2015/report-journalists-are-largest-most-active-group-on-twitter/346957/.

49 “build and gut-check”: Farhad Manjoo, “How Twitter Is Being Gamed to Feed Misinformation,” New York Times, May 31, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/31/technology/how-twitter-is-being-gamed-to-feed-misinformation.html.

49 “owning your own newspaper”: Michael Barbaro, “Pithy, Mean and Powerful: How Donald Trump Mastered Twitter for 2016,” New York Times, October 5, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/06/us/politics/donald-trump-twitter-use-campaign-2016.html.

49 330 million users: “Q3 2017 Letter to Shareholders,” Twitter, October 26, 2017, http://files.shareholder.com/downloads/AMDA-2F526X/5458918398x0x961121/3D6E4631-9478-453F-A813-8DAB496307A1/Q3_17_Shareholder_Letter.pdf.

49 60 million photographs: “Simply Measured Q3 2014 Instagram Study,” Simply Measured, http://get.simplymeasured.com/rs/simplymeasured2/images/InstagramStudy2014Q3.pdf?mkt_tok=3RkMMJWWfF9wsRolua%252FAZKXonjHpfsX56%252BgtXaC0lMI%252F0ER3fOvrPUfGjI4CTsViI%252BSLDwEYGJlv6SgFQrDEMal41bgNWRM%253D.

50 $19 billion: Nicholas Carlson, “Facebook Is Buying Huge Messaging App WhatsApp for $19 Billion!,” Business Insider, February 19, 2014, http://www.businessinsider.com/facebook-is-buying-whatsapp-2014-2.

50 Thailand and the Philippines: Adam Minter, “Emerging Markets Can’t Quit Facebook,” Bloomberg, April 19, 2018, https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-04-19/emerging-markets-can-t-quit-facebook.

50 “The web that many”: Tim Berners-Lee, “The Web Is Under Threat. Join Us and Fight for It,” Web Foundation, March 12, 2018, https://webfoundation.org/2018/03/web-birthday-29/.

51 nearly a billion users: Emma Lee, “WeChat Nears 1 Billion Users,” TechNode, August 17, 2017, https://technode.com/2017/08/17/wechat-nears-1-billion-users/.

51 On WeChat: Jonah M. Kessel and Paul Mozur, “How China Is Changing Your Internet,” New York Times, August 9, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/video/technology/100000004574648/china-internet-wechat.html.

51 not allowed to delete: “Why Am I Unable to Delete My WeChat Account?,” WeChat Help Center, accessed March 17, 2018, https://help.wechat.com/cgi-bin/micromsg-bin/oshelpcenter?opcode=2&plat=android&lang=en&id=161028miE7fI161028Qjiii2&Channel=helpcenter.

51 More than half: “Internet Usage Statistics,” Internet World Stats, accessed March 17, 2018, https://www.internetworldstats.com/stats.htm.

51 “Statistically, we’re likely”: Jakob Nielsen, “One Billion Internet Users,” Nielsen Norman Group, December 19, 2005, https://www.nngroup.com/articles/one-billion-internet-users/.

51 two-thirds of the online population: Measuring the Information Society Report 2014 (International Telecommunications Union, 2014), http://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Statistics/Documents/publications/mis2014/MIS2014_without_Annex_4.pdf.

51 double in the next five years: GSMA, “The Mobile Economy 2018,” https://www.gsma.com/mobileeconomy/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/The-Mobile-Economy-Global-2018.pdf.

51 more people in sub-Saharan Africa: Global Trends 2030: Alternative Worlds (report, National Intelligence Council, 2012), 52, https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/GlobalTrends_2030.pdf.

51 Mount Everest base camp: Daniel Oberhaus, “How to Use the Internet on the Summit of Everest,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, July 31, 2016, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/4xa4zp/when-the-internet-came-to-everest.

52 hundreds of feet beneath: Author’s visit to ICBM Vision Lab, Ogden, UT, July 13, 2017.

52 passed 1 billion: “There Are Now over 1 Billion Websites on the Internet,” Business Insider, September 17, 2014, http://www.businessinsider.com/afp-number-of-websites-explodes-past-a-billion-and-counting-2014-9.

 

 3. THE TRUTH IS OUT THERE

53 “For nothing is secret”: Luke 8:17 (King James Version).

53 @ReallyVirtual wasn’t: Jethro Mullen, “Whatever Happened to Guy Who Tweeted About Raid That Killed Osama bin Laden?,” CNN, Jan-uary 20, 2016, http://www.cnn.com/2016/01/20/asia/osama-bin-laden-raid-tweeter-sohaib-athar-rewind/.

53 the more pleasant town: Paul McNamara, “Catching Up with the Guy Who ‘Live-Blogged’ bin Laden Raid,” BuzzBlog (blog), Network World, May 1, 2014, https://www.networkworld.com/article/2226829/software/catching-up-with-the-guy-who-live-blogged-bin-laden-raid.html.

54 “Helicopter hovering above”: Sohaib Athar (@ReallyVirtual), “Helicopter hovering above Abbottabad at 1AM (is a rare event),” Twitter, May 1, 2011, 12:58 P.M., https://twitter.com/ReallyVirtual/status/64780730286358528.

54 “Go away helicopter”: Sohaib Athar (@ReallyVirtual), “Go away helicopter—before I take out my giant swatter :-/,” Twitter, May 1, 2011, 1:05 P.M., https://twitter.com/reallyvirtual/status/64782523485528065?lang=en.

54 “I hope its not”: Sohaib Athar (@ReallyVirtual), “A huge window shaking bang here in Abbottabad Cantt. I hope its not the start of something nasty :-S,” Twitter, May 1, 2011, 1:09 P.M., https://twitter.com/ReallyVirtual/status/64783440226168832.

54 Just as Donald Trump: Matthew Dessem, “Fact Check: What Was Donald Trump Doing During the bin Laden Raid?” Browbeat (blog), Slate, October 20, 2016, http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2016/10/20/what_was_donald_trump_doing_during_the_bin_laden_raid.html.

54 “Justice has been done”: Macon Phillips, “Osama bin Laden Dead,” Home (blog), The White House, May 2, 2011, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2011/05/02/osama-bin-laden-dead.

54 “now I’m the guy”: Sohaib Athar (@ReallyVirtual), “Uh oh, now I’m the guy who liveblogged the Osama raid without knowing it,” Twitter, May 1, 2011, 9:41 P.M., https://twitter.com/reallyvirtual/status/64912440353234944?lang=en.

54 Twitter follower count jumped: Steve Myers, “How 4 People and Their Social Network Turned an Unwitting Witness to bin Laden’s Death Into a Citizen Journalist,” Poynter, May 3, 2011, http://www.poynter.org/2011/how-4-people-their-social-network-turned-an-unwitting-witness-to-bin-ladens-death-into-a-citizen-journalist/130724/.

54 Local journalists sped: Mullen, “Whatever Happened to Guy?”

54 only way that Athar: Ibid.

54 “disintermediation”: Robert Gellman, “Disintermediation and the Internet,” Government Information Quarterly 13, no. 1 (1996): 1–8.

55 just 6 percent: “Internet Users (Per 100 People): Pakistan,” UNdata, http://data.un.org/Data.aspx?d=WDI&f=Indicator_Code%3AIT.NET.USER.P2.

55 “Secrets now come”: Authors’ interview with CIA official, northern Virginia, September 10, 2016.

55 “Welcome to America”: “George Allen Introduces Macaca,” YouTube video, 01:02, uploaded by zkman, August 15, 2006, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r90z0PMnKwI.

55 made exploratory trips: Tim Craig, “The ‘What If’ of Allen Haunts the GOP Race,” Washington Post, February 6, 2008, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/02/05/AR2008020503237.html.

56 the rally’s 100 attendees: Tim Craig and Michael D. Shear, “Allen Quip Provokes Outrage, Apology,” Washington Post, August 15, 2006, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/14/AR2006081400589.html.

56 referring to Sidarth’s hair: Ibid.

56 Salon’s person of the year: Michael Scherer, “Salon Person of the Year: S. R. Sidarth,” Salon, December 16, 2006, http://www.salon.com/2006/12/16/sidarth/.

57 9 billion digital devices: Peter Newman, “The Internet of Things 2018 Report: How the IoT Is Evolving to Reach the Mainstream with Businesses and Consumers,” Business Insider, February 26, 2018, http://www.businessinsider.com/the-internet-of-things-2017-report-2018-2-26-1.

57 soar to 50 billion: “The Sensor-Based Economy,” Wired, January 2017, https://www.wired.com/brandlab/2017/01/sensor-based-economy/.

57 almost a trillion sensors: Ibid.

57 sixty-five different elements: Rebecca Hill, “Shocker: Cambridge Analytica Scandal Touch-Paper Aleksandr Kogan Tapped Twitter Data Too,” The Register, April 30, 2018, https://www.theregister.co.uk/2018/04/30/aleksandr_kogan_also_slurped_twitter_data/.

57 Argus Panoptes: “Argus,” Encyclopedia Britannica, accessed March 18, 2018, https://www.britannica.com/topic/Argus-Greek-mythology.

57 the Panopticon: Thomas McMullan, “What Does the Panopticon Mean in the Age of Digital Surveillance?,” The Guardian, July 23, 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/jul/23/panopticon-digital-surveillance-jeremy-bentham.

57 filled with “telescreens”: George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four (Harcourt, Brace & World, 1977).

58 more than a dozen: Michael Bauman, “How Beto O’Rourke Explains America,” The Ringer, February 28, 2018, https://www.theringer.com/2018/2/28/16898726/beto-orourke-ted-cruz-texas-senate-race-2018-midterm-elections.

58 500,000 new comments: “The Top 20 Valuable Facebook Statistics—Updated March 2018,” Zephoria Digital Marketing, accessed March 18, 2018, https://zephoria.com/top-15-valuable-facebook-statistics/.

58 400 hours of video: Meeting (not for attribution), Washington, DC, May 4, 2016.

58 more than 300,000 tweets: “Twitter Usage Statistics,” Internet Live Stats, accessed March 18, 2018, http://www.internetlivestats.com/twitter-statistics/.

58 “digital universe” doubles: John Gantz and David Reinsel, “The Digital Universe in 2020: Big Data, Bigger Digital Shadows, and Biggest Growth in the Far East—United States,” IDC Country Brief (IDC, February 2013), https://www.emc.com/collateral/analyst-reports/idc-digital-universe-united-states.pdf.

58 agents’ daily jogs: “Exercise App Shows Why Anonymous Data Can Still Be Dangerous,” CBC Radio, February 2, 2018, http://www.cbc.ca/radio/spark/383-dangerous-data-libraries-and-more-1.4516637/exercise-app-shows-why-anonymous-data-can-still-be-dangerous-1.4516651.

58 “For the first time”: Mark Milley, speech (Future of War Conference 2017, New America Foundation, Washington, DC, March 21, 2017).

59 the Allies amassed: William Mahoney, “Before the Beaches: The Logistics of Operation Overlord and D-Day” (undergraduate thesis, University of Indiana, 2014), https://spea.indiana.edu/doc/undergraduate/ugrd_thesis2014_mgmt_mahoney.pdf.

59 Its algorithms mine: Erica Fink et al., “Ashley Madison: Life After the Hack,” CNN (2017), http://money.cnn.com/mostly-human/click-swipe-cheat/?playvid=3.

59 Russians used it to send: Associated Press, “Ukraine Soldiers Bombarded by ‘Pinpoint Propaganda’ Texts,” ABC News, May 11, 2017, http://abcnews.go.com/amp/Technology/wireStory/sinister-text-messages-reveal-high-tech-front-ukraine-47341695.

59 started back in 2006: Kate Knibbs, “How Facebook’s Design Has Changed over the Last 10 Years,” The Daily Dot, February 4, 2014, https://www.dailydot.com/debug/old-facebook-profiles-news-feeds/.

60 26,000 selfies: Lauren Buchanan, “Staggering Stats on Selfies,” Best Beauty (blog), Luster Premium White, November 6, 2015, http://blog.lusterpremiumwhite.com/staggering-stats-on-selfies.

60 Refugees take selfies: “Paddling to Europe,” Reuters, September 18, 2015, http://www.reuters.com/news/picture/paddling-to-europe-idUSRTS1S1K.

60 victim of an airplane hijacking: Danielle Wiener-Bronner, “The British Bloke Who Took a Photo with the EgyptAir Hijacker Is History’s Greatest Hero,” Splinter, March 29, 2016, https://fusion.kinja.com/the-british-bloke-who-took-a-photo-with-the-egyptair-hi-1793855879.

60 leaders of 178 countries: “Twinplomacy Study 2017,” Twinplomacy, May 31, 2017, http://twiplomacy.com/blog/twiplomacy-study-2017/.

60 “Let’s all love”: Erin Cunningham, “Former Iranian President Ahmadinejad Banned Twitter. Then He Joined It,” Washington Post, March 6, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/03/06/former-iranian-president-ahmadinejad-banned-twitter-then-he-joined-it/?utm_term=.12a3f4eb8193.

60 #TalkOIR: OIR Spokesman (@OIRSpox), “Send YOUR questions about #CJTFOIR #Iraq and #Syria on Thurs. May 26 at 9pm in #Baghdad, 2pm EDT using #TalkOIR,” Twitter, March 23, 2016, 9:43 A.M., https://twitter.com/OIRSpox/status/734786795859283968.

60 A U.S. military officer: Steve Warren, “Hey Reddit,” Reddit, https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/4i5r4h/hey_reddit_im_col_steve_warren_spokesman_for/.

60 “the end of forgetting”: Jeffrey Rosen, “The Web Means the End of Forgetting,” New York Times, July 21, 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/25/magazine/25privacy-t2.html?pagewanted=all.

61 a thousand hours: “Trump Archive,” Internet Archive, accessed March 28, 2018, http://archive.org/details/trumparchive&tab=about.

61 some 40,000 messages: “Trump Twitter Archive,” accessed March 28, 2018, http://trumptwitterarchive.com/.

61 whose very essence: Nahal Toosi, “Is Trump’s Twitter Account a National Security Threat?,” Politico, December 13, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/trump-twitter-national-security-232518.

61 “Solid gold info”: Noor Al-Sibai, “Naval War College Prof Explains How Trump’s ‘Stress’ Tweets Are a Roadmap for America’s Enemies,” Raw Story, May 8, 2017, http://www.rawstory.com/2017/05/naval-war-college-prof-explains-how-trumps-stress-tweets-are-a-roadmap-for-americas-enemies/.

61 Russian intelligence services: Bill Neely, “Russia Compiles Psychological Dossier on Trump for Putin,” NBC News, February 20, 2017, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/russia-compiles-psychological-dossier-trump-putin-n723196.

61 “If you had pictures”: “Obama Avoids Partisanship in First Post–White House Appearance,” CBS News, April 24, 2017, http://www.cbsnews.com/news/obama-speaks-univeristy-of-chicago-community-organizing-live-updates/.

61 “something much more akin”: Olivia Solon, “‘This Oversteps a Boundary’: Teenagers Perturbed by Facebook Surveillance,” The Guardian, May 2, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/may/02/facebook-surveillance-tech-ethics.

62 6 million Twitter users: Stephanie Busari, “Tweeting the Terror: How Social Media Reacted to Mumbai,” CNN, November 28, 2008, http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/asiapcf/11/27/mumbai.twitter/.

62 “I have just heard”: Kapil (@kapilb), “I have just heard 2 more loud blasts around my house in colaba,” Twitter, November 26, 2008, 9:09 A.M., https://twitter.com/kapilb/status/1024849394.

62 “Grenades thrown”: Romi (@romik), “grenades thrown at colaba,” Twitter, November 26, 2008, 9:31 A.M., https://twitter.com/romik/status/1024888964.

62 “people have been evacuated”: Sunil Verma (@skverma), “I just spoke with my friends at the Taj and Oberoi—people have been evacuated or are barracaded in their Rooms,” Twitter, November 26, 2008, 10:55 A.M., https://twitter.com/skverma/status/1025031065.

62 Mumbai’s online community: Robert Mackey, “Tracking the Mumbai Attacks,” The Lede (blog), New York Times, November 26, 2008, https://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/11/26/tracking-the-mumbai-attacks/?pagemode=print&_r=0.

62 He posted them: Charles Arthur, “How Twitter and Flickr Recorded the Mumbai Terror Attacks,” The Guardian, November 27, 2008, http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2008/nov/27/mumbai-terror-attacks-twitter-flickr.

63 more than 1,800 times: “2008 Mumbai Attacks: Revision History,” Wikipedia, accessed March 18, 2018, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=2008_Mumbai_attacks&dir=prev&offset=20081129144458&limit=250&action=history.

63 Google Maps would: “Map of Mumbai Attacks,” Google Maps, accessed March 18, 2018, https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?ll=18.917400000000004%2C72.82687799999997&spn=0.007054%2C0.007864&hl=en&msa=0&z=15&ie=UTF8&mid=1I6SuyXRZLDapOIK8ViEQ3j608Tw.

63 in cellphone contact: Thomas Elkjer Nissen, #TheWeaponizationOfSocialMedia: @Characteristics_of_Contemporary_Conflicts (Royal Danish Defence College, 2015), 93, https://www.stratcomcoe.org/thomas-nissen-weaponization-social-media; Manish Agrawal, Onook Oh, and H. Raghav Rao, “Information Control and Terrorism: Tracking the Mumbai Terrorist Attack Through Twitter,” Information Systems Frontiers 13, no. 1 (2011): 33–43.

64 Indian government had said: Busari, “Tweeting the Terror.”

64 “Die, die, die”: Ibid.

64 begging for blood donations: Noah Schatman, “Mumbai Attack Aftermath Detailed, Tweet by Tweet,” Wired, November 26, 2008, https://www.wired.com/2008/11/first-hand-acco/.

64 spread word of tip lines: Tamar Weinberg, The New Community Rules: Marketing on the Social Web (O’Reilly, 2009), 127.

64 to work collectively: Jeff Howe, “The Rise of Crowdsourcing,” Wired, June 1, 2006, https://www.wired.com/2006/06/crowds/.

65 $218 million: Clare Foran, “Bernie Sanders’s Big Money,” The Atlantic, March 1, 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/03/bernie-sanders-fundraising/471648/.

65 “to crowdfund their war”: “Why an Ordinary Man Went to Fight Islamic State,” The Economist, December 24, 2016, https://www.economist.com/news/christmas-specials/21712055-when-islamic-state-looked-unbeatable-ordinary-men-and-women-went-fight-them-why.

65 fundamentalist donors: Elizabeth Dickinson, “Private Gulf Donors and Extremist Rebels in Syria” (panel presentation, Brookings Institution, Washington, DC, December 19, 2013).

65 “financial jihad”: Lisa Daftari, “Hezbollah’s New Crowdfunding Campaign: ‘Equip a Mujahid,’” The Foreign Desk, February 9, 2017, http://www.foreigndesknews.com/world/middle-east/hezbollahs-new-crowdfunding-campaign-equip-mujahid/?utm_content=buffer08b58&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer.

65 rocket-propelled grenade: Dickinson, “Private Gulf Donors.”

65 their religious obligations: Daftari, “Hezbollah’s New Crowdfunding Campaign.”

66 “Thanks for vote”: Adam Linehan, “This Controversial Instagram Account Lets You Decide Whether ‘ISIS Fighters’ Live or Die,” Task & Purpose, March 28, 2016, http://taskandpurpose.com/instagram-account-lets-decide-whether-isis-fighters-live-die/?utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=share&utm_content=tp-share.

66 “A guy on the toilet”: Ibid.

66 took about thirty seconds: After Action Report for the Response to the 2013 Boston Marathon Bombings (Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency et al., December 2014), http://www.mass.gov/eopss/docs/mema/after-action-report-for-the-response-to-the-2013-boston-marathon-bombings.pdf.

66 “Holy shit!”: Kristen Surman (@KristenSurman), “Holy shit! Explosion!,” Twitter, April 15, 2013, 2:50 P.M., https://twitter.com/KristenSurman/status/323871059499683840.

66 first photo of the attack: Dan Lampariello (@Boston_to_a_T), “Explosion at coply,” Twitter, April 15, 2013, 2:50 P.M., https://twitter.com/DanLampNews/status/323871088532668416.

66 Fox Sports Radio: Fox Sports 1380/95.3 (@KRKO1380), “BREAKING: Per our man on the ground at the Boston Marathon, @tooblackdogs, there was an explosion. More to follow,” Twitter, April 15, 2013, 2:52 P.M., https://twitter.com/KRKO1380/status/323871355860840450.

66 nearly an hour: Hong Qu, “Social Media and the Boston Bombings: When Citizens and Journalists Cover the Same Story,” Nieman Lab, April 17, 2013, http://www.niemanlab.org/2013/04/social-media-and-the-boston-bombings-when-citizens-and-journalists-cover-the-same-story/.

66 more than doubled: “Number of Smartphone Users Worldwide from 2014 to 2020 (Billions),” Statista, accessed March 18, 2018, https://www.statista.com/statistics/330695/number-of-smartphone-users-worldwide/.

66 an incomprehensibly vast now: “Time,” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, updated January 24, 2014, accessed March 18, 2018, https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/time/#PreEteGroUniThe.

67 “present shock”: Douglas Rushkoff, Present Shock: When Everything Happens Now (Current, 2014).

67 ripe old age: Ryan Broderick, “What It’s Like to Live-Tweet the Day Your Neighborhood Becomes a War Zone,” BuzzFeed, August 30, 2016, https://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanhatesthis/from-complexo-da-alemao-to-torchbearer?utm_term=.ev4KvD1v5E#.kdy0XexXgb.

68 hyperlocal reporting: Ibid.

68 a truly local paper: Selinsgrove, like the other small towns of Pennsylvania’s central Susquehanna Valley, is served by the Daily Item, circulation roughly 14,000.

68 “I may be nine”: Hilde Kate Lysiak, “Yes, I’m a Nine-Year-Old Girl. But I’m Still a Serious Reporter,” The Guardian, April 6, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/apr/06/nine-year-old-reporter-orange-street-news-truth.

68 nearly 800 documented attacks: Paul Imison, “Journalists in Mexico Killed in Record Numbers—Along with Freedom of Speech,” Fox News, April 4, 2017, http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/04/04/journalists-in-mexico-killed-in-record-numbers-along-with-freedom-speech.html.

68 The Norte newspaper: Associated Press, “Mexican Newspaper Closes Citing Insecurity for Journalists,” Fox News, April 2, 2017, http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/04/02/mexican-newspaper-closes-citing-insecurity-for-journalists.html.

68 “You do it”: Dana Priest, “Censor or Die: The Death of Mexican News in the Age of Drug Cartels,” Washington Post, December 11, 2015, https://www.washingtonpost.com/investigations/censor-or-die-the-death-of-mexican-news-in-the-age-of-drug-cartels/2015/12/09/23acf3ae-8a26-11e5-9a07-453018f9a0ec_story.html?utm_term=.e783173fb136.

69 But even that: “‘Adios!’: Mexican Newspaper Norte Closes After Murder of Journalist,” The Guardian, April 3, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/03/adios-mexican-newspaper-norte-closes-after-of-journalist.

69 Catwoman: Jason McGahan, “She Tweeted Against the Mexican Cartels, They Tweeted Her Murder,” The Daily Beast, October 21, 2014, http://www.thedailybeast.com/she-tweeted-against-the-mexican-cartels-they-tweeted-her-murder?via=desktop&source=twitter.

69 killed over 15,000 people: Alasdair Baverstock, “Revealed, America’s Most Fearful City Where Texans Live Next to a ‘War Zone,’” Daily Mail, October 8, 2015, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3263226/Reve-aled-America-s-fearful-city-Texans-live-war-zone-McAllen-two-murders-year-mile-away-Mexican-border-Reynosa-15-000-cut-five-years-vortex-cartel-murders-extortion-torture.html.

70 “tweeted her murder”: McGahan, “She Tweeted Against the Mexican Cartels.”

70 a group of seventeen: Alice Speri, “Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently, and These Guys Are Risking Their Lives to Document It,” Vice, September 25, 2014, https://news.vice.com/article/raqqa-is-being-slaughtered-silently-and-these-guys-are-risking-their-lives-to-document-it.

70 more powerful than: David Remnick, “Telling the Truth About ISIS and Raqqa,” The New Yorker, November 22, 2015, https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/telling-the-truth-about-isis-and-raqqa.

70 paraded in front of: Mansour Al-Hadj, “Anti-ISIS Activists in Al-Raqqa Vow to Remain Resolute Despite Constant Death Threats, Assassinations,” Middle East Media Research Institute, February 3, 2016, https://www.memri.org/jttm/anti-isis-activists-al-raqqa-vow-remain-resolute-despite-constant-death-threats-assassinations.

70 ten members of the network: David Remnick, “The Tragic Legacy of Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently,” The New Yorker, October 21, 2017, https://www.newyorker.com/news/as-told-to/the-tragic-legacy-of-raqqa-is-being-slaughtered-silently.

70 “It’s okay”: Elahe Izadi and Liz Sly, “Female Activist Killed by the Islamic State Posted This Final Defiant Message,” Washington Post, January 7, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2016/01/07/female-activist-killed-by-the-islamic-state-posted-this-final-defiant-message/.

71 “here’s what it looks like”: Cor Pan, “Mocht hij verdwijnen, zo ziet hij d’r uit,” Facebook, July 17, 2014, accessed March 18, 2018, https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=465419050262262&set=a.121009184703252.21333.100003825135026&type=3&theater.

71 They were a mix: Christopher Miller, “Field of Death: How MH17 and Its Passengers Became Victims of a Distant War,” Mashable, July 16, 2015, http://mashable.com/2015/07/16/mh17-crash-field-of-death/#krJ3QrQ8Xiqo.

71 thirty milliseconds: Crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 (report, Dutch Safety Board, October 2015), 115.

71 over 7,600 pieces: “A Detailed Description of the BUK SA-11 Which Could Have Shot Down MH17,” WhatHappenedToFlightMH17.com, March 21, 2015, http://www.whathappenedtoflightmh17.com/a-detailed-description-of-the-buk-sa-11-which-could-have-shot-down-mh17/.

71 separated into three pieces: Crash of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17, 162.

71 For ninety seconds: Ibid., 165.

71 under five minutes: Amber Dawson et al., “As It Happened: Malaysian Plane Crash in Ukraine,” BBC News, July 17, 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-28354787.

71 “just fell”: Miller, “Field of Death.”

72 World of Warcraft addict: Patrick Radden Keefe, “Rocket Man,” The New Yorker, November 25, 2013, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2013/11/25/rocket-man-2.

72 “Brown Moses”: Ibid.

72 his knowledge: Matthew Weaver, “How Brown Moses Exposed Syrian Arms Trafficking from His Front Room,” The Guardian, March 21, 2013, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/mar/21/frontroom-blogger-analyses-weapons-syria-frontline.

72 had used nerve gas: Brown Moses, “Who Was Responsible for the August 21st Attack?,” Brown Moses Blog, September 16, 2013, http://brown-moses.blogspot.com/2013/09/who-was-responsible-for-august-21st.html.

73 published its first report: Eliot Higgins, “Buk Transporter Filmed ‘Heading to Russia’ Sighted in an Earlier Photograph,” Bellingcat, July 18, 2014, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2014/07/18/buk-transporter-filmed-heading-to-russia-sighted-in-an-earlier-photograph/.

73 pattern of shrapnel damage: Eliot Higgins, “The Latest Open Source Theories, Speculation and Debunks on Flight MH17,” Bellingcat, July 22, 2014, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2014/07/22/the-latest-open-source-theories-speculation-and-debunks-on-flight-mh17/.

73 “a lot of obsessive people”: Keefe, “Rocket Man.”

73 His in-laws thought: Aric Toler, interview with authors, Washington, DC, March 10, 2016.

73 soon after the crash: Higgins, “Buk Transporter.”

74 the equivalent of: “Origin of the Separatists’ Buk: A Bellingcat Investigation,” Bellingcat, November 8, 2014, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2014/11/08/origin-of-the-separatists-buk-a-bellingcat-investigation/.

74 mapping out the odyssey: Bellingcat interactive map, Mapbox, accessed March 18, 2018, https://www.mapbox.com/labs/bellingcat/index.html.

74 even snapped a picture: Toler interview.

74 Worried about their loved ones: “MH17—Potential Suspects and Witnesses from the 53rd Anti-Aircraft Missile Brigade,” Bellingcat, 2016, https://www.bellingcat.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/53rd-report-public.pdf.

75 It included the names: Janene Pieters, “Twenty Russians Wanted for Questioning in MH17 Downing,” NL Times, January 4, 2016, http://nltimes.nl/2016/01/04/twenty-russians-wanted-questioning-mh17-downing.

75 One OSINT analyst: Email to authors, February 8, 2016.

76 GVA Dictator Alert: Amar Toor, “This Twitter Bot Is Tracking Dictators’ Flights in and out of Geneva,” The Verge, October 13, 2016, https://www.theverge.com/2016/10/13/13243072/twitter-bot-tracks-dictator-planes-geneva-gva-tracker.

76 one of every five: Eric Gomez, “How Collectible Medals and Facebook Likes Encouraged Cheaters in the Mexico City Marathon,” ESPN.com, April 16, 2018, http://www.espn.com/blog/onenacion/post/_/id/8439/how-collectible-medals-and-likes-encouraged-cheaters-in-the-mexico-city-marathon.

76 chemical weapons in Syria: “Open Source Survey of Alleged Chemical Attacks in Douma on 7th April 2018,” Bellingcat, April 11, 2018, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2018/04/11/open-source-survey-alleged-chemical-attacks-douma-7th-april-2018/.

76 indicted Mahmoud Al-Werfalli: “Situation in Libya in the Case of The Prosecutor v. Mahmoud Mustafa Busayf Al-Werfalli,” International Criminal Court, August 15, 2017, https://www.icc-cpi.int/CourtRecords/CR2017_05031.PDF.

76 “virtual kidnappings”: Daniel Borunda, “‘Virtual Kidnapping’ Cases Spread from Mexico to US, FBI Says,” El Paso Times, October 19, 2017, https://www.elpasotimes.com/story/news/crime/2017/10/19/virtual-kidnapping-cases-spread-mexico-us-fbi-says/780847001/.

76 Scouring Libyan Facebook groups: C. J. Chivers, “Facebook Groups Act as Weapons Bazaars for Militias,” New York Times, April 6, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/04/07/world/middleeast/facebook-weapons-syria-libya-iraq.html.

77 traced to stocks: Ibid.

77 “By carefully gathering”: Sangwon Yoon, “This Startup Is Predicting the Future by Decoding the Past,” Bloomberg, Markets, April 6, 2016, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-04-06/this-startup-is-predicting-the-future-by-decoding-the-past.

77 North Korean missile: James Shinn, interview with author, Washington, DC, January 7, 2016.

77 “The exponential explosion”: Michael Flynn, phone interview with authors, May 26, 2016.

78 reading the obituary: Adam Rawnsley, “The Open-Source Spies of World War II: U.S. Intelligence Analysts Helped Shape Modern Spycraft,” War Is Boring (blog), Medium, March 2, 2015, https://medium.com/war-is-boring/the-open-source-spies-of-world-war-ii-7943bd5b663c.

78 roughly 45,000 pages: Anthony Olcott, Open Source Intelligence in a Networked World (Continuum, 2012), 16.

78 Foreign Broadcast Monitoring Service: Kalev Leetaru, “The Scope of FBIS and BBC Open-Source Media Coverage, 1979–2008,” Studies in Intelligence 54, no. 1 (2010): 17–37.

78 over a thousand Soviet journals: Olcott, Open Source Intelligence in a Networked World.

78 a thousand hours of television: Leetaru, “The Scope of FBIS and BBC Open-Source Media Coverage.”

78 they suspected trickery: Olcott, Open Source Intelligence in a Networked World.

78 had risen to 50,000: Ibid., 90.

79 “Whether you’re a CEO”: Flynn interview.

79 Flynn joined: Nicholas Schmidle, “Michael Flynn, General Chaos,” The New Yorker, February 27, 2017, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/02/27/michael-flynn-general-chaos.

79 They would eschew: Ibid.

80 He envisioned: Ibid.

80 Before the rise: Flynn interview.

80 “unwanted pregnancy”: Ibid.

80 “redheaded stepchild”: Ibid.

80 alarmed the DIA’s bureaucracy: Patrick Tucker, “The Other Michael Flynn,” Defense One, November 21, 2016, https://cdn.defenseone.com/b/defenseone/interstitial.html?v=8.8.0&rf=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.defenseone.com%2Fpolitics%2F2016%2F11%2Fother-michael-flynn%2F133337%2F.

80 after thirty-three years: Schmidle, “Michael Flynn.”

80 $530,000 deal: Fredreka Schouten, “Turkish Client Paid $530,000 to Michael Flynn’s Consulting Firm,” USA Today, March 8, 2017, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/03/08/michael-flynn-received-530000-from-turkish-client-during-trump-campaign/98917184/.

81 “he was going to be”: Schmidle, “Michael Flynn.”

81 “Fear of Muslims”: Michael Flynn (@GenFlynn), “Fear of Muslims is RATIONAL: please forward this to others: the truth fears no questions . . . ,” Twitter, February 26, 2016, 5:14 P.M., accessed March 18, 2018, https://twitter.com/genflynn/status/703387702998278144?lang=en.

81 “Not anymore, Jews”: Kristen East, “Flynn Retweets Anti-Semitic Remark,” Politico, July 24, 2016, http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/michael-flynn-twitter-226091.

81 a “jihadi” who “laundered” : Bryan Bender and Andrew Hanna, “Flynn Under Fire for Fake News,” Politico, December 5, 2016, https://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/michael-flynn-conspiracy-pizzeria-trump-232227.

81 “Sex Crimes w Children”: Lauren Carroll, “Michael Flynn’s Troubling Penchant for Conspiracy Theories,” Politifact, February 14, 2017, http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2017/feb/14/michael-flynns-troubling-penchant-conspiracy-thoer/.

81 outlaw Christianity: Ibid.

81 human blood and semen: Bender and Hanna, “Flynn Under Fire for Fake News.”

81 “making sure that”: Flynn interview.

82 “We are going”: Michael Flynn (@GenFlynn), “We are going to win and win and win at everything we do. It is going to be tough, but Team Trump-Pence will #MAGA,” Twitter, December 1, 2016, 7:33 P.M., https://twitter.com/GenFlynn/status/804528907978412033?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2F; http://www.washingtonpost.com%2Fblogs%2Fpost-partisan%2Fwp%2F2016%2F12%2F02%2Fsorry-lt-gen-flynn-its-unrealistic-to-win-and-win-and-win-at-everything%2F.

82 “false, fictitious”: United States of America v. Michael T. Flynn, United States District Court for the District of Columbia, filed November 30, 2017, https://www.politico.com/f/?id=00000160-128a-dd6b-afeb-37afd8000000.

82 piercing through the “fog”: Flynn interview.

 

 4. THE EMPIRES STRIKE BACK

83 “‘Truth’ is a lost cause”: Peter Pomerantsev and Michael Weiss, “The Menace of Unreality: How the Kremlin Weaponizes Information, Culture and Money” (report, Institute of Modern Russia, 2014), http://www.interpretermag.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/The_Menace_of_Unreality_Final.pdf.

83 “Information wants”: Steven Levy, “‘Hackers’ and ‘Information Wants to Be Free,’” Backchannel (blog), Medium, November 21, 2014, https://medium.com/backchannel/the-definitive-story-of-information-wants-to-be-free-a8d95427641c.

83 “The Net interprets”: Philip Elmer-Dewitt, “First Nation in Cyberspace,” Time, December 6, 1993, http://kirste.userpage.fu-berlin.de/outerspace/internet-article.html.

83 “the Japanese guy”: Bruce Sterling, “Triumph of the Plastic People,” Wired, January 1, 1995, https://www.wired.com/1995/01/prague/.

84 first so-called internet revolution: Olesya Tkacheva et al., Internet Freedom and Political Space (RAND, 2013), 121.

84 government censors: Lev Grossman, “Iran Protests: Twitter, the Medium of the Movement,” Time, June 17, 2009, http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1905125,00.html.

84 98 percent of the links: “Iran and the ‘Twitter Revolution,’” Pew Research Center, June 25, 2009, http://www.journalism.org/2009/06/25/iran-and-twitter-revolution/.

84 “The Revolution”: Andrew Sullivan, “The Revolution Will Be Twittered,” The Daily Dish (blog), The Atlantic, June 13, 2009, http://www.theatlantic.com/daily-dish/archive/2009/06/the-revolution-will-be-twittered/200478/.

84 Nobel Peace Prize: Lewis Wallace, “Wired Backs Internet for Nobel Peace Prize,” Wired, November 20, 2009, https://www.wired.com/2009/11/internet-for-peace-nobel/.

84 Mohamed Bouazizi: Yasmine Ryan, “The Tragic Life of a Street Vendor,” Al Jazeera, January 20, 2011, http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/features/2011/01/201111684242518839.html.

85 “Is Egypt about to have”: Abigail Hauslohner, “Is Egypt About to Have a Facebook Revolution?,” Time, January 24, 2011, http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2044142,00.html.

85 Mubarak’s resignation: Leila Fadel, “With Peace, Egyptians Overthrow a Dictator,” Washington Post, February 11, 2011, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/11/AR2011021105709.html.

85 “just give them”: Jeffrey Ghannam, “In the Middle East, This Is Not a Facebook Revolution,” Washington Post, February 20, 2011, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/02/18/AR2011021806964.html.

85 “I want to meet”: Sajid Farooq, “Organizer of ‘Revolution 2.0’ Wants to Meet Mark Zuckerberg,” NBC Bay Area, March 5, 2011, https://www.nbcbayarea.com/blogs/press-here/Egypts-Revolution-20-Organizer-Wants-to-Thank-Mark-Zuckerberg-115924344.html.

85 naming his firstborn: Alexia Tsotsis, “To Celebrate the #Jan25 Revolution, Egyptian Names His Firstborn ‘Facebook,’” TechCrunch, February 20, 2011, https://techcrunch.com/2011/02/19/facebook-egypt-newborn/.

85 the Arab Spring: Kentaro Toyama, “Malcolm Gladwell Is Right: Facebook, Social Media and the Real Story of Political Change,” Salon, June 6, 2015, http://www.salon.com/2015/06/06/malcolm_gladwell_is_right_facebook_social_media_and_the_real_story_of_political_change/.

86 “organize without organizations”: Clay Shirky, Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations (Penguin, 2008).

86 “the liberating power”: Roger Cohen, “Revolutionary Arab Geeks,” New York Times, January 27, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/28/opinion/28iht-edcohen28.html.

86 “We had an arsenal”: Evgeny Morozov, The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom (PublicAffairs, 2011), loc. 250, Kindle.

86 “an enthusiastic belief”: Ibid., loc. 223–31.

87 Liu was a new arrival: Charles Liu, “Chinese Guy, Angry at Embarrassing Photos Circulating Online, Tries to Destroy Internet, “Nanfang, August 26, 2016, https://thenanfang.com/man-tries-prevent-online-humiliation-destroying-public-internet-routers/.

87 Liu was sent to prison: “The Man Was Sneered by the Jump Square Dance Maliciously Disrupting the Communications Cable,” trans. Google Translate, website in Chinese, August 24, 2016, http://news.163.com/16/0824/11/BV7TGLJS00014SEH.html.

88 some 2,000 satellites: Virgil Labrador, “Satellite Communication,” Encyclopedia Britannica, accessed March 19, 2018, https://www.britannica.com/technology/satellite-communication.

88 Just a few ISPs: “Internet Service Providers (ISPs)—The World Factbook—CIA,” Encyclopedia of the Nations, accessed March 19, 2018, http://www.nationsencyclopedia.com/WorldStats/CIA-Internet-Service-Providers-ISPs.html.

88 two-thirds of all ISPs: Ibid.

88 sixty-one countries: Jim Cowie, “Could It Happen in Your Country?,” VantagePoint (blog), Dyn, November 30, 2012, http://dyn.com/blog/could-it-happen-in-your-countr/.

88 cut off the internet: Jim Cowie, “Syrian Internet Shutdown,” VantagePoint (blog), Dyn, June 3, 2011, https://dyn.com/blog/syrian-internet-shutdown/.

88 Many Algerians suspected: Elvis Boh, “Algeria’s Decision to Block Social Media Highly Criticized,” Africanews, June 21, 2016, http://www.africanews.com/2016/06/21/algeria-s-decision-to-block-social-media-highly-criticised//.

89 Algeria’s economy lost: Darrell M. West, “Internet Shutdowns Cost Countries $2.4 Billion Last Year” (report, Center for Technology Information at Brookings, Brookings Institution, October 2016), https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/intenet-shutdowns-v-3.pdf.

89 $190 million: Ibid.

89 “internet curfew”: Bill Marczak, “Time for Some Internet Problems in Duraz: Bahraini ISPs Impose Internet Curfew in Protest Village,” Bahrain Watch, August 3, 2016, https://bahrainwatch.org/blog/2016/08/03/bahrain-internet-curfew/.

89 authorities narrowed their focus: Ibid.

89 every time a protest: “First Evidence of Iranian Internet Throttling as a Form of Censorship,” MIT Technology Review, June 24, 2013, https://www.technologyreview.com/s/516361/first-evidence-of-iranian-internet-throttling-as-a-form-of-censorship/.

89 a “clean” internet: “Tightening the Net: Internet Security and Censorship in Iran. Part 1: The National Internet Project” (Article 19, Free Word Center, London, 2012), https://www.article19.org/data/files/medialibrary/38315/The-National-Internet-AR-KA-final.pdf; Corin Faife, “Iran’s ‘National Internet’ Offers Connectivity at the Cost of Censorship,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, March 29, 2016, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/yp3pxg/irans-national-internet-offers-connectivity-at-the-cost-of-censorship.

90 solar-powered phone chargers: Donia Al-Watan, “Seeking Internet Access, Syrians Turn to Turkey’s Wireless Network,” Al Monitor, April 19, 2015, http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/04/aleppo-rebel-control-internet-networks-syria-turkey.html.

90 about thirty websites: E. Tammy Kim, “Two Koreas, Two Cults, Two Internets,” The New Yorker, November 3, 2016, https://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/two-koreas-two-cults-two-internets.

90 Nissenbaum is a journalist: Dion Nissenbaum, email to author, April 15, 2017.

91 attempted military coup: David Cenciotti, “Exclusive: All the Details About the Air Ops and Aerial Battle over Turkey During the Military Coup to Depose Erdogan,” The Aviationist (blog), July 18, 2016, https://theaviationist.com/2016/07/18/exclusive-all-the-details-about-the-aerial-battle-over-turkey-during-the-military-coup/.

91 “RT HERKES SOKAGA”: Dion Nissenbaum, “Turkish President Foiled Coup with Luck, Tech Savvy,” Wall Street Journal, July 17, 2016, https://www.wsj.com/articles/coup-plotters-targeted-turkish-president-with-daring-helicopter-raid-1468786991.

91 digital content coordinator: Emre Kizilkaya, “FaceTime Beats WhatsApp in Turkey’s Failed Coup,” U.S. News and World Report, July 25, 2016, http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2016/07/turkey-coup-attempt-whatsapp-facetime.html#ixzz4iDFRBe2B.

91 game of hide-and-seek: Ibid.

91 “This insurgency”: Natasha Bertrand, “The Coup Attempt in Turkey Has Presented the US and Europe with a Huge Dilemma,” Business Insider, July 15, 2016, http://www.businessinsider.com/erdogan-statement-after-coup-attempt-2016-7.

91 over 45,000 people: Gareth Jones and Ercan Gurses, “Turkey’s Erdogan Shuts Schools, Charities in First State of Emergency Decree,” Reuters, July 23, 2016, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-turkey-security-emergency-idUSKCN1030BC.

91 few of these subsequent arrests: Loveday Morris, Thomas Gibbons-Neff, and Souad Mekhennet, “Turkey Is Expected to Curb Military Power as Purge Expands,” Washington Post, July 19, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/turkey-jails-generals-as-post-coup-purge-widens/2016/07/19/db076c84-4d1f-11e6-bf27-405106836f96_story.html?utm_term=.dae46a54ad4f.

92 over 135,000 civil servants: Jones and Gurses, “Turkey’s Erdogan Shuts Schools.”

92 were increasingly restricted: “Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and WhatsApp Shutdown in Turkey,” Turkey Blocks, November 4, 2016, https://turkeyblocks.org/2016/11/04/social-media-shutdown-turkey/.

92 Journalists saw their accounts: Mahir Zeynalov (@MahirZeynalov), “Twitter is now withholding accounts of Turkish journalists even without a court order. The number of blockaded accounts is mind-boggling,” Twitter, August 11, 2016, 5:32 A.M., https://twitter.com/MahirZeynalov/status/763714666040291328.

92 satirical Instagram caption: Rod Nordland, “Turkey’s Free Press Withers as Erdogan Jails 120 Journalists,” New York Times, November 17, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/18/world/europe/turkey-press-erdogan-coup.html?_r=0.

92 clicked the “retweet” button: Dion Nissenbaum, “Detained in Turkey: A Journal Reporter’s Story,” Wall Street Journal, January 6, 2017, https://www.wsj.com/articles/detained-in-turkey-a-journal-reporters-story-1483721224.

92 As Nissenbaum explained: Ibid.

93 he had just become: Nissenbaum email.

93 “cost of the retweet”: Ibid.

93 polices its “clean” internet: Faife, “Iran’s ‘National Internet.’”

93 In Saudi Arabia: Ben Elgin and Peter Robison, “How Despots Use Twitter to Hunt Dissidents,” Bloomberg, October 27, 2016, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-10-27/twitter-s-firehose-of-tweets-is-incredibly-valuable-and-just-as-dangerous.

93 Pakistan became the first: Yasmeen Sherhan, “A Death Penalty for Alleged Blasphemy on Social Media,” The Atlantic, June 12, 2017, https://www.theatlantic.com/news/archive/2017/06/pakistan-facebook-death-penalty/529968/.

94 a crop top: Jay Akbar, “Thailand to Prosecute Anyone That Even LOOKS at Material Considered Insulting to the Monarchy in Extension to Strict Internet Censorship After King Was Pictured in Crop Top,” Daily Mail, May 22, 2017, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4529788/Thailand-prosecute-internet-insult-monarchy-king-crop-top.html.

94 “We’ll send you”: Adam Seft et al., “Information Controls During Thailand’s 2014 Coup,” The Citizen Lab, July 9, 2014, https://citizenlab.ca/2014/07/information-controls-thailand-2014-coup/.

94 “Cyber Scouts” program: David Gilbert, “Thailand’s Government Is Using Child ‘Cyber Scouts’ to Monitor Dissent,” Vice, September 19, 2016, https://news.vice.com/article/thailands-royal-family-is-using-child-cyber-scouts-to-monitor-dissent.

94 A Kazakh visiting: Catherine Putz, “Kazakh Man Given 3 Years for Insulting Putin,” The Diplomat, December 28, 2016, https://thediplomat.com/2016/12/kazakh-man-given-3-years-for-insulting-putin/.

94 “discrediting the political order”: Tetyana Lokot, “Hard Labor for Woman Who Reposted Online Criticism of Russia’s Actions in Ukraine,” Global Voices, February 22, 2016, https://globalvoices.org/2016/02/22/hard-labor-for-woman-who-reposted-online-criticism-of-russias-actions-in-ukraine/.

94 Durov sold his shares: Amar Toor, “How Putin’s Cronies Seized Control of Russia’s Facebook,” The Verge, January 31, 2014, https://www.theverge.com/2014/1/31/5363990/how-putins-cronies-seized-control-over-russias-facebook-pavel-durov-vk.

95 “spiral of silence”: Elizabeth Stoycheff, “Under Surveillance: Examining Facebook’s Spiral of Silence Effects in the Wake of NSA Internet Monitoring,” Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly 93, no. 2 (2016): 296–311.

95 actual majority opinion: Ibid.

95 first email ever sent: Jeremy Goldhorn, “The Internet,” in The China Story, Australian Centre on China in the World, August 2, 2012, https://www.thechinastory.org/keyword/the-internet/.

95 China passed the United States: David Barboza, “China Surpasses U.S. in Number of Internet Users,” New York Times, July 26, 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/26/business/worldbusiness/26internet.html.

95 nearly 800 million: Steven Millward, “China Now Has 731 Million Internet Users, 95% Access from Their Phones,” Tech in Asia, January 22, 2017, https://www.techinasia.com/china-731-million-internet-users-end-2016.

96 “harmonious society”: Maureen Fan, “China’s Party Leadership Declares New Priority: ‘Harmonious Society,’” Washington Post, October 12, 2006, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/10/11/AR2006101101610.html.

96 “correct guidance”: David Bandurski, “Chinese Leaders Meditate Loudly on the Philosophy of Censorship as 17th Congress Nears,” China Media Project, August 30, 2007, http://cmp.hku.hk/2007/08/30/as-the-17th-national-congress-nears-party-meditations-on-the-philosophy-of-censorship/.

96 hand in hand with: Jack Linchuan Qiu, “Virtual Censorship in China: Keeping the Gate Between the Cyberspaces,” International Journal of Communications Law and Policy, no. 4 (Winter 1999/2000): 11.

96 Golden Shield Project: Zixue Tai, “Casting the Ubiquitous Net of Information Control: Internet Surveillance in China from Golden Shield to Green Dam,” International Journal of Advanced Pervasive and Ubiquitous Computing 2, no. 1 (2010): 239.

97 Sun Microsystems and Cisco: Qiu, “Virtual Censorship in China.”

97 fail to reach: Lotus Ruan, Jeffrey Knockel, and Masashi Crete-Nishihata, “We (Can’t) Chat: ‘709 Crackdown’ Discussions Blocked on Weibo and WeChat,” The Citizen Lab, April 13, 2017, https://citizenlab.ca/2017/04/we-cant-chat-709-crackdown-discussions-blocked-on-weibo-and-wechat/.

97 so-called Panama Papers: Tom Phillips, “All Mentions of Panama Papers Banned from Chinese Websites,” The Guardian, April 5, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/news/2016/apr/05/all-mention-of-panama-papers-banned-from-chinese-websites.

97 “Delete Report” was dispatched: Samuel Wade, “Minitrue: Panama Papers and Foreign Media Attacks,” China Digital Times, April 4, 2016, https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2016/04/minitrue-panama-papers-foreign-media-attacks/.

97 nation of Panama: Phillips, “All Mentions of Panama Papers Banned.”

98 “river crab’d”: “Harmonization,” Know Your Meme, accessed March 19, 2018, http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/harmonization-%E6%B2%B3%E8%9F%B9.

98 Winnie-the-Pooh was disappeared: Yuan Yang, “Winnie the Pooh Blacklisted by China’s Online Censors,” Financial Times, July 16, 2017, https://amp.ft.com/content/cf7fd22e-69d5-11e7-bfeb-33fe0c5b7eaa.

98 “cleanse the web”: David Wertime, “Chinese Websites Deleted One Billion Posts in 2014, State Media Says,” Tea Leaf Nation (blog), Foreign Policy, January 17, 2015, http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/01/17/chinese-websites-deleted-one-billion-posts-in-2014-state-media-says/.

98 elimination of nearly 300: Nikhil Sonnad, “261 Ways to Refer to the Tiananmen Square Massacre in China,” Quartz, June 3, 2016, https://qz.com/698990/261-ways-to-refer-to-the-tiananmen-square-massacre-in-china/.

98 Baidu Baike: Malcolm Moore, “Tiananmen Massacre 25th Anniversary: The Silencing Campaign,” The Telegraph, May 18, 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/10837992/Tiananmen-Massacre-25th-anniversary-the-silencing-campaign.html.

98 “disturbing public order”: Oiwan Lam, “Chinese Police Arrested a Man for Complaining About Hospital Food. Netizens Say It’s Police Abuse,” Advox (blog), Global Voices, August 25, 2017, https://advox.globalvoices.org/2017/08/25/chinese-police-arrested-a-man-for-complaining-about-hospital-food-netizens-say-its-police-abuse/?utm_content=buffer7e970&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer.

98 too much grassroots support: Gary King, Jennifer Pan, and Margaret E. Roberts, “How Censorship in China Allows Government Criticism but Silences Collective Expression,” American Political Science Review 107, no. 2 (2013): 1–18.

98 movement to ban plastic bags: Ibid.

99 “it’s not true that”: Geremie R. Barmé, “Burn the Books, Bury the Scholars!,” The Interpreter, Lowy Institute, August 23, 2017, https://www.lowyinstitute.org/the-interpreter/burn-books-bury-scholars.

99 authorities have ruled: Qiu, “Virtual Censorship in China.”

99 spate of corruption scandals: “China Bans Internet News Reporting as Media Crackdown Widens,” Bloomberg, July 25, 2016, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-07-25/china-slaps-ban-on-internet-news-reporting-as-crackdown-tightens.

99 5,000 internet users: “China Threatens Tough Punishment for Online Rumor Spreading,” Reuters, September 9, 2013, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-internet-idUSBRE9880CQ20130909.

99 online personalities were “invited”: Angus Grigg, “How China Stopped Its Bloggers,” Financial Review, July 4, 2015, http://www.afr.com/technology/social-media/how-china-stopped-its-bloggers-20150701-gi34za.

99 like hotel reviews: Ibid.

99 “I forgot who I am”: William Wan, “China Broadcasts Confession of Chinese-American Blogger,” Washington Post, September 15, 2013, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/china-broadcasts-confession-of-chinese-american-blogger/2013/09/15/3f2d82da-1e1a-11e3-8459-657e0c72fec8_story.html?utm_term=.e9e6afb7a72e.

100 anything digital: Sui-Lee Wee, “Chinese Police Arrest 15,000 for Internet Crimes,” Reuters, August 18, 2015, http://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-internet-idUSKCN0QN1A520150818.

100 speech of each group member: Lulu Yilun Chen and Keith Zhai, “China’s Latest Crackdown on Message Groups Chills WeChat Users,” Bloomberg, September 12, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-09-12/china-s-latest-crackdown-on-message-groups-chills-wechat-users.

100 armies of bureaucrats: Zhang Lei, “Invisible Footprints of Online Commentators,” Global Times, February 5, 2010, http://www.globaltimes.cn/special/2010-02/503820.html.

100 leaked government memo: Gary King, Jennifer Pan, and Margaret E. Roberts, “How the Chinese Government Fabricates Social Media Posts for Strategic Distraction, Not Engaged Argument,” American Political Science Review 111, no. 3 (August): 501.

100 its own pay scales: Lei, “Invisible Footprints of Online Commentators.”

100 official job certifications: David Bandurski, “China’s Guerrilla War for the Web,” Home Is Where the Heart Dwells (blog), Harvard University, September 24, 2008, https://blogs.harvard.edu/guorui/2008/09/24/chinas-guerrilla-war-for-the-web/.

100 “50-Cent Army”: Lei, “Invisible Footprints of Online Commentators.”

100 ban the term “50 cents”: Christina Sterbenz, “China Banned the Term ‘50 Cents’ to Stop Discussion of an Orwellian Propaganda Program,” Business Insider, October 17, 2014, http://www.businessinsider.com/chinas-50-cent-party-2014-10?IR=T.

100 “awards in municipal publicity”: Lei, “Invisible Footprints of Online Commentators.”

100 roughly 280,000 members: Bandurski, “China’s Guerrilla War for the Web.”

100 2 million members: King, Pan, and Roberts, “How the Chinese Government Fabricates Social Media Posts.”

100 also been mimicked: Lei, “Invisible Footprints of Online Commentators.”

100 When Mao broke: Mao Tsetung, A Critique of Soviet Economics, trans. Moss Roberts (Monthly Review, 1977).

100 Mao envisioned: “Short Definitions of the ‘Mass Line’ and a ‘Mass Perspective,’” taken from Scott Harrison, The Mass Line and the American Revolutionary Movement, The Mass Line, http://massline.info/sum1p.htm.

101 hammered into a single vision: Ibid.

101 has made a comeback: David Cohen, “A Mass Line for the Digital Age,” China Brief (Jamestown Foundation) 16, no. 8 (2016), https://jamestown.org/program/a-mass-line-for-the-digital-age/.

101 Jingwang (web-cleansing) app: Oiwan Lam, “China’s Xinjiang Residents Are Being Forced to Install Surveillance Apps on Mobile Phones,” Global Voices, July 19, 2017, https://globalvoices.org/2017/07/19/chinas-xinjiang-residents-are-being-forced-to-install-surveillance-apps-on-mobile-phones/.

101 “electronic handcuffs”: Ibid.

101 “mutually helpful social atmosphere”: CCP Central Committee General Office, “ Opinions Concerning Accelerating the Construction of Credit Supervision, Warning and Punishment Mechanisms for Persons Subject to Enforcement for Trust-Breaking,” China Copyright and Media, September 25, 2016, https://chinacopyrightandmedia.wordpress.com/2016/09/25/opinions-concerning-accelerating-the-construction-of-credit-supervision-warning-and-punishment-mechanisms-for-persons-subject-to-enforcement-for-trust-breaking/.

101 unwavering loyalty: Jacob Silverman, “China’s Troubling New Social Credit System—and Ours,” New Republic, October 29, 2015, https://newrepublic.com/article/123285/chinas-troubling-new-social-credit-system-and-ours; “Planning Outline for the Construction of a Social Credit System (2014–2020),” China Copyright and Media, April 25, 2015, https://chinacopyrightandmedia.wordpress.com/2014/06/14/planning-outline-for-the-construction-of-a-social-credit-system-2014-2020/.

101 reflecting their “trustworthiness”: Silverman, “China’s Troubling New Social Credit System.”

101 “trustworthiness” score: Ibid.

101 mobile services like WeChat: Jonah M. Kessel and Paul Mozur, “How China Is Changing Your Internet,” New York Times, August 9, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/video/technology/100000004574648/china-internet-wechat.html.

101 a staggering amount: Ibid.

102 Buying too many: Celia Hatton, “China’s ‘Social Credit’: Beijing Sets Up Huge System,” BBC News, October 26, 2015, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186.

102 regularly buying diapers: Ibid.

102 “breaks social trust”: Clinton Nguyen, “China Might Use Data to Create a Score for Each Citizen Based on How Trustworthy They Are,” Business Insider, October 26, 2016, http://www.businessinsider.com/china-social-credit-score-like-black-mirror-2016-10?r=UK&IR=T.

102 “report acts”: “Planning Outline for the Construction of a Social Credit System.”

102 you can lose access: Nguyen, “China Might Use Data.”

102 online matchmaking service: Celia Hatton, “China ‘Social Credit’: Beijing Sets Up Huge System,” BBC News, October 26, 2015, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-34592186.

102 Thailand: Michael de Waal-Montgomery, “Thailand Reportedly Close to Introducing Its Own China-Style Internet Firewall,” VentureBeat, September 23, 2015, https://venturebeat.com/2015/09/23/thailand-reportedly-close-to-introducing-its-own-china-style-internet-firewall/.

102 Vietnam: Ian Timberlake, “Vietnam Steps Up China-Style Internet Censorship,” Sydney Morning Herald, July 1, 2010, http://www.smh.com.au/technology/vietnam-steps-up-chinastyle-internet-censorship-20100701-zpg0.html.

102 Zimbabwe: Elin Box, “Zimbabwe to Implement China-Style Internet Censorship Regime,” Global Marketing News (blog), Webcertain, April 11, 2016, http://blog.webcertain.com/zimbabwe-internet-censorship-like-china/11/04/2016/.

102 Cuba: Mauricio Claver-Carone, “When Helping ‘the Cuban People’ Means Bankrolling the Castros,” Wall Street Journal, June 23, 2015, https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB11021741326745413664304581020103630034440.

102 Putin has even gone: Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, “Putin Brings China’s Great Firewall to Russia in Cybersecurity Pact,” The Guardian, November 29, 2016, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/29/putin-china-internet-great-firewall-russia-cybersecurity-pact.

103 “It was difficult”: Katie Davies, “Revealed: Confessions of a Kremlin Troll,” Moscow Times, April 18, 2017, https://themoscowtimes.com/articles/revealed-confessions-of-a-kremlin-troll-57754.

103 more than 200 blog posts: Ibid.

103 One story (possibly apocryphal): Ion Mihai Pacepa and Ronald J. Rychlak, Disinformation: Former Spy Chief Reveals Secret Strategies for Undermining Freedom, Attacking Religion, and Promoting Terrorism (WND Books, 2013), loc. 284, Kindle.

103 more than 10,000: Thomas Rid, “Disinformation: A Primer in Russian Active Measures and Influence Campaigns,” testimony before the Senate Committee on Intelligence, March 30, 2017, https://www.intelligence.senate.gov/sites/default/files/documents/os-trid-033017.pdf.

104 Operation INFEKTION: Thomas Boghardt, “Operation INFEKTION: Soviet Bloc Intelligence and Its AIDS Disinformation Campaign,” Studies in Intelligence 53, no. 4 (2009).

104 Indian newspaper Patriot: Ibid.

104 “well-known American scientist”: David Robert Grimes, “Russian Fake News Is Not New: Soviet AIDS Propaganda Cost Countless Lives,” The Guardian, June 14, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/science/blog/2017/jun/14/russian-fake-news-is-not-new-soviet-aids-propaganda-cost-countless-lives.

104 Lyndon LaRouche movement: Boghardt, “Operation INFEKTION.”

104 “Everyone shall have”: Constitution of the Russian Federation, art. 29.4.

105 “spoke in grave”: “1984 in 2014,” The Economist, March 29, 2014, https://www.economist.com/news/europe/21599829-new-propaganda-war-underpins-kremlins-clash-west-1984-2014.

105 A pop star garbed: Christine Friar, “Russia’s Using Pop Music on YouTube to Ridicule Millennial Protesters,” The Daily Dot, May 19, 2017, https://www.dailydot.com/upstream/russia-youtube-propoganda-pop-music/?tw=dd.

105 constant drumbeat of anxiety: Gary Shteyngart, “‘Out of My Mouth Comes Unimpeachable Manly Truth,’” New York Times Magazine, February 18, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/22/magazine/out-of-my-mouth-comes-unimpeachable-manly-truth.html?_r=0.

105 “Imagine you have”: Evan Osnos, David Remnick, and Joshua Yaffa, “Trump, Putin, and the New Cold War,” The New Yorker, March 6, 2017, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2017/03/06/trump-putin-and-the-new-cold-war.

105 He once proposed: Diana Bruk, “The Best of Vladimir Zhirinovsky, the Clown Prince of Russian Politics,” Vice, August 10, 2013, https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/the-best-of-vladimir-zhirinovsky-russias-craziest-politician.

105 Boris Nemtsov was not: Joshua Yaffa, “The Unaccountable Death of Boris Nemtsov,” The New Yorker, February 26, 2016, http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/the-unaccountable-death-of-boris-nemtsov.

105 at least thirty-eight: Oren Dorell, “Mysterious Rash of Russian Deaths Casts Suspicion on Vladimir Putin,” USA Today, May 2, 2017, https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2017/05/02/dozens-russian-deaths-cast-suspicion-vladimir-putin/100480734/.

106 arranging “scandals”: Jill Dougherty, “How the Media Became One of Putin’s Most Powerful Weapons,” The Atlantic, April 21, 2015, https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/04/how-the-media-became-putins-most-powerful-weapon/391062/.

106 dozens of independent journalists: “Journalists Killed in Russia Between 1992 and 2018/Motive Confirmed,” Committee to Protect Journalists, https://cpj.org/data/killed/europe/russia/?status=Killed&motiveConfirmed%5B%5D=Confirmed&type%5B%5D=Journalist&cc_fips%5B%5D=RS&start_year=1992&end_year=2018&group_by=year.

106 illusion of free speech: Dougherty, “How the Media Became.”

106 “all forms of political discourse”: Peter Pomerantsev, Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the New Russia (PublicAffairs, 2014), 64.

106 the most serious protests: Ellen Barry, “Rally Defying Putin’s Party Draws Tens of Thousands,” New York Times, December 10, 2011, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/11/world/europe/thousands-protest-in-moscow-russia-in-defiance-of-putin.html.

106 “the role of”: Mark Galeotti, “The ‘Gerasimov Doctrine’ and Russian Non-Linear War,” In Moscow’s Shadows (blog), July 6, 2014, https://inmoscowsshadows.wordpress.com/2014/07/06/the-gerasimov-doctrine-and-russian-non-linear-war/.

106 the Gerasimov Doctrine: As Mark Galeotti notes, the Gerasimov Doctrine was neither Gerasimov’s nor was it presented at the time as a doctrine. Nonetheless, this is the name that stuck. Galeotti, “The ‘Gerasimov Doctrine.’”

106 enshrined in Russian military theory: See Embassy of the Russian Federation to the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Island, “The Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation,” news release, June 29, 2015 (policy adopted December 25, 2014), https://rusemb.org.uk/press/2029; Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, “Doctrine of Information Security of the Russian Federation,” December 5, 2016, http://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/official_documents/-/asset_publisher/CptICkB6BZ29/content/id/2563163.

106 “war on information warfare”: Jolanta Darczewska, The Anatomy of Russian Information Warfare: The Crimean Operation, a Case Study, Point of View, no. 42 (Centre for Eastern Studies, May 2014), 10https://www.osw.waw.pl/sites/default/files/the_anatomy_of_russian_information_warfare.pdf, 13.

107 conglomerate of nearly seventy-five: Ibid., 10.

107 the “4 Ds”: Ben Nimmo, “Anatomy of an Info-War: How Russia’s Propaganda Machine Works, and How to Counter It,” StopFake, May 19, 2015, https://www.stopfake.org/en/anatomy-of-an-info-war-how-russia-s-propaganda-machine-works-and-how-to-counter-it/.

107 identity and mission shifted: Dougherty, “How the Media Became.”

107 $30 million: Simon Shuster, “Russia Today: Inside Putin’s On-Air Machine,” Time, March 5, 2015, http://time.com/rt-putin/.

107 approximately $400 million: Gabrielle Tetrault-Farber, “Looking West, Russia Beefs Up Spending on Global Media Giants,” Moscow Times, September 23, 2014, https://themoscowtimes.com/articles/looking-west-russia-beefs-up-spending-on-global-media-giants-39708.

107 “weapons system”: Shuster, “Russia Today.”

107 “The phone exists”: Ibid.

107 more YouTube subscribers: “Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections” (Intelligence Community Assessment, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, January 6, 2017), 10, https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/ICA_2017_01.pdf.

108 RT has promoted: Matthew Bodner, Matthew Kupfer, and Bradley Jardine, “Welcome to the Machine: Inside the Secretive World of RT,” Moscow Times, June 1, 2017, https://themoscowtimes.com/articles/welcome-to-the-machine-inside-the-secretive-world-of-rt-58132.

108 “‘Question More’ is not about”: Matthew Armstrong, “RT as a Foreign Agent: Political Propaganda in a Globalized World,” War on the Rocks, May 4, 2015, https://warontherocks.com/2015/05/rt-as-a-foreign-agent-political-propaganda-in-a-globalized-world/.

108 Sputnik International: “Major News Media Brand ‘Sputnik’ Goes Live November 10,” Sputnik, October 11, 2014, https://sputniknews.com/russia/201411101014569630/.

108 Baltica targets audiences: Inga Springe et al., “Sputnik’s Unknown Brother,” Re:Baltica, April 6, 2017, https://en.rebaltica.lv/2017/04/sputniks-unknown-brother/.

108 first source of this false report: Ben Nimmo, “Three Thousand Fake Tanks,” @DFRLLab (blog), Medium, January 12, 2017, https://medium.com/@DFRLab/three-thousand-fake-tanks-575410c4f64d.

109 all-out assault: Matthew Sparkes, “Russian Government Edits Wikipedia on Flight MH17,” The Telegraph, July 18, 2014, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/10977082/Russian-government-edits-Wikipedia-on-flight-MH17.html.

109 “Questions over Why”: Paul Szoldra, “Here’s the Ridiculous Way Russia’s Propaganda Channel Is Covering the Downed Malaysia Airliner,” Business Insider Australia, July 19, 2014, https://www.businessinsider.com.au/rt-malaysia-airlines-ukraine-2014-7#JhJsCOWZzphQ00IG.99.

109 Russian Union of Engineers: Eliot Higgins, “SU-25, MH17 and the Problems with Keeping a Story Straight,” Bellingcat, January 10, 2015, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/01/10/su-25-mh17-and-the-problems-with-keeping-a-story-straight/.

110 bad photoshop job: Veli-Pekka Vivimäki, “Russian State Television Shares Fake Images of MH17 Being Attacked,” Bellingcat, November 14, 2014, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/2014/11/14/russian-state-television-shares-fake-images-of-mh17-being-attacked/.

110 “It came from”: Max Seddon, “Russian TV Airs Clearly Fake Image to Claim Ukraine Shot Down MH17,” BuzzFeed, November 15, 2014, https://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/russian-tv-airs-clearly-fake-image-to-claim-ukraine-shot-dow?utm_term=.vhnM2Yn2y4#.yvpq59Z5Q6.

110 doctored satellite images: Eliot Higgins, “Russia’s Colin Powell Moment—How the Russian Government’s MH17 Lies Were Exposed,” Bellingcat, July 16, 2015, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2015/07/16/russias-colin-powell-moment-how-the-russian-governments-mh17-lies-were-exposed/.

111 “This is information war”: “An Ex St. Petersburg ‘Troll’ Speaks Out,” Meduza, October 15, 2017, https://meduza.io/en/feature/2017/10/15/an-ex-st-petersburg-troll-speaks-out?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Newpercent20Campaign&utm_term=percent2ASituationpercent20Report.

111 solicited Russian advertisers: Ilya Klishin, “How Putin Secretly Conquered Russia’s Social Media over the Past 3 Years,” Global Voices, January 30, 2015, https://globalvoices.org/2015/01/30/how-putin-secretly-conquered-russias-social-media-over-the-past-3-years/.

111 Nearly a dozen: Ibid.

111 Special Counsel Robert Mueller: Priscilla Alvarez and Taylor Hosking, “The Full Text of Mueller’s Indictment of 13 Russians,” The Atlantic, February 16, 2018, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/02/rosenstein-mueller-indictment-russia/553601/.

111 Internet Research Agency: Adrian Chen, “The Agency,” New York Times Magazine, June 7, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/07/magazine/the-agency.html.

111 the “Facebook desk”: Associated Press, “Ex-Workers at Russian ‘Troll Factory’ Trust U.S. Indictment,” Los Angeles Times, February 19, 2018, http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-russian-troll-factory-20180219-story.html.

111 “I really only stayed”: Davies, “Revealed:” Confessions of a Kremlin Troll.

112 “expected to manage”: Max Seddon, “Documents Show How Russia’s Troll Army Hit America,” BuzzFeed, June 2, 2014, https://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/documents-show-how-russias-troll-army-hit-america?utm_term=.kaWolQvoO#.tsawEvpw1.

112 retweeted 1,213,506 times: Ben Popken, “Twitter Deleted 200,000 Russian Troll Tweets. Read Them Here,” NBC News, February 14, 2018, https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/now-available-more-200-000-deleted-russian-troll-tweets-n844731.

112 seventh most retweeted account: Kevin Poulsen, “Exclusive: Russia Activated Twitter Sleeper Cells for 2016 Election Day Blitz,” The Daily Beast, November 7, 2017, https://www.thedailybeast.com/exclusive-russia-activated-twitter-sleeper-cells-for-election-day-blitz?via=twitter_page.

112 Flynn followed at least: Kevin Poulsen and Ben Collins, “Michael Flynn Followed Russian Troll Accounts, Pushed Their Messages in Days Before Election,” The Daily Beast, November 1, 2017, https://www.thedailybeast.com/michael-flynn-followed-russian-troll-accounts-pushed-their-messages-in-days-before-election.

112 @tpartynews: Drew Griffin and Donnie O’Sullivan, “The Fake Tea Party Twitter Account Linked to Russia and Followed by Sebastian Gorka,” CNN, September 22, 2017, https://www.cnn.com/2017/09/21/politics/tpartynews-twitter-russia-link/index.html.

112 seemingly trustworthy individuals: John D. Gallacher et al., “Junk News on Military Affairs and National Security: Social Media Disinformation Campaigns Against US Military Personnel and Veterans” (data memo 2017.9, Computational Propaganda Project, University of Oxford, October 9, 2017), http://comprop.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/93/2017/10/Junk-News-on-Military-Affairs-and-National-Security-1.pdf.

112 “First you had to be”: “Former Russian Troll Describes Night Shift as ‘Bacchanalia,’” Moscow Times, October 27, 2017, https://themoscowtimes.com/news/former-russian-troll-describes-night-shift-as-bacchanalia-59398.

112 “vote for Jill Stein”: Donie O’Sullivan and Dylan Byers, “Exclusive: Fake Black Activist Accounts Linked to Russian Government,” CNNMoney, September 28, 2017, http://money.cnn.com/2017/09/28/media/blacktivist-russia-facebook-twitter/index.html.

113 103.8 million times: Craig Timberg, “Russian Propaganda May Have Been Shared Hundreds of Millions of Times, New Research Says,” The Switch (blog), Washington Post, October 5, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/10/05/russian-propaganda-may-have-been-shared-hundreds-of-millions-of-times-new-research-says/?utm_term=.b14ae0521f56.

113 as high as 24 percent: “HPSCI Minority Exhibit A,” U.S. House of Representatives Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Democrats, accessed March 19, 2018, https://democrats-intelligence.house.gov/hpsci-11-1/.

113 over 800 million users: Jonathan Albright, “Instagram, Meme Seeding, and the Truth About Facebook Manipulation, Pt. 1,” Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, November 8, 2017, https://medium.com/berkman-klein-center/instagram-meme-seeding-and-the-truth-about-facebook-manipulation-pt-1-dae4d0b61db5.

113 an astounding 145 million: Ibid.

113 @Jenn_Abrams: Ben Collins and Joseph Cox, “Jenna Abrams, Russia’s Clown Troll Princess, Duped the Mainstream Media and the World,” The Daily Beast, November 2, 2017, https://www.thedailybeast.com/jenna-abrams-russias-clown-troll-princess-duped-the-mainstream-media-and-the-world.

114 Facebook automatically steered: Nicholas Confessore and Daisuke Wakabayashi, “How Russia Harvested American Rage to Reshape U.S. Politics,” New York Times, October 9, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/09/technology/russia-election-facebook-ads-rage.html.

144 Secured Borders: Scott Shane, “Purged Facebook Page Tied to the Kremlin Spread Anti-Immigrant Bile,” New York Times, September 12, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/12/us/politics/russia-facebook-election.html.

144 journalist Jessikka Aro: Jessikka Aro, “My Year as a Pro-Russia Troll Magnet: International Shaming Campaign and an SMS from Dead Father,” Yle Kioski, September 11, 2015, http://kioski.yle.fi/omat/my-year-as-a-pro-russia-troll-magnet.

144 labeled a “pornographer”: Jeff Stein, “How Russia Is Using LinkedIn as a Tool of War Against Its U.S. Enemies,” Newsweek, August 3, 2017, http://www.newsweek.com/russia-putin-bots-linkedin-facebook-trump-clinton-kremlin-critics-poison-war-645696.

145 pushing the theme of #UniteTheRight: Conspirado Norteño (@conspirator0), “David Jones’ Locker: Where Truth Goes to Die #TrumpRussia,” Twitter, August 22, 2017, 5:51 P.M., https://twitter.com/conspirator0/status/900158639884955648.

145 disputing the report: For a lively conversation, see the Twitter account Logic Reason (@gsobjc), https://twitter.com/gsobjc?lang=en.

145 In Venezuela: Peter Pomerantsev, introduction to The New Authoritarians: Ruling Through Disinformation, Beyond Propaganda (Transitions Forum, Legatum Institute, June 2015), 6, https://lif.blob.core.windows.net/lif/docs/default-source/publications/the-new-authoritarians—ruling-through-disinformation-june-2015-pdf.pdf?sfvrsn=4.

146 In Azerbaijan: Arzu Geybulla, “In the Crosshairs of Azerbaijan’s Patriotic Trolls,” Open Democracy, November 22, 2016, https://www.opendemocracy.net/od-russia/arzu-geybulla/azerbaijan-patriotic-trolls; Claudio Guarnieri, Joshua Franco, and Collin Anderson, “False Friends: How Fake Accounts and Crude Malware Targeted Dissidents in Azerbaijan,” Amnesty Global Insights (blog), Medium, March 9, 2017, https://medium.com/amnesty-insights/false-friends-how-fake-accounts-and-crude-malware-targeted-dissidents-in-azerbaijan-9b6594cafe60.

146 Even in democratic India: Sohini Mitter, “India’s Ruling Party Has a Troll Army to Silence Opponents Online, Book Claims,” Mashable, December 27, 2016, http://mashable.com/2016/12/27/bjp-planned-online-trolling/#go_GF.fD8Gqo.

146 at least twenty-nine regimes: Adam Satariano, “Government ‘Cyber Troops’ Manipulate Facebook, Twitter, Study Says,” Bloomberg, July 17, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-07-17/government-cyber-troops-manipulate-facebook-twitter-study-says.

146 at least eighteen national-level elections: Sanja Kelly et al., Freedom on the Net 2017: Manipulating Social Media to Undermine Democracy (Freedom House November 2017), 10, https://freedomhouse.org/sites/default/files/FOTN_2017_Final.pdf.

146 denying the truth: George Simon, “Gaslighting as a Manipulation Tactic: What It Is, Who Does It, and Why,” Counselling Resource, November 8, 2011, http://counsellingresource.com/features/2011/11/08/gaslighting/.

146 “Facts . . . become interchangeable”: Lauren Ducca, “Donald Trump Is Gaslighting America,” Teen Vogue, December 10, 2016, https://www.teenvogue.com/story/donald-trump-is-gaslighting-america.

 

 5. THE UNREALITY MACHINE

118 “When all think alike”: Walter Lippmann, The Stakes of Diplomacy (Henry Holt, 1915), 51.

118 Moët champagne: Samanth Subramanian, “Inside the Macedonian Fake-News Complex,” Wired, February 15, 2017, https://www.wired.com/2017/02/veles-macedonia-fake-news/.

118 slick wardrobes: Alexander Smith and Vladimir Banic, “Fake News: How a Partying Macedonian Teen Earns Thousands Publishing Lies,” NBC News, December 9, 2016, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/fake-news-how-partying-macedonian-teen-earns-thousands-publishing-lies-n692451.

118 old industrial town: “About Veles,” Macedonia Information, accessed March 19, 2018, http://makedonija.name/cities/veles.

118 four times the advertising: Josh Constine, “Facebook Swells to 1.65B Users and Beats Q1 Estimates with $5.38B Revenue,” TechCrunch, April 27, 2016, https://techcrunch.com/2016/04/27/facebook-q1-2016-earnings/.

118 With each click: Subramanian, “Inside the Macedonian Fake-News Complex.”

118 tens of thousands of dollars: Ibid.

119 swelled into the hundreds: Craig Silverman and Lawrence Alexander, “How Teens in the Balkans Are Duping Trump Supporters with Fake News,” BuzzFeed, November 3, 2016, https://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/how-macedonia-became-a-global-hub-for-pro-trump-misinfo?utm_term=.mqxmBEGNRa#.panz3vD86O.

119 would hold special events: Smith and Banic, “Fake News.”

119 “Dmitri”: Ibid.

119 a “clickbait coach”: Isa Soares et al., “The Fake News Machine: Inside a Town Gearing Up for 2020,” CNNMoney, http://money.cnn.com/interactive/media/the-macedonia-story/.

119 “Since fake news started”: Smith and Banic, “Fake News.”

119 “some white people”: Silverman and Alexander, “How Teens in the Balkans.”

119 false reports received: Craig Silverman, “This Analysis Shows How Viral Fake Election News Outperformed Real News on Facebook,” BuzzFeed, November 16, 2016, https://www.buzzfeed.com/craigsilverman/viral-fake-election-news-outperformed-real-news-on-facebook?utm_term=.apjBaw3rL#.tezr61jzN.

120 “You see they like”: Smith and Banic, “Fake News.”

120 Of the top twenty: Silverman, “This Analysis Shows.”

120 “Pope Francis Shocks World”: Ibid.

120 Three times as many: Ibid.

120 Pope Francis didn’t: Philip Pullella, “Pope Warns Media over ‘Sin’ of Spreading Fake News, Smearing Politicians,” Reuters, December 7, 2016, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-pope-media/pope-warns-media-over-sin-of-spreading-fake-news-smearing-politicians-idUSKBN13W1TU.

120 “I didn’t force anyone”: Smith and Banic, “Fake News.”

120 “They’re not allowed”: Ibid.

120 President Obama himself: David Remnick, “Obama Reckons with a Trump Presidency,” The New Yorker, November 28, 2016, http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/11/28/obama-reckons-with-a-trump-presidency.

121 “access to their own”: James Breiner, “What Freedom of the Press Means for Those Who Own One,” MediaShift, December 10, 2014, http://mediashift.org/2014/12/what-freedom-of-the-press-means-for-those-who-own-one/.

121 “axiom of political science”: Alexis de Tocqueville, The Republic of the United States of America, and Its Political Institutions, Reviewed and Examined, trans. Henry Reeves (A. S. Barnes, 1851), 199.

121 “Imagine a future”: Nicholas Negroponte, Being Digital (Knopf, 1995), 153.

121 the “Daily Me”: Ibid.

122 the “Daily We”: Cass Sunstein, “The Daily We,” Boston Review, June 1, 2001, http://bostonreview.net/cass-sunstein-internet-democracy-daily-we.

122 “You’re the only person”: Eli Pariser, The Filter Bubble: How the New Personalized Web Is Changing What We Read and How We Think (Penguin, 2011), 9.

123 “YouTube cannot contain”: Aric Toler, “‘No Safe Spaces on the Flat Earth’—Emerging Alt-Right Inspires Flat Earth Online Communities,” Bellingcat, June 7, 2017, https://www.bellingcat.com/resources/articles/2017/06/07/flat-earth-online-communities/.

123 The best predictor: We consulted several excellent sources for a primer on homophily. See Aris Anagnostopoulos et al., “Viral Misinformation: The Role of Homophily and Polarization,” arXiv:1411.2893 [cs.SI], November 2014; Walter Quattrociocchi, Antonia Scala, and Cass R. Sunstein, “Echo Chambers on Facebook” (discussion paper no. 877, Harvard Law School, Cambridge, MA, September 2016), http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/olin_center/papers/pdf/Sunstein_877.pdf; Michela Del Vicario et al., “The Spreading of Misinformation Online,” PNAS 113, no. 3 (2016): 554–59, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/289263634_The_spreading_of_misinformation_online; Delia Mocanu et al., “Collective Attention in the Age of (Mis)information,” arXiv:1403.3344 [cs.SI], March 2014.

123 “love of the same”: Aaron Recitca, “Homophily,” New York Times Magazine, December 10, 2006, https://www.nytimes.com/2006/12/10/magazine/10Section2a.t-4.html.

124 Yale University researchers: Gordon Pennycook, Tyrone Cannon, and David G. Rand, “Implausibility and Illusory Truth: Prior Exposure Increases Perceived Accuracy of Fake News but Has No Effect on Entirely Implausible Statements” (working paper, March 16, 2018), https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2958246.

124 a second “Holocaust”: Orac, “The Violent Rhetoric of the Antivaccine Movement: ‘Vaccine Holocaust’ and Potential Impending Attacks on Journalists,” Respectful Insolence (blog), May 17, 2017, https://respectfulinsolence.com/2017/05/17/the-violent-rhetoric-of-the-antivaccine-movement-vaccine-holocaust-and-potential-impending-attacks-on-journalists/.

125 lower-tier celebrities: For a blunt take on the subject, see “Anti-Vaccine Body Count,” http://www.jennymccarthybodycount.com/.

125 “Healthy young child”: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), “Healthy young child goes to doctor, gets pumped with massive shot of many vaccines, doesn’t feel good and changes—AUTISM. Many such cases!,” Twitter, March 28, 2014, 5:35 A.M., https://twitter.com/realdonaldtrump/status/449525268529815552?lang=en.

125 “personal belief exception”: Anna Merlan, “Meet the New, Dangerous Fringe of the Anti-Vaccination Movement,” Jezebel, June 29, 2015, https://jezebel.com/meet-the-new-dangerous-fringe-of-the-anti-vaccination-1713438567.

125 sixty-year high: Rong-Gong Lin, “Latest Measles Outbreak Highlights a Growing Problem in California,” Los Angeles Times, January 7, 2015, http://www.latimes.com/local/california/la-me-aa2-snapshot-measles-whooping-cough-20150108-story.html.

125 sickened 147 children: “Year in Review: Measles Linked to Disneyland,” Public Health Matters Blog, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, December 2, 2015, https://blogs.cdc.gov/publichealthmatters/2015/12/year-in-review-measles-linked-to-disneyland/.

125 law requiring kindergarten vaccinations: Erin Hare, “Facts Alone Won’t Convince People to Vaccinate Their Kids,” FiveThirtyEight, June 12, 2017, https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/facts-alone-wont-convince-people-to-vaccinate-their-kids/?utm_content=buffer21fe5&utm_medium=social&utm_source=twitter.com&utm_campaign=buffer.

125 dig in their heels: Charles G. Lord, Lee Ross, and Mark R. Lepper, “Biased Assimilation and Attitude Polarization: The Effects of Prior Theories on Subsequently Considered Evidence,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 37, no. 11 (1979): 2098–109.

126 “Once, every village”: Robert Bateman (@RobertLBateman), “Once, every village had an idiot. It took the internet to bring them all together.—Unknown (well, by me),” Twitter, August 19, 2017, 4:16 P.M., https://twitter.com/RobertLBateman/status/899047467282518017.

126 A 2016 study: Marc Lynch, Deen Freelon, and Sean Aday, “How Social Media Undermines Transitions to Democracy,” Bullets and Blogs, no. 4 (PeaceTech Lab, 2016), https://ipdgc.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/zaxdzs2221/f/downloads/Blogs%20and%20Bullets%20IV.pdf.

126 “encouraged political society”: Ibid., 21.

126 “echo-chamber qualities”: Sean Aday, Deen Freelon, and Marc Lynch, “How Social Media Undermined Egypt’s Democratic Transition,” Monkey Cage (blog), Washington Post, October 7, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/10/07/how-social-media-undermined-egypts-democratic-transition/?utm_term=.c6f0a6afc33b.

127 “There’s no such thing”: Jack Holmes, “A Trump Surrogate Drops the Mic: ‘There’s No Such Thing as Facts,’” Esquire, December 1, 2016, http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/videos/a51152/trump-surrogate-no-such-thing-as-facts/.

127 shielded their terrified children: Marc Fisher, John Woodrow Cox, and Peter Hermann, “Pizzagate: From Rumor, to Hashtag, to Gunfire in D.C.,” Washington Post, December 6, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/pizzagate-from-rumor-to-hashtag-to-gunfire-in-dc/2016/12/06/4c7def50-bbd4-11e6-94ac-3d324840106c_story.html?utm_term=.c84c2847b899.

127 customers made a run for it: Amanda Robb, “Anatomy of a Fake News Scandal,” Rolling Stone, November 16, 2017, https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/news/pizzagate-anatomy-of-a-fake-news-scandal-w511904.

127 an employee holding pizza dough: Fisher, Cox, and Hermann, “Pizzagate.”

127 tiny computer room: Ibid.

128 “lucid, deadly serious”: Spencer S. Hsu, “Pizzagate Gunman Says He Was Foolish, Reckless, Mistaken—and Sorry,” Washington Post, June 14, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/public-safety/pizzagate-shooter-apologizes-in-handwritten-letter-for-his-mistakes-ahead-of-sentencing/2017/06/13/f35126b6-5086-11e7-be25-3a519335381c_story.html?utm_term=.63e54b2d390d.

128 tearful farewell: Grace Hauck, “‘Pizzagate’ Shooter Sentenced to 4 Years in Prison,” CNN, June 22, 2017, https://www.cnn.com/2017/06/22/politics/pizzagate-sentencing/index.html.

128 sentenced to four years: Ibid.

128 For James Alefantis: Ibid.

128 known collectively as #Pizzagate: Fisher, Cox, and Hermann, “Pizzagate.”

128 1.4 million mentions: Robb, “Anatomy of a Fake News Scandal.”

128 “Something’s being covered up”: Ibid.

128 Russian sockpuppets working: Ibid.

128 nearly half of Trump voters: Catherine Rampell, “Americans—Especially but Not Exclusively Trump Voters—Believe Crazy, Wrong Things,” Washington Post, December 28, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/rampage/wp/2016/12/28/americans-especially-but-not-exclusively-trump-voters-believe-crazy-wrong-things/.

128 “the intel on this”: Adam Goldman, “The Comet Ping Pong Gunman Answers Our Reporter’s Questions,” New York Times, December 7, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/07/us/edgar-welch-comet-pizza-fake-news.html.

129 Posobiec was relentless: Fisher, Cox, and Hermann, “Pizzagate.”

129 “They want to control”: Jack Posobiec (@JackPosobiec), “ANNOUNCING: My next book 4D Warfare: How to Use New Media to Fight and Win the Culture Wars! Published by @VoxDay and Castalia House!,” August 3, 2017, 8:03 A.M., https://twitter.com/JackPosobiec/status/893125262958891009.

129 “False flag”: Paul Farhi, “‘False Flag’ Planted at a Pizza Place? It’s Just One More Conspiracy to Digest,” Washington Post, December 5, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/false-flag-planted-at-a-pizza-place-its-just-one-more-conspiracy-to-digest/2016/12/05/fc154b1e-bb09-11e6-94ac-3d324840106c_story.html?utm_term=.7ecbd9f78337.

129 “Nothing to suggest”: Jack Posobiec (@JackPosobiec), “DC Police Chief: ‘Nothing to suggest man w/gun at Comet Ping Pong had anything to do with #pizzagate’” (tweet deleted), available at Scoopnest, https://www.scoopnest.com/user/JackPosobiec/805559273426141184-dc-police-chief-nothing-to-suggest-man-w-gun-at-comet-ping-pong-had-anything-to-do-with-pizzagate.

129 livestreaming from the White House: Jared Holt and Brendan Karet, “Meet Jack Posobiec: The ‘Alt-Right’ Troll with Press Pass in White House,” Slate, August 16, 2017, https://www.salon.com/2017/08/16/meet-jack-posobiec-the-alt-right-troll-with-a-press-pass-in-white-house_partner/; Jack Posobiec (@JackPosobiec), “Free our people,” Twitter, May 9, 2017, 10:28 A.M., https://twitter.com/jackposobiec/status/861996422920536064.

129 retweeted multiple times: Colleen Shalby, “Trump Retweets Alt-Right Media Figure Who Published ‘Pizzagate’ and Seth Rich Conspiracy Theories,” Los Angeles Times, August 14, 2017, http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-pol-updates-everything-president-trump-retweets-alt-right-blogger-who-1502769297-htmlstory.html; Maya Oppenheim, “Donald Trump Retweets Far-Right Conspiracy Theorist Jack Posobiec Who Took ‘Rape Melania’ Sign to Rally,” Independent, January 15, 2018, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-jack-posobiec-pizzagate-rape-melania-sign-twitter-conspiracy-theory-far-right-a8159661.html.

129 “power law”: Emma Pierson, “Twitter Data Show That a Few Powerful Users Can Control the Conversation,” Quartz, May 5, 2015, https://qz.com/396107/twitter-data-show-that-a-few-powerful-users-can-control-the-conversation/.

130 study of 330 million: Xu Wei, “Influential Bloggers Set Topics Online,” China Daily Asia, December 27, 2013, https://www.chinadailyasia.com/news/2013-12/27/content_15108347.html.

130 a mere 300 accounts: Ibid.

130 susceptibility to further falsehoods: Sander van der Linden, “The Conspiracy-Effect: Exposure to Conspiracy Theories (About Global Warming) Decreases Pro-Social Behavior and Science Acceptance,” Personality and Individual Differences 87 (December 2015): 171–73.

130 more supportive of “extremism”: Sander van der Linden, “The Surprising Power of Conspiracy Theories,” Psychology Today, August 24, 2015, https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/socially-relevant/201508/the-surprising-power-conspiracy-theories.

130 spread about six times faster: Brian Dowling, “MIT Scientist Charts Fake News Reach,” Boston Herald, March 11, 2018, http://www.bostonherald.com/news/local_coverage/2018/03/mit_scientist_charts_fake_news_reach.

130 “Falsehood diffused”: Soroush Vosoughi, Deb Roy, and Sinan Aral, “The Spread of True and False News Online,” Science 359, no. 6380 (March 9, 2018): 1146–51.

131 fake political headlines: Silverman, “This Analysis Shows.”

131 study of 22 million tweets: Philip N. Howard et al., “Social Media, News and Political Information During the US Election: Was Polarizing Content Concentrated in Swing States?” (data memo 2017.8, Computational Propaganda Project, University of Oxford, September 28, 2017), http://comprop.oii.ox.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/sites/89/2017/09/Polarizing-Content-and-Swing-States.pdf.

131 “junk news”: Ibid.

131 “Our bodies are programmed”: danah boyd, “Streams of Content, Limited Attention: The Flow of Information Through Social Media,” quoted in Pariser, The Filter Bubble,” 14.

131 more than 400 times: Brian Stelter, “Trump Averages a ‘Fake’ Insult Every Day. Really. We Counted,” CNNMoney, January 27, 2018, http://money.cnn.com/2018/01/17/media/president-trump-fake-news-count/index.html.

132 “how social media”: See, but certainly don’t buy, Jack Posobiec, Citizens for Trump: The Inside Story of the People’s Movement to Take Back America (CreateSpace, 2017).

132 Jestin Coler: Laura Sydell, “We Tracked Down a Fake-News Creator in the Suburbs. Here’s What We Learned,” All Things Considered, NPR, November 23, 2016, https://www.npr.org/sections/alltechconsidered/2016/11/23/503146770/npr-finds-the-head-of-a-covert-fake-news-operation-in-the-suburbs.

132 full-fledged empire: Ibid.

132 false story of an FBI agent: David Mikkelson, “Fact Check: FBI Agent Suspected in Hillary Email Leaks Found Dead,” Snopes, November 5, 2016, http://www.snopes.com/fbi-agent-murder-suicide/.

132 1.6 million readers: Sydell, “We Tracked Down.”

132 at least 15 million times: Ryan Grenoble, “Here Are Some of Those Fake News Stories That Mark Zuckerberg Isn’t Worried About,” Huffington Post, November 16, 2016, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/facebook-fake-news-stories-zuckerberg_us_5829f34ee4b0c4b63b0da2ea.

132 “not the safest crowd”: Sydell, “We Tracked Down.”

133 1.25 million news stories: Yochai Benkler et al., “Study: Breitbart-Led Right-Swing Media Ecosystem Altered Broader Media Agenda,” Columbia Journalism Review, March 3, 2017, https://www.cjr.org/analysis/breitbart-media-trump-harvard-study.php.

133 founder Andrew Breitbart: Charlie Spiering, “New Andrew Breitbart footage: ‘My Goal Is to Destroy the New York Times and CNN,’” Washington Examiner, August 6, 2012, http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/new-andrew-breitbart-footage-my-goal-is-to-destroy-the-new-york-times-and-cnn/article/2504131.

133 “#War”: Joseph Bernstein, “Alt-White: How the Breitbart Machine Laundered Racist Hate,” BuzzFeed, October 5, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/heres-how-breitbart-and-milo-smuggled-white-nationalism?utm_term=.eekpAwn4E#.xuoQnyPGK.

133 Short for “alternative right”: “Alt-Right,” Southern Poverty Law Center, https://www.splcenter.org/fighting-hate/extremist-files/ideology/alt-right.

133 the Associated Press put it: John Daniszewski, “How to Describe Extremists Who Rallied in Charlottesville,” The Definitive Source (blog), Associated Press, August 15, 2017, https://blog.ap.org/behind-the-news/how-to-describe-extremists-who-rallied-in-charlottesville.

133 “the platform for the alt-right”: Sarah Posner, “How Donald Trump’s New Campaign Chief Created an Online Haven for White Nationalists,” Mother Jones, August 22, 2016, https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2016/08/stephen-bannon-donald-trump-alt-right-breitbart-news/.

133 edit their own: Bernstein, “Alt-White.”

134 judged by key measures: Benkler et al., “Study.”

134 sneaking in via Mexico: Ildefonso Ortiz and Brandon Darby, “Mexico Helping Unvetted African Migrants to U.S. Border, Many from Al-Shabaab Terror Hotbed,” Breitbart, September 10, 2016, http://www.breitbart.com/texas/2016/09/10/african-immigrants-working-mexicos-immigration-system-get-free-pass-california/.

134 Twitter account parodying Trump: John Hayward, “Three Green Berets Killed, Two Wounded in Niger Ambush,” Breitbart, October 5, 2017, http://www.breitbart.com/national-security/2017/10/05/three-green-berets-killed-two-wounded-niger-ambush/amp/.

134 John Herrman had observed: John Herrman, “In the Trenches of the Facebook Election,” The Awl, November 21, 2014, https://theawl.com/in-the-trenches-of-the-facebook-election-cc0a268cb4f7.

134 59 percent of all links: Makysm Gabielkov et al., “Social Clicks: What and Who Gets Read on Twitter?” (paper prepared for Sigmetrics ’16, Antibes Juan-Les-Pins, France, June 14–18, 2016), https://hal.inria.fr/hal-01281190/document.

135 one-tenth of professional media coverage: Thomas E. Patterson, “News Coverage of the 2016 General Election: How the Press Failed the Voters,” Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics, and Public Policy, Harvard Kennedy School, December 7, 2016, https://shorensteincenter.org/news-coverage-2016-general-election/.

135 thirty-two minutes: Andrew Tyndall, “Issues? What Issues?,” Tyndall Report, October 25, 2016, http://tyndallreport.com/comment/20/5778/.

135 “ Breitbart of the left”: Jonathan Easley, “Top Dem Super PAC Launches Anti-Trump War Room,” The Hill, December 6, 2016, http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/308978-top-dem-super-pac-launches-anti-trump-war-room.

135 secret employ: Casey Michel, “The Bizarre Rise and Dramatic Fall of Louise Mensch and Her ‘Blue Detectives,’” ThinkProgress, January 19, 2018, https://thinkprogress.org/blue-detectives-collapse-trump-russia-a42a94537bdf/.

135 2017 French presidential election: Laura Daniels, “How Russia Hacked the French Election,” Politico, April 23, 2017, https://www.politico.eu/article/france-election-2017-russia-hacked-cyberattacks/.

135 Spain: Vasco Cotovio and Emanuella Grinberg, “Spain: ‘Misinformation’ on Catalonia Referendum Came from Russia,” CNN, November 13, 2017, https://www.cnn.com/2017/11/13/europe/catalonia-russia-connection-referendum/index.html.

135 Pakistani defense minister: Ben Westcott, “Duped by Fake News Story, Pakistani Minister Threatens Nuclear War with Israel,” CNN, December 26, 2016, https://www.cnn.com/2016/12/26/middleeast/israel-pakistan-fake-news-nuclear/index.html.

135 false Facebook update: Justin Lynch, “In South Sudan, Fake News Has Deadly Consequences,” Slate, June 9, 2017, http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/06/in_south_sudan_fake_news_has_deadly_consequences.html.

136 sectarian and ethnic violence: “Social Media and Conflict in South Sudan: A Lexicon of Hate Speech Terms” (report, PeaceTech Lab, n.d.), https://static1.squarespace.com/static/54257189e4b0ac0d5fca1566/t/5851c214725e25c531901330/1481753114460/PeaceTech+Lab_+SouthSudanLexicon.pdf.

136 rival Sudanese Facebook groups: Lynch, “In South Sudan.”

136 In India: “Hindutva.Info Runs Fake News of Hindus Thrashing Barkati,” ENewsRoom, February 16, 2018, https://enewsroom.in/hindutva-info-runs-fake-story-hindus-rastravadi-muslims-bashing-barkati/.

136 in Myanmar: Euan McKirdy, “When Facebook Becomes ‘the Beast’: Myanmar Activists Say Social Media Aids Genocide,” CNN, April 6, 2018, https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/06/asia/myanmar-facebook-social-media-genocide-intl/index.html.

136 in Sri Lanka: Amanda Taub and Max Fisher, “Where Countries Are Tinderboxes and Facebook Is a Match,” New York Times, April 21, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/21/world/asia/facebook-sri-lanka-riots.html.

136 “The germs”: Ibid.

136 trademark look: Michael Lohmuller, “Panic Ensues After MS13 Allegedly Prohibits Blonde Hair in Honduras Markets,” InSight Crime, May 27, 2015, https://www.insightcrime.org/news/analysis/ms13-allegedly-prohibits-blonde-hair-in-honduras-markets/.

136 criminals solemnly denounced: MS-13, press release, trans. Google Translate, InSight Crime, http://www.insightcrime.org/images/PDFs/2015/El-Salvador-Gang-Press-Release.pdf.

136 force genital mutilation: Ian Black and Fazel Hawramy, “ISIS Denies Ordering That All Girls in Mosul Undergo FGM,” The Guardian, July 24, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jul/24/isis-deny-ordering-fgm-girls-mosul.

137 An ISIS Twitter account: Ibid.

137 Ninety percent of Americans: Michael Barthel, Amy Mitchell, and Jesse Holcomb, “Many Americans Believe Fake News Is Sowing Confusion,” Pew Research Center, December 15, 2016, http://www.journalism.org/2016/12/15/many-americans-believe-fake-news-is-sowing-confusion/.

137 Nearly one-quarter of Americans: Ibid.

137 Washington Post quietly ended: Caitlin Dewey, “What Was Fake on the Internet This Week: Why This Is the Final Column,” The Intersect (blog), Washington Post, December 18, 2015, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2015/12/18/what-was-fake-on-the-internet-this-week-why-this-is-the-final-column/?utm_term=.05edc76143b3.

137 mused columnist Caitlin Dewey: Ibid.

137 “digital wildfires”: “Digital Wildfires in a Hyperconnected World,” World Economic Forum, http://reports.weforum.org/global-risks-2013/view/risk-case-1/digital-wildfires-in-a-hyperconnected-world/.

137 More than half: Sue Shellenbarger, “Most Students Don’t Know When News Is Fake, Stanford Study Finds,” Wall Street Journal, November 21, 2016, https://www.wsj.com/articles/most-students-dont-know-when-news-is-fake-stanford-study-finds-1479752576.

137 “If it’s going viral”: Matt McKinney, “‘If It’s Going Viral, It Must Be True’: Hampton Roads Kids Struggle with Fake News, Teachers Say,” Virginian-Pilot, November 28, 2016, https://pilotonline.com/news/local/education/public-schools/if-it-s-going-viral-it-must-be-true-hampton/article_4a785dfb-3dd3-5229-9578-c4585adfefb4.html.

138 Angee Dixson was mad: Angee’s archived Twitter account provides an excellent snapshot of a Russian botnet in action. See Angee Dixson (@angeelistr), http://archive.today/2017.08.17-214343/https://twitter.com/angeelistr.

138 some ninety times a day: Isaac Arnsdorf, “Pro-Russian Bots Take Up the Right-Wing Cause After Charlottesville,” ProPublica, August 23, 2017, https://www.propublica.org/article/pro-russian-bots-take-up-the-right-wing-cause-after-charlottesville.

138 #UniteTheRight rally: Christina Caron, “Heather Heyer, Charlottesville Victim, Is Recalled as a ‘Strong Woman,’” New York Times, August 13, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/13/us/heather-heyer-charlottesville-victim.html.

138 claimed “both sides”: Dan Merica, “Trump Says Both Sides to Blame Amid Charlottesville Backlash,” CNN, August 16, 2017, https://www.cnn.com/2017/08/15/politics/trump-charlottesville-delay/index.html.

138 “Dems and Media”: Arnsdorf, “Pro-Russian Bots.”

138 “Angee Dixson” was actually: Ibid.

138 a photograph of Lorena Rae: Casey Michel, “Russia-Linked Propaganda Accounts Banned by Twitter Are Still Active on Facebook,” ThinkProgress, November 4, 2017, https://thinkprogress.org/russia-linked-propaganda-facebook-1ca727253ccf/.

138 at least 60,000: Tom Williams, “The Power of Social Media—How Twitter Exposed a Brexiteer, More Influential Than Sky News, as a Russian Troll,” PoliticsMeansPolitics (blog), Medium, August 31, 2017, https://blog.politicsmeanspolitics.com/the-power-of-social-media-how-twitter-exposed-a-brexiteer-more-influential-than-sky-news-as-a-e0b991129bd9.

139 Fake followers and “likes”: Nicholas Confessore et al., “The Follower Factory,” New York Times, January 27, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/01/27/technology/social-media-bots.html.

139 at least $1 billion: Doug Bock Clark, “Inside a Counterfeit Facebook Farm,” The Week, June 15, 2015, http://theweek.com/articles/560046/inside-counterfeit-facebook-farm.

139 18 million “likes”: Heather Timmons and Josh Horwitz, “China’s Propaganda News Outlets Are Absolutely Crushing It on Facebook,” Quartz, May 6, 2016, https://qz.com/671211/chinas-propaganda-outlets-have-leaped-the-top-of-facebook-even-though-it-banned-at-home/.

139 more than a million “fans”: Ibid.

140 4 percent supposedly lived: Jennings Brown and Adi Cohen, “There’s Something Odd About Donald Trump’s Facebook Page,” Vocativ, June 17, 2015, http://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trumps-facebook-followers-2015-6.

140 Dhaka in Bangladesh: Charles Arthur, “How Low-Paid Workers at ‘Click Farms’ Create Appearance of Online Popularity,” The Guardian, August 2, 2013, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2013/aug/02/click-farms-appearance-online-popularity.

140 Lapu-Lapu in the Philippines: Clark, “Inside a Counterfeit Facebook Farm.”

140 companies’ spam protection: Ibid.

140 Czech word meaning “slave”: Lydia H. Liu, The Freudian Robot: Digital Media and the Future of the Unconscious (University of Chicago Press, 2010), 6.

140 “Lizynia Zikur”: ProPublica (@ProPublica), “The weirdness continues. This Russian account has just 76 followers and tweeted just once: a smear of us, that got . . . 23,400+ retweets,” Twitter, August 24, 2017, 6:08 P.M., https://twitter.com/ProPublica/status/900887458400829440.

141 The “Star Wars” botnet: Bill Brenner, “Twitter’s Phantom Menace: A Star Wars Botnet,” Naked Security, https://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2017/01/25/potential-phantom-menace-found-on-twitter-a-star-wars-botnet/.

141 roughly 15 percent: Confessore et al., “The Follower Factory.”

141 random soccer statistics: Jillian C. York, “Syria’s Twitter spambots,” The Guardian, April 21, 2011, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2011/apr/21/syria-twitter-spambots-pro-revolution.

141 beautiful landscape images: Ibid.

141 hashtags like #FreeTibet: “Twitter Bots Target Tibetan Protests,” Krebs on Security (blog), March 12, 2012, http://krebsonsecurity.com/2012/03/twitter-bots-target-tibetan-protests/.

142 first documented uses: Marion R. Just et al., “‘It’s Trending on Twitter’—An Analysis of the Twitter Manipulations in the Massachusetts 2010 Special Senate Election” (paper prepared for the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, New Orleans, August 30–September 2, 2012), https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2108272#.

142 “Swift Boat” negative advertising campaign: Ibid.

142 “Twitterbomb”: Ibid.

142 more than a million fake followers: Samuel Woolley and Phil Howard, “Bots Unite to Automate the Presidential Election,” Wired, May 15, 2016, https://www.wired.com/2016/05/twitterbots-2/.

142 In Italy: Andrea Vogt, “Hot or Bot? Italian Professor Casts Doubt on Politician’s Twitter Popularity,” The Guardian, July 22, 2012, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jul/22/bot-italian-politician-twitter-grillo.

142 military cyberwarfare specialists: Choe Sang-Hun, “South Korean Officials Accused of Political Meddling,” New York Times, December 19, 2013, http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/20/world/asia/south-korean-cyberwarfare-unit-accused-of-political-meddling.html.

142 nearly 25 million messages: Lee Yoo Eun, “South Korea’s Spy Agency, Military Sent 24.2 Million Tweets to Manipulate Election,” Global Voices, November 25, 2013, https://globalvoices.org/2013/11/25/south-koreas-spy-agency-military-sent-24-2-million-tweets-to-manipulate-election/.

142 shifted their attention: Philip N. Howard and Bence Kollanyi, “Bots, #Strongerin, and #Brexit: Computational Propaganda During the UK-EU Referendum,” arXiv:1606.06356 [cs.SI], June 20, 2016.

143 ratio of five to one: Ibid.

143 linked to Russia: Robert Booth et al., “Russia Used Hundreds of Fake Accounts to Tweet About Brexit, Data Shows,” The Guardian, November 14, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/nov/14/how-400-russia-run-fake-accounts-posted-bogus-brexit-tweets.

143 less than 1 percent: Howard and Kollanyi, “Bots, #Strongerin, and #Brexit.”

143 roughly 400,000 bot accounts: Alessandro Bessi and Emilio Ferrara, “Social Bots Distort the 2016 U.S. Presidential Election Online Discussion,” First Monday 21, no. 11 (November 2016), http://firstmonday.org/ojs/index.php/fm/article/view/7090/5653.

143 “colonized” pro-Clinton hashtags: John Markoff, “Automated Pro-Trump Bots Overwhelmed Pro-Clinton Messages, Researchers Say,” New York Times, November 17, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/18/technology/automated-pro-trump-bots-overwhelmed-pro-clinton-messages-researchers-say.html?nytmobile=0&_r=0.

143 five-to-one ratio: Bence Kollanyi, Philip N. Howard, and Samuel C. Woolley, “Bots and Automation over Twitter During the U.S. Election” (data memo 2016.4, Computational Propaganda Project, University of Oxford, November 2016), http://blogs.oii.ox.ac.uk/politicalbots/wp-content/uploads/sites/89/2016/11/Data-Memo-US-Election.pdf.

143 quote 150 bots: “Chapter 15. Make America Bot Again. Part Three,” SadBotTrue, http://sadbottrue.com/article/24/.

143 the online handle “MicroChip”: Joseph Bernstein, “Never Mind the Russians, Meet the Bot King Who Helps Trump Win Twitter,” BuzzFeed, April 5, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/from-utah-with-love?utm_term=.dmdwvOGde#.hg6qwrJ28.

144 more than 30,000 retweets: Ibid.

144 “how this game works”: Ibid.

144 their “information war”: “An Ex St. Petersburg ‘Troll’ Speaks Out,” Meduza, October 15, 2017, https://meduza.io/en/feature/2017/10/15/an-ex-st-petersburg-troll-speaks-out?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Newpercent20Campaign&utm_term=percent2ASituationpercent20Report.

144 2.2. million “election-related tweets”: Twitter, Inc., “United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary, Subcommittee on Crime and Terrorism Update on Results of Retrospective Review of Russian-Related Election Activity,” January 19, 2018, https://www.judiciary.senate.gov/imo/media/doc/Edgett%20Appendix%20to%20Responses.pdf.

144 454.7 million times: Ibid.

144 cited forty-one times: Sheera Frenkel and Katie Bender, “To Stir Discord in 2016, Russians Turned Most Often to Facebook,” New York Times, February 17, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/17/technology/indictment-russian-tech-facebook.html.

144 126 million users: Twitter, Inc., “United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary.”

144 retweeted @realDonaldTrump: Ibid.

145 collective U.S. intelligence community: “Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent US Elections” (Intelligence Community Assessment, Office of the Director of National Intelligence, January 6, 2017), https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/ICA_2017_01.pdf.

145 five different cybersecurity companies: P. W. Singer, “Cyber-Deterrence and the Goal of Resilience: 30 New Actions That Congress Can Take to Improve U.S. Cybersecurity,” testimony before the House Armed Services Committee hearing “Cyber Warfare in the 21st Century: Threats, Challenges, and Opportunities,” March 1, 2017, http://docs.house.gov/meetings/AS/AS00/20170301/105607/HHRG-115-AS00-Wstate-SingerP-20170301.pdf.

145 between 48 percent and 73 percent: Twitter, Inc., “United States Senate Committee on the Judiciary.”

145 “The news media”: Jonathon Morgan and Kris Schaffer, “Sockpuppets, Secessionists, and Breitbart,” Data for Democracy (blog), Medium, March 31, 2017, https://medium.com/data-for-democracy/sockpuppets-secessionists-and-breitbart-7171b1134cd5.

145 Samuel Woolley: Craig Timberg, “As a Conservative Twitter User Sleeps, His Account Is Hard at Work,” Washington Post, February 5, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/as-a-conservative-twitter-user-sleeps-his-account-is-hard-at-work/2017/02/05/18d5a532-df31-11e6-918c-99ede3c8cafa_story.html?utm_term=.59665eea94ba.

145 France: Daniels, “How Russia Hacked the French Election.”

145 Mexico: David Alire Garcia and Noe Torres, “Russia Meddling in Mexican Election: White House Aide McMaster,” Reuters, January 7, 2018, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-mexico-russia-usa/russia-meddling-in-mexican-election-white-house-aide-mcmaster-idUSKBN1EW0UD.

145 one study found: Kirk Semple and Marina Franco, “Bots and Trolls Elbow Into Mexico’s Crowded Electoral Field,” New York Times, May 1, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/01/world/americas/mexico-election-fake-news.html.

145 Jonathon Morgan and Kris Schaffer: This report numbers among the most fascinating and insightful to come out of the flurry of data-driven, bot-centric journalism that began in 2017. Morgan and Schaffer, “Sockpuppets, Secessionists, and Breitbart.”

145 particular language and culture: Ibid.

146 “suddenly and simultaneously”: Ibid.

146 a shared playbook: Ibid.

146 four times as likely: Ibid.

146 the word “Jewish”: Ibid.

 

 6. WIN THE NET, WIN THE DAY

148 “Media weapons”: Charlie Winter, “Media Jihad: The Islamic State’s Doctrine for Information Warfare” (report, International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence, 2017), 18, http://icsr.info/wp-content/uploads/2017/02/Media-jihad_web.pdf.

148 “You can sit”: Lorraine Murphy, “The Curious Case of the Jihadist Who Started Out as a Hacktivist,” Vanity Fair, December 15, 2015, https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2015/12/isis-hacker-junaid-hussain.

148 “He had hacker cred”: Ibid.

148 easy familiarity with: Del Quentin Wilber, “Here’s How the FBI Tracked Down a Tech-Savvy Terrorist Recruiter for the Islamic State,” Los Angeles Times, April 13, 2017, http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-fg-islamic-state-recruiter-20170406-story.html.

149 some 30,000 recruits: Martin Chulov, Jamie Grierson, and Jon Swaine, “Isis Faces Exodus of Foreign Fighters as Its ‘Caliphate’ Crumbles,” The Guardian, April 26, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/26/isis-exodus-foreign-fighters-caliphate-crumbles.

149 “The knives have been”: Rukmini Callimachi, “Clues on Twitter Show Ties Between Texas Gunman and ISIS Network,” New York Times, May 11, 2015, www.nytimes.com/2015/05/12/us/twitter-clues-show-ties-between-isis-and-garland-texas-gunman.html.

149 He took a wife: Nancy Youssef, “The British Punk Rocker Widow Who Wants to Run ISIS’s Hackers,” The Daily Beast, September 27, 2015, https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-british-punk-rocker-widow-who-wants-to-run-isiss-hackers.

149 Pentagon’s “kill list”: “UK Jihadist Junaid Hussain Killed in Syria Drone Strike, Says US,” BBC News, August 27, 2015, http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-34078900.

149 tricked into clicking: James Cartledge, “Isis Terrorist Junaid Hussain Killed in Drone Attack After Boffins ‘Crack Group’s Code,’” Birmingham Live, September 16, 2015, http://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/isis-terrorist-junaid-hussain-killed-10069425.

149 leave his stepson: Adam Goldman and Eric Schmitt, “One by One, ISIS Social Media Experts Are Killed as Result of F.B.I. Program,” New York Times, November 24, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/24/world/middleeast/isis-recruiters-social-media.html?mtrref=www.google.com&gwh=D9D7306F189C9D3AD771F097D5C1BD35&gwt=pay.

150 word of the day: Jessica Stern and J. M. Berger, ISIS: The State of Terror (Ecco, 2015), 120.

150 apocalyptic interpretation: Quite literally apocalyptic. See William McCants, The ISIS Apocalypse: The History, Strategy, and Doomsday Vision of the Islamic State (St. Martin’s, 2015).

150 “Terrorism is theater”: Brian Jenkins, “International Terrorism: A New Kind of Warfare” (RAND Papers Series, no. P-5261, RAND, June 1974), https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/papers/2008/P5261.pdf.

151 Jihadi Design: Gilad Shiloach, “How ISIS Supporters Learn to Design Propaganda,” The Daily Dot, March 7, 2017, https://www.dailydot.com/layer8/isis-propaganda-graphic-design/.

151 “With the old methods”: Richard Engel, “Sadat’s Assassination Plotter Remains Unrepentant,” NBC News, July 5, 2011, http://www.nbcnews.com/id/43640995/ns/world_news-mideast_n_africa/t/sadats-assassination-plotter-remains-unrepentant/.

151 propelled by some 60,000: Steffan Truvé, “ISIS Jumping from Account to Account, Twitter Trying to Keep Up,” Recorded Future, September 3, 2014, https://www.recordedfuture.com/isis-twitter-activity/.

151 dramatic screengrabs: George Brown and CNN Wire, “How Should Media Cover American Beheading,” News Channel 3, August 20, 2014, http://wreg.com/2014/08/20/media-outlets-struggle-with-american-beheaded-coverage/.

152 “Don’t share it”: Ibid.

152 One aspiring politician: Amanda Terkel, “GOP House Candidate Uses James Foley Execution Footage in Campaign Ad,” Huffington Post, October 6, 2014, www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/10/06/wendy-rogers-arizona_n_5940346.html.

152 submerged in a pool: “ISIS Release Brutal Execution Videos of Mosul ‘Spies,’” Newsweek, June 23, 2015, http://www.newsweek.com/isis-execution-videoisis-iraq-videoislamic-state-execution-videoisis-603331.

152 “Kill the Jordanian”: Gilad Shiloach, “Crowdsourcing Terror: ISIS Asks for Ideas on Killing Jordanian Pilot,” Vocativ, December 26, 2014, http://www.vocativ.com/world/isis-2/suggestions-kill-pilot/.

152 “This is our football”: Jay Caspian King, “ISIS’s Call of Duty,” The New Yorker, September 18, 2014, https://www.newyorker.com/tech/elements/isis-video-game?loc=contentwell&lnk=image-of-a-decapitated-head&dom=section-2&irgwc=1&source=affiliate_impactpmx_12f6tote_desktop_VigLink&mbid=affiliate_impactpmx_12f6tote_desktop_VigLink.

152 “first terrorist group”: Jared Cohen, “Digital Counterinsurgency: How to Marginalize the Islamic State Online,” Foreign Affairs, November/December 2015, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/middle-east/digital-counterinsurgency.

152 nearly fifty different: Charlie Winter, “Documenting the Virtual ‘Caliphate’” (report, Quilliam, October 2015), 16, http://www.quilliaminternational.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/FINAL-documenting-the-virtual-caliphate.pdf.

152 over a thousand “official”: Ibid., 5.

153 at least 30,000 civilians: “Iraq Body Count,” accessed March 19, 2018, https://www.iraqbodycount.org/database/.

153 lived with their parents: “Case by Case: ISIS Prosecutions in the United States, March 1, 2014–June 30, 2016” (report, Center on National Security at Fordham Law, July 2016), http://static1.squarespace.com/static/55dc76f7e4b013c872183fea/t/577c5b43197aea832bd486c0/1467767622315/ISIS+Report+-+Case+by+Case+-+July2016.pdf.

153 pledge his allegiance: Thomas Joscelyn, “Orlando Terrorist Swore Allegiance to Islamic State’s Abu Bakr al Baghdadi,” FDD’s Long War Journal, June 20, 2016, http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2016/06/orlando-terrorist-swore-allegiance-to-islamic-states-abu-bakr-al-baghdadi.php.

153 had gone viral: Denver Nicks, “Orlando Shooter Checked Facebook to See If His Attack Went Viral,” Time, June 16, 2016, http://time.com/4371910/orlando-shooting-omar-mateen-facebook/?xid=emailshare.

153 virtually every actual scholar: Jennifer Williams, “How ISIS Uses and Abuses Islam,” Vox, November 18, 2015, https://www.vox.com/2015/11/18/9755478/isis-islam.

153 exaggerated its gains: Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, Nathaniel Barr, and Bridget Moreng, “How the Islamic State’s Propaganda Feeds Into Its Global Expansion Efforts,” War on the Rocks, April 28, 2016, warontherocks.com/2016/04/how-islamic-states-propaganda-feeds-into-its-global-expansion-efforts/.

153 claim after the fact: Joshua Keating, “ISIS Is Not Known for Falsely Taking Credit for Attacks—Until Recently,” Slate, October 2, 2017, http://www.slate.com/blogs/the_slatest/2017/10/02/isis_s_claims_of_responsibility_are_getting_more_dubious.html.

154 “If there is”: Mark Mazzetti and Eric Schmitt, “In the Age of ISIS, Who’s a Terrorist, and Who’s Simply Deranged?,” New York Times, July 17, 2016, www.nytimes.com/2016/07/18/world/europe/in-the-age-of-isis-whos-a-terrorist-and-whos-simply-deranged.html.

154 “information jihad”: Charlie Winter, “What I Learned from Reading the Islamic State’s Propaganda Instruction Manual,” Lawfare (blog), April 2, 2017, https://lawfareblog.com/what-i-learned-reading-islamic-states-propaganda-instruction-manual.

154 media “projectiles”: Ibid.

154 “make terrorism sexy”: David Francis, “Why Don Draper Would Be Impressed by the Islamic State,” The Cable (blog), Foreign Policy, April 7, 2015, http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/04/07/why-don-draper-would-be-impressed-by-the-islamic-state/.

155 “became a reality star”: Spencer Pratt, phone interview with authors, May 23, 2016.

155 how to make $50,000: Naomi Fry, “The Reality-TV Star Spencer Pratt on America’s Addiction to Drama,” The New Yorker, June 30, 2017, http://www.newyorker.com/culture/persons-of-interest/the-reality-tv-and-snapchat-star-spencer-pratt-on-americas-addiction-to-drama.

155 “I saw The Osbournes”: Pratt interview.

155 the Kardashians: Suzannah Weiss, “Spencer Pratt Missed His Chance to Make the Kardashians Famous,” Refinery29, February 20, 2017, http://www.refinery29.com/2017/02/141810/spencer-pratt-princes-of-malibu-kardashians.

155 nightclub called Privilege: Michael Sunderland, “Head over Hills: The Undying Love Story of Heidi and Spencer Pratt,” Vice, February 12, 2016, https://broadly.vice.com/en_us/article/9aepp7/heidi-montag-spencer-pratt-the-hills-profile.

156 “manipulating the media”: Pratt interview.

156 “working with the paparazzi”: Ibid.

156 “Best Villain”: “Teen Choice Awards 2009 Nominees,” Los Angeles Times, June 15, 2009, http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/awards/2009/06/teen-choice-awards-2009-nominees.html.

156 “shot that scene”: Pratt interview.

156 “just an awful asshole”: Ibid.

157 pioneering 1944 study: Fritz Heider and Marianne Simmel, “An Experimental Study of Apparent Behavior,” American Journal of Psychology 57, no. 2 (1944): 243–59.

157 “psychological political by-products”: Matthew Armstrong, “The Past, Present, and Future of the War for Public Opinion,” War on the Rocks, January 19, 2017, https://warontherocks.com/2017/01/the-past-present-and-future-of-the-war-for-public-opinion/.

158 “everyone’s an editor”: Heidi Montag, phone interview with authors, May 23, 2016.

158 “everyone is a reality star”: Pratt interview.

158 shrunk to eight seconds: “Attention Span Statistics,” Statistic Brain, https://www.statisticbrain.com/attention-span-statistics/.

158 fifth-grade education: “Most Presidential Candidates Speak at Grade 6–8 Level,” Cision, March 16, 2016, https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/most-presidential-candidates-speak-at-grade-6-8-level-300237139.html.

158 the complexity score dipped: Derek Thompson, “Presidential Speeches Were Once College-Level Rhetoric—Now They’re for Sixth-Graders,” The Atlantic, October 14, 2014, https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/10/have-presidential-speeches-gotten-less-sophisticated-over-time/381410/.

159 a shark swimming down: Kaleigh Rogers, “‘Shark Swims Down a Flooded Street’ Is a Viral Hoax That Won’t Die,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, October 5, 2015, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/jp5ydp/shark-swims-down-a-flooded-street-is-a-viral-hoax-that-wont-die.

160 more unyieldingly hyperpartisan: Adam Hughes and Onyi Lam, “Highly Ideological Members of Congress Have More Facebook Followers Than Moderates Do,” Pew Research Center, August 21, 2017, http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/08/21/highly-ideological-members-of-congress-have-more-facebook-followers-than-moderates-do/.

160 why conspiracy theories: Marco Guerini and Carlo Strapparava, “Why Do Urban Legends Go Viral?,” Information Processing and Management 52, no. 1 (January 2016): 163–72.

160 a jar of Nutella: Scott Campbell, “ISIS Using Kittens and NUTELLA to Lure Jihadi Wannabes into Evil Death Cult,” Mirror, May 27, 2016, http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/world-news/isis-using-kittens-nutella-lure-8061303.

160 from far-right political leaders: Andrew Marantz, “Trolls for Trump,” The New Yorker, October 31, 2016, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2016/10/31/trolls-for-trump.

160 women’s rights activists: Laura Durnell, “All Women Must Control the Narrative in and After the Trumpian Age,” Huffington Post, February 28, 2017, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/women-must-control-the-narrative-in-the-age-of-trump_us_58b609fae4b02f3f81e44dc7.

160 the Kardashian clan: Nathan Heller, “The Multitasking Celebrity Takes Center Stage,” The New Yorker, June 23, 2016, http://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-organizational-celebrity.

160 Omar Hammami: Simon Cottee, “Why It’s So Hard to Stop ISIS Propaganda,” The Atlantic, March 2, 2015, https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/03/why-its-so-hard-to-stop-isis-propaganda/386216/.

161 “we’ll lose the battle”: Meeting (not for attribution), Department of State, Washington, DC, October 7, 2015.

161 Gunner Stone: Korey Lane, “What Does Gunner Stone Mean? Heidi Montag and Spencer Pratt’s First Child Is Already Pretty Interesting,” Romper, October 4, 2017, https://www.romper.com/p/what-does-gunner-stone-mean-heidi-montag-spencer-pratts-first-child-is-already-pretty-interesting-2790177.

161 “When we do not know”: T. S. Eliot, “The Perfect Critics,” in The Sacred Wood: Essays on Poetry and Criticism (Knopf, 1921), 9.

161 “vast accumulations of knowledge”: Ibid.

162 the stronger the emotions: Jonah Berger and Katherine Milkman, “What Makes Online Content Viral?,” Journal of Marketing Research 49, no. 2 (2012): 192–205; Marco Guerini and Jacopo Staiano, “Deep Feelings: A Massive Cross-Lingual Study on the Relation Between Emotions and Virality,” arXiv:1503.04723 [cs.SI], March 2015.

162 70 million messages: Rui Fan et al., “Anger Is More Influential Than Joy: Sentiment Correlation in Weibo,” PLoS ONE 9, no. 10 (2014), e:110184, http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article/file?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0110184&type=printable.

162 “Anger is more influential”: Ibid.

162 ramp up their language: Ibid.

162 nearly 700,000 users: Adam D. L. Kramer, Jamie E. Guillory, and Jeffrey T. Hancock, “Experimental Evidence of Massive-Scale Emotional Contagion Through Social Networks,” PNAS 111, no. 24 (2014): 8788–90.

162 “emotional contagion”: Ibid.

163 “Our lives matter”: Elazar Sontag, “To This Black Lives Matter Co-founder, Activism Begins in the Kitchen,” Washington Post, March 26, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/food/to-this-black-lives-matter-co-founder-activism-begins-in-the-kitchen/2018/03/26/964ec51a-2df1-11e8-b0b0-f706877db618_story.html?utm_term=.150be2273ebc.

163 adding the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter: Jon Schuppe and Safia Samee Ali, “Cities Don’t Want Justice Department to Back Off Police Reforms,” NBC News, April 5, 2017, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/cities-dont-want-justice-department-back-police-reforms-n742661.

163 “trolling for MiGs”: Andy Bodle, “Trolls: Where Do They Come From?,” The Guardian, April 19, 2012, https://www.theguardian.com/media/mind-your-language/2012/apr/19/trolls-where-come-from.

164 “If you don’t fall”: Steven Supmante, “Trolling the Web: A Guide,” Urban75 Magazine, n.d., http://www.urban75.com/Mag/troll.html#one.

164 emotional manipulation: Natalie Sest and Evita March, “Constructing the Cyber-Troll: Psychopathy, Sadism, and Empathy,” Personality and Individual Differences 119 (December 2017): 69–72.

164 philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre: Anti-Semite and Jew (Schocken, 1948), 13.

164 “Ironghazi”: Ben Collins and Joseph Cox, “Jenna Abrams, Russia’s Clown Troll Princess, Duped the Mainstream Media and the World,” The Daily Beast, November 2, 2017, https://www.thedailybeast.com/jenna-abrams-russias-clown-troll-princess-duped-the-mainstream-media-and-the-world.

164 psychopathy and sadism: Sest and March, “Constructing the Cyber-Troll.”

165 twice as likely to engage: Justin Cheng et al., “Anyone Can Become a Troll: Causes of Trolling Behavior in Online Discussions,” arXiv:1702.01119 [cs.SI], February 2017, 8.

165 “can be contagious”: Ibid., 2.

166 “You have the prettiest”: Jonathan Vankin, “Taylor Swift the New Dear Abby? Gives Lovelorn Fan Wise-Beyond-Her-Years Advice,” Inquisitr, July 25, 2014, http://www.inquisitr.com/1373553/taylor-swift-the-new-dear-abby-gives-lovelorn-fan-wise-beyond-her-years-advice/.

166 another, 16-year-old fan: Rebecca Borison, “Taylor Swift Is Incredibly Good at Being a Celebrity,” Business Insider, September 10, 2014, http://www.businessinsider.com/taylor-swift-is-a-business-genius-2014-9.

166 #Taylurking: Lindsey Weber, “Taylor Swift Is the Reigning Queen of Celebrity Social-Media,” Vulture, October 29, 2014, http://www.vulture.com/2014/10/taylor-swift-queen-of-celebrity-social-media.html.

166 “this new site”: Taylor Swift, “For Taylor Swift, the Future of Music Is a Love Story,” Wall Street Journal, July 7, 2014, https://www.wsj.com/articles/for-taylor-swift-the-future-of-music-is-a-love-story-1404763219.

166 “In the future”: Ibid.

166 she strategically copyrighted: Dan Rys, “Taylor Swift Files Nine Trademarks for the Word ‘Swifties,’ but Why?,” Billboard, March 15, 2017, https://www.billboard.com/articles/business/7727743/taylor-swift-trademarks-swifties-but-why.

166 40 million albums: “Taylor Swift Named IFPI Global Recording Artist of 2014,” IFPI, February 23, 2015, http://www.ifpi.org/news/Taylor-Swift-named-IFPI-global-recording-artists-of-2014.

166 digital streaming records: Lisa Marie Segarra, “Taylor Swift’s Spotify Songs Made an Insane Amount of Money in a Week,” Fortune, June 23, 2017, http://fortune.com/2017/06/23/taylor-swift-spotify-songs-money/.

166 youngest of Forbes: Zack O’Malley Greenburg, “Taylor Swift Is the Youngest of America’s Richest Self-Made Women,” Forbes, June 1, 2016, https://www.forbes.com/sites/zackomalleygreenburg/2016/06/01/taylor-swift-is-the-youngest-of-americas-richest-self-made-women/#3c2593c07c1a.

166 weren’t very candid: Tim Teeman, “Why Taylor Swift’s Parties Look Like Utter Hell,” The Daily Beast, July 6, 2016, http://www.thedailybeast.com/why-taylor-swifts-parties-look-like-utter-hell.

166 “There’s no simple answer”: Amy Zimmerman, “How Kim Kardashian Beat Taylor Swift at Her Own Game,” The Daily Beast, July 18, 2016, http://www.thedailybeast.com/how-kim-kardashian-beat-taylor-swift-at-her-own-game.

167 an impromptu concert: Anna Silman, “Taylor Swift Gives the Gift of Taylor Swift for Christmas,” The Cut, December 27, 2016, https://www.thecut.com/2016/12/taylor-swift-gives-the-gift-of-taylor-swift-for-christmas.html.

167 random Christmas gifts: Kristin Harris, “Taylor Swift Surprised Her Fans with Christmas Presents and Their Reactions Are Hysterical,” BuzzFeed, November 13, 2014, https://www.buzzfeed.com/kristinharris/taylor-swift-sent-fans-surprise-christmas-presents?utm_term=.aqzdZLPZB2#.xxNbKEBK2k.

167 “the element of surprise”: Swift, “For Taylor Swift.”

167 birthday parties: Christiaan Triebert (@trbrtc), “IS fighters having dinner and cake. Photo found on mobile phone killed fighter. (h/t@AfarinMamosta/@theOSINTblog),” Twitter, May 18, 2016, 12:35 P.M., https://twitter.com/trbrtc/status/733018236481089537.

167 their cats: “Cat got your gun? Iraq, Syria, jihadist pictures go viral,” Al Arabiya, June 22, 2014, https://english.alarabiya.net/en/variety/2014/06/22/ISIS-fighters-big-on-cats.html.

168 Jumanji: John Hall, “‘We Are Humans Like You . . . Why Shouldn’t We See Jumanji?,’” Daily Mail, August 12, 2014, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2722878/Bizarre-Twitter-outburst-ISIS-fighters-reveal-love-late-Robin-Williams-blockbuster-hit-Jumanji.html.

169 “People feel like”: “Longform Podcast #254: Maggie Haberman,” Longform, July 26, 2017, https://longform.org/posts/longform-podcast-254-maggie-haberman.

169 team of eleven staffers: Kyle Cheney, “The Staff Army Behind a Clinton Tweet,” Politico Live Blog, Politico, October 15, 2016, https://www.politico.com/live-blog-updates/2016/10/john-podesta-hillary-clinton-emails-wikileaks-000011.

169 “MODERN DAY PRESIDENTIAL”: Donald Trump (@realDonaldTrump), “My use of social media is not Presidential—it’s MODERN DAY PRESIDENTIAL. Make America Great Again!,” Twitter, July 1, 2017, 3:41 P.M., https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/881281755017355264.

169 La Meute: Julia Carrie Wong, “How Facebook Groups Bring People Closer Together—Neo-Nazis Included,” The Guardian, July 31, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jul/31/extremists-neo-nazis-facebook-groups-social-media-islam.

169 “bring the world”: Josh Constine, “Facebook Changes Mission Statement to ‘Bring the World Closer Together,’” TechCrunch, June 22, 2017, https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/22/bring-the-world-closer-together/.

170 ballooned 600 percent: J. M. Berger, “Nazis vs. ISIS on Twitter: A Comparative Study of White Nationalist and ISIS Online Social Media Networks” (paper, Program on Extremism, George Washington University, September 2016), https://cchs.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/zaxdzs2371/f/downloads/Nazis%20v.%20ISIS%20Final_0.pdf.

170 some 1,600: “Hate and Extremism,” Southern Poverty Law Center, accessed March 20, 2018, https://www.splcenter.org/issues/hate-and-extremism.

170 fifty people were killed: Keegan Hankes and Alex Amend, “The Alt-Right Is Killing People,” Southern Poverty Law Center, February 5, 2018, https://www.splcenter.org/20180205/alt-right-killing-people.

170 mothers of children: Julia Ioffe, “Mothers of ISIS,” Huffington Post, August 12, 2015, http://highline.huffingtonpost.com/articles/en/mothers-of-isis/.

170 Sunday school teacher: Rukmini Callimachi, “ISIS and the Lonely Young American,” New York Times, June 27, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/28/world/americas/isis-online-recruiting-american.html.

170 “It’s a closed community”: Scott Shane, Matt Apuzzo, and Eric Schmitt, “Americans Attracted to ISIS Find an ‘Echo Chamber’ on Social Media,” New York Times, December 8, 2015, http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/09/us/americans-attracted-to-isis-find-an-echo-chamber-on-social-media.html.

171 “Isolation may be”: Hannah Arendt, Totalitarianism: Part Three of the Origins of Totalitarianism (Harcourt, 1968), 172.

171 Farah Pandith is a pioneer: Farah Pandith, interview with authors, Washington, DC, November 20, 2015.

171 “Only peer-to-peer relations”: Ibid.

171 “fully focusing on millennials”: Ibid.

172 “no government is credible”: Ibid.

172 “Dumbledore’s Army”: Ibid.

172 Online Civil Courage Initiative: “Online Civil Courage Initiative,” ISD, accessed March 19, 2018, https://www.isdglobal.org/programmes/communications-technology/online-civil-courage-initiative-2/.

172 Gen Next: Adam Popescu, “This Online Group of Former Islamic Extremists Deradicalizes Jihadists,” Bloomberg, October 23, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-23/this-online-group-of-former-islamic-extremists-deradicalizes-jihadists.

172 Creative Minds for Social Good: “Hedayah Launches ‘Creative Minds for Social Good’ Initiative to Counter Terrorist Propaganda,” Hedayah, October 25, 2016, http://www.hedayahcenter.org/media-details/49/news/73/press-releases/688/hedayah-launches-creative-minds-for-social-good-initiative-to-counter-terrorist-propaganda.

172 “swarm the content”: Pandith interview.

172 “digital world war”: Haroon K. Ullah, Digital World War: Islamists, Extremists, and the Fight for Cyber Supremacy (Yale University Press, 2017).

173 nearly 8 million times: Paul Stollery, “Mentions of ‘Fuck’ Online,” @PaulStollery (blog), Medium, https://medium.com/@PaulStollery/all-of-the-fucks-given-online-in-2016-58c60edd6e44.

173 “Trump ran against”: David Wong [Jason Pargin], “Don’t Panic,” Cracked, November 9, 2016, http://www.cracked.com/blog/dont-panic/.

173 $5 billion worth: Mary Harris, “A Media Post-Mortem on the 2016 Presidential Election,” Media Quant, November 14, 2016, http:///www.mediaquant.net/2016/11/a-media-post-mortem-on-the-2016-presidential-election/.

173 “Trump understands”: Eli Stokols and Josh Dawsey, “Trump’s Twitter Feed Traumatizes Washington,” Politico, January 5, 2017, http://www.politico.com/story/2017/01/trump-twitter-feed-fears-233242.

174 “I think that social media”: Rebecca Morin, “Trump Says Social Media Was Key to Victory,” Politico, November 12, 2016, https://www.politico.com/story/2016/11/donald-trump-social-media-231285.

174 “Poe’s Law”: For a good definition, see “Poe’s Law,” RationalWiki, accessed March 20, 2018, http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Poe%27s_Law.

174 saw someone like them: Dale Beran, “4chan: The Skeleton Key to the Rise of Trump,” @DaleBeran (blog), Medium, February 14, 2017, https://medium.com/@DaleBeran/4chan-the-skeleton-key-to-the-rise-of-trump-624e7cb798cb.

175 The discussion board /r/The_Donald: “/r/The_Donald metrics,” Reddit Metrics, accessed March 20, 2018, http://redditmetrics.com/r/The_Donald#disqus_thread.

175 Trump aides who: Ben Schreckinger, “World War Meme,” Politico Magazine, March/April 2017, https://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/03/memes-4chan-trump-supporters-trolls-internet-214856.

175 pattern that continued: Charlie Warzel, “From Reddit to Trump’s Twitter—in Less Than 24 Hours,” BuzzFeed, March 3, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/from-reddit-to-trumps-twitter-in-less-than-24-hours?utm_term=.nq3Op34p7m#.odynXpYXQ1.

175 “They are endlessly available”: Charlie Warzel, “‘Journalistic Integrity Is Dead.’ Is the Mainstream Media Next?,” Infowarzel, TinyLetter, July 23, 2017, tinyletter.com/Infowarzel/letters/journalistic-integrity-is-dead-is-the-mainstream-media-next.

175 the firm Brandwatch: Adam Tiouririne, “Hillary Clinton’s Twitter Chart of Doom,” Bloomberg, November 16, 2016, www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2016-11-16/hillary-clinton-s-twitter-chart-of-doom.

176 “We have an army”: Michael Flynn, speech (Young Americans Forum, Washington, DC, November 12, 2016). Video available at “Lieutenant General Michael T. Flynn,” Young America’s Foundation, November 12, 2016, accessed March 20, 2018, https://www.yaf.org/videos/lieutenant-general-michael-t-flynn/.

176 its strategic efforts: Steven Bertoni, “Exclusive Interview: How Jared Kushner Won Trump the White House,” Forbes, November 22, 2016, https://www.forbes.com/sites/stevenbertoni/2016/11/22/exclusive-interview-how-jared-kushner-won-trump-the-white-house/#633d9c9a3af6.

176 his first $2 million: Sue Halpern, “How He Used Facebook to Win,” New York Review of Books, June 8, 2017, http://www.nybooks.com/articles/2017/06/08/how-trump-used-facebook-to-win/.

176 every last bit: Ibid.

177 8 trillion pieces: Ibid.

177 5,000 data points: Ibid.

177 “sex compass”: Alyssa Newcomb, “‘Sex Compass’ App Harvested User Data, Former Cambridge Analytica Employee Says,” NBC News, April 17, 2018, https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/sex-compass-app-harvested-user-data-former-cambridge-analytica-employee-n866666.

177 not just 87 million users: Sean Burch, “Facebook Now Says 87 Million Users Hit by Cambridge Analytica Leak,” The Wrap, April 4, 2018, https://www.thewrap.com/facebook-87-million-cambridge-analytica-leak/.

177 direct messages: Alex Hern and Carole Cadwalladr, “Revealed: Aleksander Kogan Collected Facebook Users’ Direct Messages,” The Guardian, April 13, 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2018/apr/13/revealed-aleksandr-kogan-collected-facebook-users-direct-messages.

177 “gold mine”: Natasha Bertrand, “A Long-Overlooked Player Is Emerging as a Key Figure in the Trump-Russia Investigation,” Business Insider, June 23, 2017, http://www.businessinsider.com/brad-parscale-trump-russia-investigation-2017-6.

177 patterns of Facebook “likes”: Hannes Grassegger and Mikael Krogerus, “The Data That Turned the World Upside Down,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, January 28, 2017, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/mg9vvn/how-our-likes-helped-trump-win.

177 only ten “likes”: Ibid.

177 “We exploited Facebook”: Carole Cadwalladr and Emma Graham-Harrison, “Revealed: 50 Million Facebook Profiles Harvested for Cambridge Analytica in Major Data Breach,” The Guardian, March 17, 2018, https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/mar/17/cambridge-analytica-facebook-influence-us-election.

177 Lookalike Audiences: Halpern, “How He Used Facebook to Win.”

178 “fifteen people”: Brad Parscale, interview, “How Facebook Ads Helped Elect Trump,” 60 Minutes, CBS, October 6, 2017, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/how-facebook-ads-helped-elect-trump/.

178 “perfect” messages: Issie Laprowsky, “Here’s How Facebook Actually Won Trump the Presidency,” Wired, November 15, 2016, https://www.wired.com/2016/11/facebook-won-trump-election-not-just-fake-news/.

178 almost 6 million different versions: Sarah Frier, “Trump’s Campaign Said It Was Better at Facebook. Facebook Agrees,” Bloomberg, April 3, 2018, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-04-03/trump-s-campaign-said-it-was-better-at-facebook-facebook-agrees.

178 approached 200,000: Ibid.

178 even the topics: Bertoni, “Exclusive Interview.”

178 “all being orchestrated”: Ibid.

178 “15 Hedgehogs”: “15 Hedgehogs with Things That Look Like Hedgehogs,” BuzzFeed, February 18, 2013, https://www.buzzfeed.com/babymantis/15-hedgehogs-with-things-that-look-like-hedgehogs-1opu?utm_term=.sdy7MQdMKY#.tg3jL0eLm4.

178 “Which Ousted”: Miriam Berger, “Which Ousted Arab Spring Ruler Are You?,” BuzzFeed, March 6, 2014, https://www.buzzfeed.com/miriamberger/which-ousted-arab-spring-ruler-are-you?utm_term=.dfDje0RyZJ#.camR0ZnQ8B.

179 more than 200 articles: Robinson Meyer, “How Many Stories Do Newspapers Publish Per Day?” The Atlantic, May 26, 2016, https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2016/05/how-many-stories-do-newspapers-publish-per-day/483845/.

179 monitored the performance: David Rowan, “How BuzzFeed Mastered Social Sharing to Become a Media Giant for a New Era,” Wired, January 2, 2014, http://www.wired.co.uk/article/buzzfeed.

179 “12 Extremely Disappointing”: Dave Sopera, “12 Extremely Disappointing Facts About Popular Music,” BuzzFeed, October 11, 2011, https://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/12-extremely-disappointing-facts-about-popular-mus#.qr9a4wzrG.

179 “Leonardo DiCaprio Might Be”: Lauren Yapalater, “Leonardo DiCaprio Might Be a Human Puppy,” BuzzFeed, April 26, 2013, https://www.buzzfeed.com/lyapalater/leonardo-dicaprio-might-be-a-human-puppy?utm_term=.ge7NqKQqan#.rpPL9oD9kZ.

179 “firehose of falsehood”: Christopher Paul and Miriam Matthews, “The Russian ‘Firehose of Falsehood’ Propaganda Model,” Perspective (report, RAND, 2016), https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/perspectives/PE100/PE198/RAND_PE198.pdf.

 

 7. LIKEWAR

181 “the first non-linear war”: Surkov is famed less for his writing than as a principal architect of the modern Russian state. Natan Dubovitsky [Vladislav Surkov], “Without Sky,” quoted in Peter Pomerantsev, Nothing Is True and Everything Is Possible: The Surreal Heart of the New Russia (PublicAffairs, 2014), 2.

181 crew of the CS Alert: “British Cable Steamer Cuts Germany’s Trans-Atlantic Submarine Cables,” Palestine: Information with Provenance Database, accessed March 20, 2018, http://cosmos.ucc.ie/cs1064/jabowen/IPSC/php/event.php?eid=4289.

181 all seven of Germany’s: The exact order by which the lines were cut remains a matter of contention. See Chad R. Fuldwider, German Propaganda and U.S. Neutrality in World War I (University of Missouri Press, 2016), 196; “British Cable Steamer.”

181 German word kadaver: Garth S. Jowett and Victoria O’Donnell, Propaganda and Persuasion, 5th ed. (Sage, 2012), 167.

182 When the United States: Ibid., 217–25.

182 Pentagon immediately classified: David Ronfeldt, phone interview with author, December 4, 2014.

182 “Cyberwar Is Coming!”: John Arquilla and David Ronfeldt, “Cyberwar Is Coming!,” Comparative Strategy 12, no. 2 (1993): 141–65, https://www.rand.org/content/dam/rand/pubs/reprints/2007/RAND_RP223.pdf.

182 “information is becoming”: Ibid.

183 “It means trying”: Ibid.

183 essentially a dead topic: Ronfeldt interview.

183 “Our hope was”: John Arquilla, phone interview with author, November 3, 2014.

184 “global information warfare”: Jolanta Darczewska, The Anatomy of Russian Information Warfare: The Crimean Operation, A Case Study, Point of View, no. 42 (Centre for Eastern Studies, May 2014).

184 release of an atomic bomb: Ulrik Franke, “War by Non-military Means: Understanding Russian Information Warfare” (report, Swedish Ministry of Defense, March 2015), 27, http://johnhelmer.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Sweden-FOI-Mar-2015-War-by-non-military-means.pdf.

184 “blur the traditional”: Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, “Doctrine of Information Security of the Russian Federation,” December 5, 2016, http://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/official_documents/-/asset_publisher/CptICkB6BZ29/content/id/2563163.

184 “a system of spiritual”: Franke, “War by Non-military Means,” 12.

184 “measures aiming to pre-empt”: Ibid., 11.

184 “three warfares”: Information at War: From China’s Three Warfares to NATO’s Narratives, Beyond Propaganda (Transitions Forum, Legatum Institute, September 2015), https://stratcomcoe.org/legatum-institute-information-war-chinas-three-warfares-natos-narratives.

185 “War is accelerating”: State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, “China’s Military Strategy (2015)” (report, May 2015), https://jamestown.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/China%E2%80%99s-Military-Strategy-2015.pdf.

185 Operation Earnest Voice: Nick Fielding and Ian Cobain, “Revealed: US Spy Operation That Manipulates Social Media,” The Guardian, March 17, 2011, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2011/mar/17/us-spy-operation-social-networks.

185 “allow one U.S. serviceman”: Ibid.

185 In 2015, Britain formed: Ewen MacAskill, “British Army Creates Team of Facebook Warriors,” The Guardian, January 31, 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/31/british-army-facebook-warriors-77th-brigade.

185 “agent of change”: “77th Brigade,” British Army, accessed October 5, 2017, http://www.army.mod.uk/structure/39492.aspx?t=/77thBrigade (page deleted). See also David Hume Footsoldier, “Introducing 77 Brigade and a New Way of Business,” Think Defence, February 29, 2015, https://www.thinkdefence.co.uk/2015/02/introducing-77-brigade-new-way-business/.

185 “weaponization of social media”: “NATO Installs Information Warfare Center in Latvia,” Telesur, March 29, 2015, https://www.telesurtv.net/english/news/NATO-Installs-Information-Warfare-Center-in-Latvia-20150329-0017.html.

186 “chilled-out [dude]”: Jessica Chia, “Pepe Croaks: Cartoonist Kills Off Frog Character That Spawned Thousands of Memes Before It Was Hijacked by the Far Right and Branded a Hate Symbol,” Daily Mail, May 9, 2017, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4487364/Pepe-croaks-Cartoonist-kills-frog-turned-hate-symbol.html.

186 declared a hate symbol: “Pepe the Frog,” Anti-Defamation League, accessed March 20, 2018, https://www.adl.org/education/references/hate-symbols/pepe-the-frog.

187 Trump tweeted a picture: “Pepe the Frog,” Know Your Meme, accessed March 20, 2018, http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/pepe-the-frog#fn2.

187 “somewhere in the American”: “Wanted: Put Up a Pepe Billboard,” WeSearchr, updated October 4, 2016, https://web.archive.org/web/20180122193031/http://wesearchr.com/bounties/put-up-a-pepe-billboard.

187 Russia’s UK embassy: James Vincent, “Russian Embassy Trolls UK Prime Minister with Pepe Cartoon,” The Verge, January 10, 2017, https://www.theverge.com/2017/1/10/14222780/russian-embassy-trolls-uk-prime-minister-with-pepe.

187 “drinkin’, stinkin’”: Matt Furie, Boy’s Club #1 (Buenaventura, 2006).

187 “Feels good man”: “Feels Good Man,” Know Your Meme, accessed March 20, 2018, http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/feels-good-man.

187 began to make their own: Katie Notopoulos, “1,272 Rare Pepes,” BuzzFeed, May 11, 2015, https://www.buzzfeed.com/katienotopoulos/1272-rare-pepes?utm_term=.cbOagq2gN8#.qu9X8EA8ob.

187 the unofficial mascot: “Pepe the Frog,” Know Your Meme.

188 thirty “shitposters”: Olivia Nuzzi, “How Pepe the Frog Became a Nazi Trump Supporter and Alt-Right Symbol,” The Daily Beast, May 26, 2016, http://www.thedailybeast.com/how-pepe-the-frog-became-a-nazi-trump-supporter-and-alt-right-symbol.

188 a literal Nazi: Ibid.

188 punched him in the face: Paul P. Murphy, “White Nationalist Richard Spencer Punched During Interview,” CNN, January 21, 2017, https://www.cnn.com/2017/01/20/politics/white-nationalist-richard-spencer-punched/.

189 “Meme War Veteran”: “Meme War Veteran Hat,” Snake Hound Machine, accessed March 20, 2018, http://www.snakehoundmachine.com/product/meme-war-veteran-hat/.

189 far-right militias: Jack Smith IV, “America’s Militia Movement Found Its Next Generation of Soldiers: Teenage 4chan Trolls,” Mic, May 23, 2017, https://mic.com/articles/177106/americas-militia-movement-alt-right-teenage-4chan-trolls-boston-free-speech-rally.

189 peppered with Pepe memes: Claudia Koerner and Cora Lewis, “Here’s What We Know About the Man Accused of Killing a Woman at a White Supremacist Rally,” BuzzFeed, August 12, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/claudiakoerner/what-we-know-about-james-alex-fields-charlottesville-crash?utm_term=.otXDA8VA9l#.ik6Dmlbmd9.

189 Ku Klux Klan mask: “From Charlottesville. Pepe did nothing wrong!,” /r/The_Donald, Reddit, accessed November 10, 2017, https://www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/6t9ryg/from_charlottesville_pepe_did_nothing_wrong/.

189 evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins: James Gleick, “What Defines a Meme?,” Smithsonian, May 2011, http://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/what-defines-a-meme-1904778/?all.

189 “The computers”: Richard Dawkins, The Selfish Gene, 40th anniv. ed. (Oxford University Press, 2016), 255.

190 Russian secret police: “Anti-Semitism in the United States: Henry Ford Invents a Jewish Conspiracy,” Jewish Virtual Library, http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/henry-ford-invents-a-jewish-conspiracy.

190 “It is a perfect milieu”: “Memes: The New Replicators—Chapter 11 from Richard Dawkins, ‘The Selfish Gene,’” Evolution etc (blog), November 23, 2015, http://evolutionetc.blogspot.com/2015/11/memes-new-replicators-chapter-11-from.html.

190 “a first class ecology”: “Richard Dawkins,” Know Your Meme, accessed March 20, 2018, http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/people/richard-dawkins.

190 a toxic Twitter troll: David Freeman and Eliza Sankar-Gorton, “15 of Richard Dawkins’ Most Controversial Tweets,” Huffington Post, September 22, 2015, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/15-of-richard-dawkins-most-controversial-tweets_us_56004360e4b00310edf7eaf6.

191 “Digital content can travel”: Whitney Phillips and Ryan Milner, “The Complex Ethics of Online Memes,” The Ethics Centre, October 26, 2016, http://www.ethics.org.au/On-Ethics/blog/October-2016/the-complex-ethics-of-online-memes.

191 went so far as to sue: Matthew Gault, “Pepe the Frog’s Creator Goes Legally Nuclear Against the Alt-Right,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, September 18, 2017, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/8x8gaa/pepe-the-frogs-creator-lawsuits-dmca-matt-furie-alt-right.

191 “nonlinear battlefield”: Michael B. Prosser, “Memetics—a Growth Industry in US Military Operations” (master’s thesis, Marine Corps School of Advanced Warfighting, 2006), http://www.dtic.mil/dtic/tr/fulltext/u2/a507172.pdf.

191 “military memetics”: Jacob Siegel, “Is America Prepared for Meme Warfare?,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, January 31, 2017, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/xyvwdk/meme-warfare.

191 “Exploring the Utility”: Vera Zakem, Megan K. McBride, and Kate Hammerberg, “Exploring the Utility of Memes for U.S. Government Influence Campaigns” (report, Center for Naval Analyses, April 2018), https://www.cna.org/CNA_files/PDF/DRM-2018-U-017433-Final.pdf.

191 Bureau of Memetic Warfare: /bmw/—The Bureau of Memetic Warfare (website), 8chan, https://8ch.net/bmw/index.html.

192 One user grandly summarized: “Control the Memes, Control the World,” /bmw/—The Bureau of Memetic Warfare, 8chan, https://8ch.net/bmw/res/1.html#1.

192 form of Jeff Giesea: Joseph Bernstein, “This Man Helped Build the Trump Meme Army—Now He Wants to Reform It,” BuzzFeed, January 18, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/this-man-helped-build-the-trump-meme-army-and-now-he-wants-t?utm_term=.usYQYkNYy6#.ogmlxRJxMO.

192 put his thoughts to paper: Jeff Giesea, “It’s Time to Embrace Memetic Warfare,” Defence Strategic Communications 1, no. 1 (Winter 2015): 68, https://www.stratcomcoe.org/jeff-giesea-its-time-embrace-memetic-warfare.

192 “It’s time to adopt”: Ibid., 76.

193 “Own the moment”: August Cole (@august_cole), “Own the moment, own the hour. Own the hour, own the country. @selectedwisdom @peterwsinger,” Twitter, January 23, 2018, 12:27 P.M., https://twitter.com/august_cole/status/955899876700717056.

193 bombs on packed school buses: Aluf Benn, “Israel Killed Its Subcontractor in Gaza,” Haaretz, November 14, 2012, https://www.haaretz.com/.premium-death-of-israel-s-subcontractor-1.5198285.

193 five assassination attempts: “The Maestro of Difficult Missions,” Majalla, October 30, 2009, http://eng.majalla.com/2009/10/article559851/the-maestro-of-difficult-missions.

193 Israeli Heron drone: Nick Meo, “How Israel Killed Ahmed Jabari, Its Toughest Enemy in Gaza,” November 17, 2012, The Telegraph, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/israel/9685598/How-Israel-killed-Ahmed-Jabari-its-toughest-enemy-in-Gaza.html.

193 “The IDF has begun”: IDF (@IDFSpokesperson), “The IDF has begun a widespread campaign on terror sites & operatives in the #Gaza Strip, chief among them #Hamas & Islamic Jihad targets,” Twitter, November 14, 2012, 6:29 A.M., https://twitter.com/IDFSpokesperson/status/268722403989925888.

193 “In case you missed”: IDF (@IDFSpokesperson), “In case you missed it—VIDEO—IDF Pinpoint Strike on Ahmed Jabari, Head of #Hamas Military Wing http://youtu.be/P6U2ZQ0EhN4#PillarOfDefense,” Twitter, November 14, 2012, 11:12 A.M., https://twitter.com/idfspokesperson/status/268793527943708673.

193 nearly 5 million times: “IDF Pinpoint Strike on Ahmed Jabari, Head of Hamas Military Wing,” YouTube video, 0:09, uploaded by Israel Defense Forces, November 14, 2012, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6U2ZQ0EhN4.

193 share it with all: Yaakov Lappin, “IAF Strike Kills Hamas Military Chief Jabari,” Jerusalem Post, November 14 2012, http://www.jpost.com/Defense/IAF-strike-kills-Hamas-military-chief-Jabari.

194 dozens of missile caches: “Ahmed Jabari Funeral Draws Large Crowds, but No Hamas Leaders,” Israel Hayom, November 15, 2012, http://www.israelhayom.com/site/newsletter_article.php?id=6425.

194 “We recommend”: Brian Fung, “Military Strikes Go Viral: Israel Is Live-Tweeting Its Own Offensive into Gaza,” The Atlantic, November 14, 2012, http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/11/military-strikes-go-viral-israel-is-live-tweeting-its-own-offensive-into-gaza/265227/.

194 “Our blessed hands”: Ibid.

194 Two IDF soldiers: “Israel Under Fire—November 2012,” Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, November 22, 2012, http://www.mfa.gov.il/mfa/foreignpolicy/terrorism/pages/israel_under_fire-november_2012.aspx.

194 “the world of social networks”: “War Fighting in the Information Age—the Israeli Way,” IMSL, January 16, 2013, http://intelmsl.com/insights/in-the-news/war-fighting-in-the-information-age-the-israeli-way/.

194 more than 10 million heated messages: Chris Moody, “Gaza Goes Viral: An Analysis of Influence—Google Ideas Summit” (speech, Google Ideas Conflict in a Connected World Conference, New York, October 21, 2013), https://blog.gdeltproject.org/gaza-goes-viral-an-analysis-of-influence-google-ideas-summit/.

194 even a Pinterest page: “War Fighting in the Information Age.”

194 a “Consistent” badge: Jon Mitchell, “Unbelievable! The IDF Has Gamified Its War Blog,” Readwrite, November 15, 2012, http://readwrite.com/2012/11/15/unbelievable-the-idf-has-gamified-its-war-blog/.

195 “What Would You Do?”: Luke Justin Heemsbergen and Simon Lindgren, “The Power of Precision Air Strikes and Social Media Feeds in the 2012 Israel-Hamas Conflict: ‘Targeting Transparency,’” Australian Journal of International Affairs 68, no. 5 (2014): 581.

195 “Playing war games”: Peter Schorsch, “Israeli Defense Forces Live-Tweets War,” SaintPetersBlog, http://saintpetersblog.com/israeli-defense-forces-live-tweets-war/.

195 “Israeli hunger for pizza”: Ran Boker, “Hamas Hacks Channel 10: ‘Prepare for Drawn-Out Stay in Bomb Shelters,’” Ynetnews, July 15, 2014, http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4543596,00.html.

195 nearly 300 messages: Thomas Zeitzoff, “Does Social Media Influence Conflict? Evidence from the 2012 Gaza Conflict,” Journal of Conflict Resolution 62, no. 1 (2016): 29–63.

195 the Hamas spokesperson: Lahav Harkov, “IDF and Hamas Wage War on Twitter,” Jerusalem Post, November 21, 2012, http://www.jpost.com/Features/In-Thespotlight/IDF-and-Hamas-wage-war-on-Twitter.

195 “short bursts”: David Sarno, “Twitter Creator Jack Dorsey Illuminates the Site’s Founding Document. Part I,” Technology (blog), Los Angeles Times, February 18, 2009, http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2009/02/twitter-creator.html.

196 more than halved: Zeitzoff, “Does Social Media Influence Conflict?,” 35.

196 Hamas actively solicited: Stuart Winer, “Netanyahu: Hamas Wants ‘Telegenically Dead Palestinians,’” Times of Israel, July 20, 2014, http://www.timesofisrael.com/netanyahu-hamas-wants-telegenically-dead-palestinians/.

196 “There is nothing wrong”: Sarah Fowler, “Hamas and Israel Step Up Cyber Battle for Hearts and Minds,” BBC News, July 15, 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-28292908.

197 “People don’t need”: Ian Burrell, “Israel-Gaza Conflict: Social Media Becomes the Latest Battleground in Middle East Aggression—but Beware of Propaganda and Misinformation,” Independent, July 14, 2014, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/israel-gaza-conflict-social-media-becomes-the-latest-battleground-in-middle-east-aggression-but-9605952.html.

197 more than 4 million times: Paul Mason, “Why Israel Is Losing the Social Media War over Gaza,” Huffington Post, July 23, 2014, http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/paul-mason/israel-gaza-social-media_b_5612510.html?utm_hp_ref=uk.

197 many Israelis were furious: Mirren Gidda, “Poll: 92% of Israeli Jews Say Operation Protective Edge Was Justified,” Time, August 19, 2014, http://time.com/3144232/israeli-jews-poll-gaza-protective-edge/.

197 nine out of ten: Ibid.

197 one-third of Palestinians: Harriet Salem, “Facebook Is Being Sued by 20,000 Israelis for Inciting Palestinian Terror,” Vice, October 27, 2015, https://news.vice.com/article/facebook-is-being-sued-by-20000-israelis-for-inciting-palestinian-terror.

197 just 7 years old: Janna Jihad, “10-Year-Old Palestinian Journalist Covers Violence in the West Bank,” Women in the World, June 1, 2016, https://womenintheworld.com/2016/06/01/10-year-old-palestinian-journalist-covers-violence-in-the-west-bank/?refresh.

197 driven not by opportunity: “Ten-Year Old Is Youngest Palestinian Amateur Journalist,” The Palestine Chronicle, June 1, 2016, http://www.palestinechronicle.com/ten-year-old-is-youngest-palestinian-amateur-journalist/.

197 death of a cousin: Jihad, “10-Year-Old Palestinian Journalist.”

197 her mom’s iPhone: Ibid.

197 “They’re killing us!”: Janna Jihad, “Spirit of My Land,” Facebook, December 10, 2017, https://www.facebook.com/Janna.Jihad/?hc_ref=ARSF_77Y2ygZMxH_IB7KL9aJA6VMdCXGCoIXHsF87wYBVsRlyKmhs2IAKD5PNYWXeo4&fref=nf.

198 “My camera is my gun”: Tarunika Rajesh, “Meet 13-Year-Old Journalist Janna Jihad Who Records Her Messages from the World’s Most Dangerous War Zone,” Meaww, January 16, 2018, https://meaww.com/read/women/meet-13-year-old-journalist-janna-jihad-who-records-her-messages-from-the-worlds-most-dangerous-war-zone.

198 “upload the pictures”: “Digital Intifada,” Vice, March 24, 2016, https://news.vice.com/video/digital-intifada-full-length.

198 “I will attack you”: “Hebrew Music Video Glorifying the Killing of Israeli Jews Circulates on Palestinian Social Media,” Middle East Media Research Institute, July 28, 2017, https://www.memri.org/tv/hebrew-music-video-glorifying-killing-israeli-jews-on-palestinian-social-media.

198 most vulnerable arteries: “Social Media as a Platform for Palestinian Incitement—Part II: Video Tutorials, Tips for Achieving More ‘Effective’ Attacks,” Middle East Media Research Institute, October 14, 2015, https://www.memri.org/reports/social-media-platform-palestinian-incitement-%E2%80%93-part-ii-video-tutorials-tips-achieving-more.

198 posed their toddlers: “Social Media as a Platform for Incitement—Part III: Posting Pictures of Small Children Wielding Knives as Praise, Encouragement for Terrorism,” Middle East Media Research Institute, October 22, 2015, https://www.memri.org/reports/social-media-platform-incitement-%E2%80%93-part-iii-posting-pictures-small-children-wielding-knives.

198 #killajew: “Incitement to Violence Against Jews Spreads Online,” Anti-Defamation League, October 9, 2015, https://www.adl.org/blog/incitement-to-violence-against-jews-spreads-online.

198 “job to save my son”: “Digital Intifada.”

198 Jewish Internet Defense Force: Sharon Udasin, “Internet Activist No Friend of Facebook,” Jewish Week, September 29, 2009, http://jewishweek.timesofisrael.com/internet-activist-no-friend-of-facebook/.

199 hasbara fellowships: “Wikipedia, Israel and the Internet: Hasbara Fellowships,” Deconditioning Our Minds (blog), http://decondition.blogspot.com/2007/08/wikipedia-israel-and-internet.html.

199 “information directorate”: “Cabinet Communique,” Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, July 8, 2007, http://mfa.gov.il/MFA/PressRoom/2007/Pages/Cabinet%20Communique%208-Jul-2007.aspx.

199 fund an “internet warfare squad”: Rona Kuperboim, “Thought-Police Is Here,” Ynetnews, July 10, 2009, https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-3744516,00.html.

199 Freedom Flotilla: Isabel Kershner, “Israel Intercepts Gaza Flotilla; Violence Reported,” New York Times, May 30, 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/05/31/world/middleeast/31flotilla.html.

199 a bloody boarding: Noah Schactman, “Israel Turns to YouTube, Twitter After Flotilla Fiasco,” Wired, June 1, 2010, https://www.wired.com/2010/06/israel-turns-to-youtube-twitter-to-rescue-info-war/.

199 “They tried to block”: Gilad Lotan, phone interview with author, November 7, 2014.

199 “we are going to lose”: Joshua Mitnick, “Gaza Aid Flotilla: Why Israel Expects to Lose the PR War,” Christian Science Monitor, May 28, 2010, https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2010/0528/Gaza-aid-flotilla-Why-Israel-expects-to-lose-the-PR-war.

199 a fun side project: Noah Schactman, “Israel’s Accidental YouTube War,” Wired, January 21, 2009, https://www.wired.com/2009/01/israels-acciden/; Allison Hoffman, “The ‘Kids’ Behind IDF’s Media,” Tablet, November 20, 2012, http://www.tabletmag.com/jewish-news-and-politics/117235/the-kids-behind-idf-media.

199 one energetic 26-year-old: Hoffman, “The ‘Kids’ Behind IDF’s Media.”

199 “I say it’s magic”: Ibid.

199 “join the international”: “Join the International Social Media Desk,” IDF Blog, Israeli Defense Forces, https://web.archive.org/web/20170129003601/https://www.idfblog.com/join/.

199 “Create. Engage. Influence”: Ibid.

200 400 volunteers: Lidar Gravé-Lazi, “IDC Fights War on Another Front,” Jerusalem Post, July 15, 2014, http://www.jpost.com/printarticle.aspx?id=362804.

200 “This war doesn’t end”: Reuven Weiss, “A Lesson in Hasbara,” Ynetnews, June 27, 2017, https://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4981081,00.html.

200 “Iron Dome of Truth”: Allison Kaplan Sommer, “Sexy Women, ‘Missions’ and Bad Satire: Israeli Government App Recruits Online Soldiers in Anti-BDS Fight,” Haaretz, June 13, 2017, https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/premium-how-israel-recruits-online-foot-soldiers-to-fight-bds-1.5483038.

200 “You are going to tell”: “The Right Thing . . . The Easy Way!,” YouTube video, 02:29, uploaded by 4IL, June 7, 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxKrn8Aqa0A.

200 monitored social networks: Tia Goldenberg, “Israel Takes On Facebook in Battle Against Incitement,” AP News, July 21, 2016, https://apnews.com/e08f5c12f80143f986c02df2e45c1dec/israel-takes-facebook-battle-against-incitement.

200 Humvees prowled: “Digital Intifada.”

200 more than 400 Arabs: Goldenberg, “Israel Takes On Facebook.”

200 conviction rate of 99 percent: “Digital Intifada.”

201 weird moments of impropriety: Paul Szoldra, “The Taliban Is Waging an Online Flame War Against the United States,” Task & Purpose, March 15, 2018, https://taskandpurpose.com/taliban-online-trolls-flame-war/.

201 a NATO commander’s mistress: That commander was General David Petraeus, who was called out in an infamous but now deleted tweet: Abdulqahar Balkhi (@balkhi_a), “Dear Petraeus, Afghanistan is no Paula on whom you can unleash ‘precision strike’ assets & wish problems away,” Twitter, January 14, 2016, 9:43 P.M., https://twitter.com/balkhi_a/status/687872651801395201.

201 “Both are named Lana”: Imed Lamloum, “Libya’s Facebook Militias,” Correspondent (blog), Agence France-Presse, January 11, 2017, https://correspondent.afp.com/libyas-facebook-militias.

201 “90 percent of information”: Ibid.

202 throw at each other: David Stern, “The Twitter War: Social Media’s Role in Ukraine Unrest,” National Geographic, May 11, 2014, https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2014/05/140510-ukraine-odessa-russia-kiev-twitter-world/.

202 Russian-backed separatist commander: “Funeral of DPR Battalion Commander ‘Givi’ Took Place in Donetsk City—Approximately 55 Thousand Attend,” DONI Press, February 10, 2017, https://dnipress.com/en/posts/funeral-of-dpr-battalion-commander-givi-took-place-in-donetsk-city-approximately-55-thousand-attend/.

202 laughing and crying emojis: Christopher Miller (@ChristopherJM), “Mix of crying & laughing emojis from @lifenews_ru Facebook live viewers of Givi’s Donetsk funeral, https://www.facebook.com/lifenews.ru/?fref=ts . . . ,” Twitter, February 10, 2017, 12:09 A.M., https://twitter.com/christopherjm/status/829965418295070720.

202 television series South Park: @Russia, “Whoever comes to us with #sanctions, from sanctions will perish. We dedicate this video to those who try to hurt us with new sanctions!,” Twitter, August 2, 2017, 12:38 P.M., https://twitter.com/ukraine/status/892864248799428609.

202 reported one soldier dead: ATO [Anti-Terrorist Operation] Press Center, trans. Facebook built-in translator, Facebook, August 1, 2017, https://www.facebook.com/ato.news/posts/1650531408290992 (post deleted).

202 one leader tweeting threats: “North Korea Calls Trump Tweet ‘a Declaration of War,’” CBS News, September 25, 2017, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/north-korea-trump-statement-declaration-of-war-live-updates/.

203 “a ‘pro-Russian drift’”: “Novaya Gazeta’s ‘Kremlin Papers’ Article: Full Text in English,” UNIAN, February 25, 2015, https://www.unian.info/politics/1048525-novaya-gazetas-kremlin-papers-article-full-text-in-english.html.

203 “centrifugal aspirations”: Ibid.

203 name of this Ukrainian revolt: Jim Heintz, “Ukraine’s Euromaidan: What’s in a Name?,” Yahoo!, December 2, 2013, https://www.yahoo.com/news/ukraines-euromaidan-whats-name-090717845.html.

203 explained by Dmitry Peskov: Jim Rutenberg, “RT, Sputnik and Russia’s New Theory of War,” New York Times, September 13, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/13/magazine/rt-sputnik-and-russias-new-theory-of-war.html.

204 “an informational disaster”: Ibid.

204 Negative Russian-language news: Szabolcs Panyi, “Orbán Is a Tool in Putin’s Information War Against the West,” Rovatok, February 4, 2017, http://index.hu/english/2017/02/04/orban_is_a_tool_for_putin_in_his_information_war_against_the_west/.

204 At least thirty-one people: Howard Amos and Harriet Salem, “Ukraine Clashes: Dozens Dead After Odessa Building Fire,” The Guardian, May 2, 2014, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/may/02/ukraine-dead-odessa-building-fire.

204 “17-year-old hooligans”: “Odessa Tragedy Survivor: ‘Many People Strangled After Escaping the Fire,’” RT, May 7, 2014, https://www.rt.com/news/157256-odessa-witness-massacre-ukraine/.

204 “Mass Murder in Odessa”: Daniel McAdams, “US Media Covers Up Mass Murder in Odessa,” Infowars, May 5, 2014, https://www.infowars.com/us-media-covers-up-mass-murder-in-odessa/.

204 “not to allow fascism”: “Odessa Tragedy ‘Fascism in Action’—Lavrov,” RT, May 7, 2014, https://www.rt.com/news/157292-lavrov-odessa-ukraine-fascism/.

204 strapping the mother: Anna Nemtsova, “There’s No Evidence the Ukrainian Army Crucified a Child in Slovyansk,” The Daily Beast, July 15, 2014, https://www.thedailybeast.com/theres-no-evidence-the-ukrainian-army-crucified-a-child-in-slovyansk.

205 “Sweetest guys”: Jessica Misener, “People in Crimea Are Taking Pictures and Selfies with Soldiers,” BuzzFeed, March 2, 2014, https://www.buzzfeed.com/jessicamisener/people-in-crimea-are-taking-selfies-with-soldiers?utm_term=.gkqZE1XE0O#.imVmqpXqMd.

205 “little green men”: Vitaly Shevchenko, “‘Little Green Men’ or ‘Russian Invaders?,’” BBC News, March 11, 2014, http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26532154.

205 “We pounded Ukraine”: Max Seddon, “Does This Soldier’s Instagram Account Prove Russia Is Covertly Operating in Ukraine?,” BuzzFeed, July 30, 2014, https://www.buzzfeed.com/maxseddon/does-this-soldiers-instagram-account-prove-russia-is-covertl?utm_term=.tiEGwg5wz7#.vfN1zVLzQa.

205 more than 10,000 medals: “Russia’s War in Ukraine: The Medals and Treacherous Numbers,” Bellingcat, August 31, 2016, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2016/08/31/russias-war-ukraine-medals-treacherous-numbers/.

205 “it was hybrid warfare”: Ivo H. Daalder, “Responding to Russia’s Resurgence,” Foreign Affairs, November/December 2017, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/russia-fsu/2017-10-16/responding-russias-resurgence?cid=int-fls&pgtype=hpg.

205 “amazing information blitzkrieg”: John Vandiver, “SACEUR: Allies Must Prepare for Russia ‘Hybrid War,’” Stars and Stripes, September 4, 2014, https://www.stripes.com/news/saceur-allies-must-prepare-for-russia-hybrid-war-1.301464.

205 “I began to understand”: David Patrikarakos, War in 140 Characters (Basic Books, 2017), loc. 122, Kindle.

206 Baltic states of Latvia: “Internet Trolling as a Hybrid Warfare Tool: The Case of Latvia” (report, Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, n.d.), https://www.stratcomcoe.org/internet-trolling-hybrid-warfare-tool-case-latvia-0; Teri Schultz, “Latvia Faces Hybrid Threat as EU, NATO Boost Defenses,” DW, April 12, 2016, http://www.dw.com/en/latvia-faces-hybrid-threat-as-eu-nato-boost-defenses/a-36616678.

206 raped a 15-year-old: “Lithuania Looking for Source of False Accusation of Rape by German Troops,” Reuters, February 17, 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-lithuania-nato-idUSKBN15W1JO.

206 swarmed Latvian news portals: “Internet Trolling as a Hybrid Warfare Tool,” 48.

206 confiscate Estonian cars: Inga Springe et al., “Sputnik’s Unknown Brother,” Re:Baltica, April 6, 2017, https://en.rebaltica.lv/2017/04/sputniks-unknown-brother/.

206 ethnic-Russian enclaves: Emma Graham-Harrison and Daniel Boffey, “Lithuania Fears Russian Propaganda Is Prelude to Eventual Invasion,” The Guardian, April 3, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/apr/03/lithuania-fears-russian-propaganda-is-prelude-to-eventual-invasion.

206 “If we lose”: Ibid.

206 no limit on the number: Alberto Nardelli, “Angela Merkel’s Stance on Refugees Means She Stands Alone Against Catastrophe,” The Guardian, November 8, 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/nov/08/angela-merkel-refugee-crisis-europe.

207 covered only by RT: Rutenberg, “RT, Sputnik and Russia’s New Theory of War.”

207 story was a hoax: Nadine Schmidt and Tim Hume, “Berlin Teen Admits Fabricating Migrant Gang-Rape Story, Official Says,” CNN, February 1, 2016, https://www.cnn.com/2016/02/01/europe/germany-teen-migrant-rape-false/index.html.

207 “It is clear”: Tim Hume and Carolin Schmid, “Russia Cries Cover-Up in Alleged Migrant Rape of 13-Year-Old in Germany,” CNN, January 27, 2016, https://www.cnn.com/2016/01/27/europe/russia-germany-berlin-rape/index.html.

207 nearly sixty years: Kate Connolly, “German Election: Merkel Wins Fourth Term but Far-Right AfD Surges to Third,” The Guardian, September 24, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/sep/24/angela-merkel-fourth-term-far-right-afd-third-german-election.

207 Scottish independence referendum: “Russia Meddled in Scottish Independence Referendum to Aid SNP, Claims Security Expert,” Express, January 5, 2017, https://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/754332/russia-spies-scotland-independence-referendum-aid-snp-claims-security-expert.

207 the UK’s Brexit proposal: Ben Nimmo, “Lobbying for Brexit: How the Kremlin’s Media Are Distorting the UK’s Debate,” Institute for Statecraft, February 13, 2016, http://www.statecraft.org.uk/research/lobbying-brexit-how-kremlins-media-are-distorting-uks-debate.

207 Catalonia teetered: David Alandete, “Russian Meddling Machine Sets Sights on Catalonia,” El País, September 28, 2017, https://elpais.com/elpais/2017/09/26/inenglish/1506413477_994601.html.

207 assassinate the prime minister: Christo Gorzev, “Balkan Gambit: Part 2. The Montenegro Zugzwang,” Bellingcat, March 25, 2017, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/uk-and-europe/2017/03/25/balkan-gambit-part-2-montenegro-zugzwang/.

207 local police discovered: Gordana Andric, “Serbian PM ‘Moved to Safety’ After Weapons Find,” Balkan Insight, October 29, 2016, https://www.balkaninsight.com/en/article/police-finds-weapons-near-serbian-pm-house-10-29-2016.

208 European Parliament declared: “European Parliament Urges Action Against Russian ‘Hostile Propaganda,’” DW, November 23, 2016, http://www.dw.com/en/european-parliament-urges-action-against-russian-hostile-propaganda/a-36498112.

208 Putin answered with disdain: Ibid.

208 “every disinformation message”: Ladislav Bittman, The KGB and Soviet Disinformation, quoted in Stanley B. Cunningham, The Idea of Propaganda (Praeger, 2002), 110.

209 “make the sonofabitch”: Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail ’72 (Simon & Schuster, 1973), 227.

210 “Rape Melania”: Joseph Bernstein, “Inside the Alt-Right’s Campaign to Smear Trump Protesters as Anarchists,” BuzzFeed, January 11, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/inside-the-alt-rights-campaign-to-smear-trump-protesters-as?utm_term=.qvpx9MR9Pa#.xd4XkonkNa.

210 top-trending hashtags: Ibid.

210 Breitbart’s smug headline: Katie McHugh, “Twitter Allows ‘Rape Melania’ to Trend After Site Explodes with Trump Assassination Threats,” Breitbart, November 13, 2016, http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2016/11/13/twitter-allows-rape-melania-to-trend-after-site-explodes-with-trump-assassination-threats/.

210 Posobiec also admitted: Bernstein, “Inside the Alt-Right’s Campaign.”

210 “character assassination”: “Talk:Jack Posobiec,” Wikipedia, accessed March 20, 2018, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Jack_Posobiec#Character_assassination.

211 volunteer “Internet Army”: “Yuriy Stets, Minister of Information Policy Wants to Create ‘Internet Army,’” Euromaidan Press, January 28, 2015, http://euromaidanpress.com/2015/01/28/yuriy-stets-minister-of-information-policy-wants-to-create-internet-army/.

211 turned it into a joke: “Ukrainian Internet Army Report Card: ‘A’ for Effort ‘F’ for Achievement,” Sputnik, June 3, 2015, https://sputniknews.com/science/201503061019154259/.

211 Center of Defense Against Disinformation: Rachel Stern, “Germany’s Plan to Fight Fake News,” Christian Science Monitor, January 9, 2017, https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Passcode/2017/0109/Germany-s-plan-to-fight-fake-news.

211 “ministry of truth”: “Ministry of Truth? Berlin Reportedly Plans ‘Center of Defense Against Fake News,’” YouTube video, 7:21, uploaded by RT, December 24, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8YaN_kaov50.

211 plot by the “deep state”: “Hannity: Deep State’s Massive Effort to Destroy Trump,” Fox News, June 17, 2017, http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/06/17/hannity-deep-states-massive-effort-to-destroy-trump.html.

212 The shrouded figure gazes: “Anonymous: Operation Ice ISIS (#OpIceISIS),” YouTube video, 4:29, uploaded by AnonJournal, June 21, 2014, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kJtvFUMELM.

212 The “war” began: Emerson Brooking, “Anonymous vs. the Islamic State,” Foreign Policy, November 13, 2015, http://foreignpolicy.com/2015/11/13/anonymous-hackers-islamic-state-isis-chan-online-war/.

213 “cyber terrain vigilance”: Ghost Security Group, home page, https://ghostsecuritygroup.com/.

214 think tank wonks: Laura Rosenberger and J. M. Berger, “Hamilton 68: A New Tool to Track Russian Disinformation on Twitter,” German Marshall Fund, August 2, 2017, http://securingdemocracy.gmfus.org/blog/2017/08/02/hamilton-68-new-tool-track-russian-disinformation-twitter.

215 “I need peace”: Bana Alabed (@AlabedBana), “I need peace,” Twitter, September 24, 2016, 5:07 A.M., https://twitter.com/AlabedBana/status/779653424145113088.

215 “capturing us now”: Bana Alabed (@AlabedBana), “We are sure the army is capturing us now. We will see each other another day dear world. Bye.—Fatemah #Aleppo,” Twitter, December 4, 2016, 10:38 A.M., https://twitter.com/AlabedBana/status/805481415458623489.

215 “I miss school”: Bana Alabed (@AlabedBana), “I miss school so much—Bana #Aleppo,” Twitter, October 6, 2016, 11:54 A.M., https://twitter.com/AlabedBana/status/784104553440501761.

215 200,000 Twitter followers: Caitlin Gibson, “How a 7-Year-Old Aleppo Girl on Twitter Became Our Era’s Anne Frank,” Washington Post, December 6, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/how-a-7-year-old-aleppo-girl-on-twitter-became-our-eras-anne-frank/2016/12/06/b474af5c-bb09-11e6-91ee-1adddfe36cbe_story.html?utm_term=.e2356256891a.

215 author J. K. Rowling: Ibid.

215 Critics alleged that Bana: Nick Waters, “Finding Bana—Proving the Existence of a 7-Year-Old Girl in Eastern Aleppo,” Bellingcat, December 14, 2016, https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2016/12/14/bana-alabed-verification-using-open-source-information/.

215 “This bombs”: Bana Alabed (@AlabedBana), “I am very afraid I will die tonight. This bombs will kill me now.—Bana #Aleppo,” Twitter, October 2, 2016, 10:00 A.M., https://twitter.com/AlabedBana/status/782626282291036160.

215 “game of propaganda”: “President al-Assad Interview: ‘The Moderate Opposition Is a Myth . . . We Won’t Accept That Terrorists Take Control of Any Part of Syria,’” Global Research, October 7, 2016, https://www.globalresearch.ca/president-al-assad-interview-the-moderate-opposition-is-a-myth-we-wont-accept-that-terrorists-take-control-of-any-part-of-syria/5549743.

215 a Bellingcat investigation: Waters, “Finding Bana.”

215 her English-literate mother: Ibid.

216 “use force to unify Taiwan”: Ben Blanchard and Faith Hung, “South China Sea? For Beijing, Taiwan Is the No. 1 Security Issue,” Reuters, January 17, 2016, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-taiwan-election-security/south-china-sea-for-beijing-taiwan-is-the-no-1-security-issue-idUSKCN0UV064.

216 “Even if no grass”: Peter Navarro, “Senkaku Suicide Scenarios: China vs. Ameripan,” HuffPost, December 6, 2017, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-navarro-and-greg-autry/senkaku-suicide-scenarios_b_9583586.html.

216 censors and state media: Bethany Allen-Ebrahimian, “After South China Sea Ruling, China Censors Online Calls for War,” Tea Leaf Nation (blog), Foreign Policy, July 12, 2016, https://foreignpolicy.com/2016/07/12/after-south-china-sea-ruling-china-censors-online-calls-for-war-unclos-tribunal/.

216 “Stop boasting”: Ibid.

217 “Gone are the days”: Thomas J. Christensen, “The Advantages of an Assertive China,” Foreign Affairs, March/April 2011, https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/east-asia/2011-02-21/advantages-assertive-china.

217 Confiding in their diaries: Jan Ian Chong and Todd H. Hall, “The Lessons of 1914 for East Asia Today: Missing the Trees for the Forest,” International Security 39, no. 1 (2014): 7–43.

 

 8. MASTERS OF THE UNIVERSE

218 Janet Jackson’s nipple: Jim Hopkins, “Surprise! There’s a Third YouTube Co-founder,” USA Today, October 11, 2006, http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/news/2006-10-11-youtube-karim_x.htm.

218 nine-sixteenths of a second: Daniel Kreps, “Nipple Ripples: 10 Years of Fallout from Janet Jackson’s Halftime Show,” Rolling Stone, January 30, 2014, https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/news/nipple-ripples-10-years-of-fallout-from-janet-jacksons-halftime-show-20140130.

218 140 million viewers: Hugh McIntyre, “How Janet Jackson’s Super Bowl ‘Wardrobe Malfunction’ Helped Start YouTube,” Forbes, February 1, 2015, https://www.forbes.com/sites/hughmcintyre/2015/02/01/how-janet-jacksons-super-bowl-wardrobe-malfunction-helped-start-youtube/#7299c00019ca.

218 540,000 complaints: Anahad O’Connor, “Court Throws Out Super Bowl Fine,” July 22, 2008, http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/22/business/media/22FCC.html.

218 America Online: Kreps, “Nipple Ripples.”

219 YouTube was born: Hopkins, “Surprise!”

219 San Francisco rave scene: Nick Bilton, Hatching Twitter: A True Story of Money, Power, Friendship, and Betrayal (Penguin, 2013), 84.

219 Even Google started: John Battelle, “The Birth of Google,” Wired, August 1, 2005, https://www.wired.com/2005/08/battelle/.

219 “original sin of Silicon Valley”: Mike Monteiro, “One Person’s History of Twitter, from Beginning to End,” @monteiro (blog), Medium, October 15, 2017, https://medium.com/@monteiro/one-persons-history-of-twitter-from-beginning-to-end-5b41abed6c20.

220 color of agitation: David Robinson, “How the Colour Red Warps the Mind,” BBC News, September 1, 2014, http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20140827-how-the-colour-red-warps-the-mind.

220 like opening a present: Paul Lewis, “‘Our Minds Can Be Hijacked’: The Tech Insiders Who Fear a Smartphone Dystopia,” The Guardian, October 6, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/oct/05/smartphone-addiction-silicon-valley-dystopia.

220 2,617 times each day: Michael Winnick, “Putting a Finger on Our Phone Obsession,” dscout, June 16, 2016, https://blog.dscout.com/mobile-touches.

220 “We connect people”: Ryan Mac, Charlie Warzel, and Alex Kantrowitz, “Growth at Any Cost: Top Facebook Executive Defended Data Collection in 2016 Memo—and Warned That Facebook Could Get People Killed,” BuzzFeed, March 29, 2018, https://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanmac/growth-at-any-cost-top-facebook-executive-defended-data?utm_term=.xlReZ2OZo0#.ag5ZJRzJ1o.

221 “One Policy”: Adam D. Thierer, “Unnatural Monopoly: Critical Moments in the Development of the Bell System Monopoly,” Cato Journal 14, no. 2 (1992): 267–85.

221 replacing comment boxes: Heather Kelly, “Facebook’s Adding Text Bubbles and Round Profiles,” CNN, August 15, 2017, http://money.cnn.com/2017/08/15/technology/facebook-newsfeed-updates/index.html.

221 tiny shifts: Alexis C. Madrigal, “What Facebook Did to American Democracy,” The Atlantic, October 12, 2017, https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/10/what-facebook-did/542502/.

221 “process of building”: John Herrman, “How Hate Groups Forced Online Platforms to Reveal Their True Nature,” New York Times Magazine, August 21, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/21/magazine/how-hate-groups-forced-online-platforms-to-reveal-their-true-nature.html?nytmobile=0&_r=0.

222 “You’re so focused”: Deepa Seetharaman, Robert McMillan, and Georgia Wells, “Tone-Deaf: How Facebook Misread America’s Mood on Russia,” Wall Street Journal, March 2, 2018, https://www.wsj.com/articles/tone-deaf-how-facebook-misread-americas-mood-on-russia-1520006034.

222 “Political stories”: “Tell HN: Political Detox Week,” Hacker News, Y Combinator, accessed March 20, 2018, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13108404. This is a fascinating discussion thread that digs deep into the Silicon Valley zeitgeist.

222 “If we could use code”: Authors’ interview with senior social media company official, Washington, DC, July 14, 2016.

223 pleas from Ukrainian activists: Volodymyr Scherbachenko, “We Support Ukraine on Facebook!,” trans. Facebook built-in translator, Facebook, August 28, 2014, https://www.facebook.com/uspikh/posts/355353931293866?fref=nf.

223 “integrity of the German elections”: “Read Mark Zuckerberg’s Full Remarks on Russian Ads That Impacted the 2016 Elections,” CNBC, September 21, 2017, https://www.cnbc.com/2017/09/21/zuckerbergs-full-remarks-on-russian-ads-that-impacted-2016-election.html?view=story&%24DEVICE%24=native-android-tablet.

223 “spreading prosperity”: Mark Zuckerberg, “Building Global Community,” Facebook, February 16, 2017, https://www.facebook.com/notes/mark-zuckerberg/building-global-community/10154544292806634/.

224 “CYBERPORN”: Philip Elmer-Dewitt, “Finding Marty Rimm,” Fortune, July 1, 2015, http://fortune.com/2015/07/01/cyberporn-time-marty-rimm/.

224 Rimm vanished: Ibid.

224 “a red-light district”: Robert Cannon, “The Legislative History of Senator Exon’s Communications Decency Act: Regulating Barbarians on the Information Superhighway,” Field Communications Law Journal 49, no. 1 (1996): 53.

224 Communications Decency Act: Ibid., 58.

224 fine of $100,000: Ibid.

224 one crucial tweak: Christopher Zara, “The Most Important Law in Tech Has a Problem,” Wired, January 3, 2017, https://www.wired.com/2017/01/the-most-important-law-in-tech-has-a-problem/.

224 “the most important law”: Ibid.

225 “protection for ‘Good Samaritan’”: 47 U.S.C. § 230 (1996).

225 no list of rules: “The Big FAQ,” Blogger, (2000), accessed March 20, 2018, https://web.archive.org/web/20010904030704/http://ex.blogger.com:80/howto/faq.pyra#30366.

225 Digital Millennium Copyright Act: 17 U.S.C. § 1204 (1998).

225 “safe harbor” provision: David Kravets, “10 Years Later, Misunderstood DMCA Is the Law That Saved the Web,” Wired, October 27, 2008, https://www.wired.com/2008/10/ten-years-later/.

226 ten-minute limit: Ken Fisher, “YouTube Caps Video Lengths to Reduce Infringement,” Ars Technica, March 29, 2006, https://arstechnica.com/uncategorized/2006/03/6481-2/.

226 $1.7 billion: Matt Marshall, “They Did It! YouTube Bought by Google for $1.65B in Less Than Two Years,” VentureBeat, October 9, 2006, https://venturebeat.com/2006/10/09/they-did-it-youtube-gets-bought-by-gooogle-for-165b-in-less-than-two-years/.

226 “Content ID” system: Kevin J. Delaney, “YouTube to Test Software to Ease Licensing Fights,” Wall Street Journal, June 12, 2007, https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB118161295626932114.

226 John McCain complained: Sarah Lai Stirland, “YouTube to McCain: You Made Your DMCA Bed, Lie in It,” Wired, October 15, 2008, https://www.wired.com/2008/10/youtube-to-mcca/.

226 Digital rights activists: Ibid.

226 pushing a toy stroller: “‘Let’s Go Crazy’ #1,” YouTube video, 0:29, uploaded by Stephanie Lenz, February 7, 2007, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N1KfJHFWlhQ.

226 plead “fair use”: “Lenz v. Universal Music Corp.,” Harvard Law Review 129, no. 2289 (June 2016), https://harvardlawreview.org/2016/06/lenz-v-universal-music-corp/.

227 PhotoDNA: “New Technology Fights Child Porn by Tracking Its ‘PhotoDNA,’” Microsoft, December 15, 2009, https://news.microsoft.com/2009/12/15/new-technology-fights-child-porn-by-tracking-its-photodna/#sm.0001mpmupctevct7pjn11vtwrw6xj.

227 more than a million instances: Tracy Ith, “Microsoft’s PhotoDNA: Protecting Children and Businesses in the Cloud,” Microsoft, July 15, 2015, https://news.microsoft.com/features/microsofts-photodna-protecting-children-and-businesses-in-the-cloud/.

227 half of all American teenagers: Amanda Lenhart et al., “Social Media and Young Adults,” Pew Research Center, February 3, 2010, http://www.pewinternet.org/2010/02/03/social-media-and-young-adults/.

227 16-year-old Josh Evans: Lauren Collins, “Friend Game,” The New Yorker, January 21, 2008, https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2008/01/21/friend-game.

227 “meet a great girl”: Ibid.

227 “an online Frankenstein’s monster”: Ibid.

227 joined the Drew family: Ibid.

228 “You’re a shitty person”: Ibid.

228 convicted, but then acquitted: Kim Zetter, “Judge Acquits Lori Drew in Cyberbullying Case, Overrules Jury,” Wired, July 2, 2009, https://www.wired.com/2009/07/drew-court/.

228 Myspace was technically: “Woman Indicted in Cyber-Bully Suicide,” CBS News, May 15, 2008, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/woman-indicted-in-cyber-bully-suicide/.

229 “will not censor”: Sarah Jeong, “The History of Twitter’s Rules,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, January 14, 2016, motherboard.vice.com/read/the-history-of-twitters-rules.

229 “the free speech wing”: Josh Halliday, “Twitter’s Tony Wang: We Are the Free Speech Wing of the Free Speech Party,” The Guardian, March 22, 2012, https://www.theguardian.com/media/2012/mar/22/twitter-tony-wang-free-speech.

229 “honeypot for assholes”: Charlie Warzel, “‘A Honeypot for Assholes’: Inside Twitter’s 10-Year Failure to Stop Harassment,” BuzzFeed, August 11, 2016, https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/a-honeypot-for-assholes-inside-twitters-10-year-failure-to-s?utm_term=.yb3RlEBl8O#.wbwxNORNzy.

229 sustained harassment: Ibid.

229 “not a mediator of content”: Ibid.

229 report abusive tweets: Jeong, “The History of Twitter’s Rules.”

229 “Gamergate”: Aja Romano, “The Data Behind Gamergate Reveals Its Ugly Truth,” The Daily Dot, December 11, 2015, https://www.dailydot.com/parsec/72-hours-of-gamergate-twitter-analysis/.

229 inquest by the United Nations: Allegra Frank, “Anita Sarkeesian, Zoe Quinn, and More Take Aim at Cyber Harassment Against Women,” Polygon, September 25, 2015, https://www.polygon.com/2015/9/25/9399169/united-nations-women-cyber-violence-anita-sarkeesian-zoe-quinn.

229 “Freedom of expression”: Vijaya Gadde, “Twitter Executive: Here’s How We’re Trying to Stop Abuse While Preserving Free Speech,” PostEverything (blog), Washington Post, April 4, 2016, https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/04/16/twitter-executive-heres-how-were-trying-to-stop-abuse-while-preserving-free-speech/?utm_term=.5350fac72e36.

230 vanished from its mission statement: Jeong, “The History of Twitter’s Rules.”

230 banned “unlawful, obscene”: “Terms of Use,” YouTube, 2005, accessed March 20, 2018, https://web.archive.org/web/20050428210756/http://www.youtube.com:80/terms.php.

230 Mexican drug cartels: Manuel Roig-Franzia, “Mexican Drug Cartels Leave a Bloody Trail on YouTube,” Washington Post, April 9, 2007, http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/04/08/AR2007040801005.html.

230 Egyptian anti-torture activist: “YouTube Shuts Down Egyptian Anti-torture Activist’s Account,” CNN, November 29, 2007, http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/11/29/youtube.activist/.

230 loss of its “exclusive footage”: “Israel Brings Battle with Hamas to YouTube,” Fox News, December 31, 2008, http://www.foxnews.com/story/2008/12/31/israel-brings-battle-with-hamas-to-youtube.amp.html.

230 wanted to avoid: Julia Angwin and Hannes Grassegger, “Facebook’s Secret Censorship Rules Protect White Men from Hate Speech but Not Black Children,” ProPublica, June 28, 2017, https://www.propublica.org/article/facebook-hate-speech-censorship-internal-documents-algorithms.

230 15,000 words: Catherine Buni and Soraya Chemaly, “The Secret Rules of the Internet,” The Verge, April 13, 2016, https://www.theverge.com/2016/4/13/11387934/internet-moderator-history-youtube-facebook-reddit-censorship-free-speech.

230 “incitement of violence”: Nick Hopkins, “Revealed: Facebook’s Internal Rulebook on Sex, Terrorism and Violence,” The Guardian, May 21, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/may/21/revealed-facebook-internal-rulebook-sex-terrorism-violence.

230 “kick a person”: Ibid.

230 “cut your tongue out”: Ibid.

231 protests of historians: Ibid.

231 images of breastfeeding: Maya Rhodan, “Facebook Lifts Ban on Exposed Nipples in Breastfeeding Pictures,” Time, June 13, 2014, http://time.com/2869849/facebook-breastfeeding-nipples/.

231 #freethenipple: Alex Bruce-Smith, “Instagram Blocks the #Curvy Hashtag for Nudity Reasons,” Pedestrian.TV, July 17, 2015, https://www.pedestrian.tv/news/instagram-blocks-the-curvy-hashtag-for-nudity-reasons/.

231 portrayals of breastfeeding: Soraya Chemaly, “#FreeTheNipple: Facebook Changes Breastfeeding Mothers Photo Policy,” Huffington Post, June 9, 2014, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/soraya-chemaly/freethenipple-facebook-changes_b_5473467.html.

231 not the principal focus: Mythili Sampathkumar, “Facebook Bans Woman Who Shared Article on Breastfeeding,” Independent, October 6, 2017, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/facebook-breastfeeding-ban-woman-shared-article-a7985111.html.

231 subject to U.S. laws: Xeni Jardin, “More on Orkut and Law Enforcement: Brazil,” Boing Boing, March 13, 2007, https://boingboing.net/2007/03/13/more-on-Orkut-and-la.html.

231 dozens of national jurisdictions: Glyn Moody, “Facebook Hit with Fines and Investigations in Six EU Countries over Privacy Law Breaches,” Privacy News Online, May 18, 2017, https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/blog/2017/05/facebook-hit-fines-investigations-six-eu-countries-privacy-law-breaches/.

231 “Push-Button Publishing”: Bilton, Hatching Twitter, 16.

231 submit censorship requests: Jocelyn Richard, “Google Will Censor Blogger Blogs on ‘Per Country’ Basis,” Huffington Post, February 1, 2012, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/02/01/google-blogger-censorship_n_1247380.html.

232 “an American company”: Austin Carr, “Can Alphabet’s Jigsaw Solve Google’s Most Vexing Problems?,” Fast Company, October 22, 2017, https://www.fastcompany.com/40474738/can-alphabets-jigsaw-solve-the-internets-most-dangerous-puzzles.

232 “I woke up”: Kate Conger, “Cloudflare CEO on Terminating Service to Neo-Nazi Site: ‘The Daily Stormer Are Assholes,’” Gizmodo, August 16, 2017, https://gizmodo.com/cloudflare-ceo-on-terminating-service-to-neo-nazi-site-1797915295.

232 celebrating the murder: Judd Legum, “White Supremacists Cheer Trump’s Response to Charlottesville Violence,” ThinkProgress, August 12, 2017, https://thinkprogress.org/white-supremacists-cheer-trumps-response-to-charlottesville-violence-3d0d50196c52/.

232 “censoring the internet”: Jon Brodkin, “Cloudflare Changes Abuse Policy but Refuses to ‘Censor the Internet,’” Ars Technica, May 8, 2017, https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2017/05/cloudflare-changes-abuse-policy-but-refuses-to-censor-the-internet/.

233 “This was my decision”: Conger, “Cloudflare CEO.”

233 some fifty countries passed laws: Paul Mozur, Mark Scott, and Mike Isaac, “Facebook Faces a New World as Officials Rein In a Wild Web,” New York Times, September 17, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/17/technology/facebook-government-regulations.html.

234 snipers killing U.S. soldiers: “Islamic Terrorists Using YouTube to Spread Propaganda,” Fox News, February 13, 2007, http://www.foxnews.com/story/2007/02/13/islamic-terrorists-using-youtube-to-spread-propaganda.html.

234 slow to remove the clips: Ibid.

234 700-video library: Brian Bennett, “YouTube Is Letting Users Decide on Terrorism-Related Videos,” Los Angeles Times, December 12, 2010, http://articles.latimes.com/2010/dec/12/nation/la-na-youtube-terror-20101213.

234 Fort Hood, Texas: Scott Shane, “The Lessons of Anwar al-Awlaki,” New York Times Magazine, August 27, 2015, https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/30/magazine/the-lessons-of-anwar-al-awlaki.html?_r=0.

234 YouTube algorithm: Bennett, “YouTube Is Letting Users Decide.”

234 his online propaganda: Eric Holder to Patrick Leahy, letter (unclassified), May 22, 2013, https://www.justice.gov/slideshow/AG-letter-5-22-13.pdf.

234 another six years: Alex Hern, “‘YouTube Islamist’ Anwar al-Awlaki Videos Removed in Extremism Clampdown,” The Guardian, November 13, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/nov/13/youtube-islamist-anwar-al-awlaki-videos-removed-google-extremism-clampdown.

235 Twitter brushed off: Ben Farmer, “Congress Calls on Twitter to Block Taliban,” The Telegraph, December 25, 2011, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/twitter/8972884/Congress-calls-on-Twitter-to-block-Taliban.html.

235 why not the Taliban: Jon Boone, “Taliban Join the Twitter Revolution,” The Guardian, May 12, 2011, https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/may/12/taliban-join-twitter-revolution.

235 obsessive Twitter adopters: Jessica Stern and J. M. Berger, ISIS: The State of Terror (Ecco, 2015), 63–64.

235 snapped by the gunmen: “Kenya Attack Unfolded in Up and Down Twitter Feeds,” NDTV, September 25, 2013, www.ndtv.com/world-news/kenya-attack-unfolded-in-up-and-down-twitter-feeds-535648.

235 “#Westgate”: Harriet Alexander, “Tweeting Terrorism: How Al Shabaab Live Blogged the Nairobi Attacks,” The Telegraph, September 22, 2013, https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/africaandindianocean/kenya/10326863/Tweeting-terrorism-How-al-Shabaab-live-blogged-the-Nairobi-attacks.html.

235 spread misinformation: Journalist Josh Kron, email to authors, January 3, 2017.

235 Twitter intervened: Alexander, “Tweeting Terrorism.”

235 registered new ones: J. M. Berger, “Twitter’s Week of Reckoning,” Foreign Policy, October 1, 2013, http://foreignpolicy.com/2013/10/01/twitters-week-of-reckoning/.

235 at least 70,000 Twitter accounts: J. M. Berger and Jonathon Morgan, “The ISIS Twitter Census: Defining and Describing the Population of ISIS Supporters on Twitter” (analysis paper no. 20, Brookings Project on U.S. Relations with the Islamic World, Brookings Institution, March 2015), 4.

236 definition of “terrorist activity”: David Fidler, “The War on Terrorists’ Tweets,” Defense One, July 17, 2015, http://www.defenseone.com/technology/2015/07/war-terrorists-tweets/118087/.

236 “closing that internet up”: Andrew Griffin, “Donald Trump Wants to Ban the Internet, Plans to Ask Bill Gates to ‘Close It Up,’” Independent, December 8, 2015, http://www.independent.co.uk/news/people/donald-trump-wants-to-ban-the-internet-will-ask-bill-gates-to-close-it-up-a6764396.html.

236 Twitter blocklists: David Auerbach, “Beware the Blocklists,” Slate, August 11, 2015, http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/bitwise/2015/08/twitter_blocklists_they_can_stop_harassment_and_they_can_create_entirely.html.

236 hundreds of times: Nichole Perlroth and Mike Isaac, “Terrorists Mock Bids to End Use of Social Media,” New York Times, December 7, 2015, www.nytimes.com/2015/12/08/technology/terrorists-mock-bids-to-end-use-of-social-media.html.

236 a birthday cake: Ibid.

236 detecting 95 percent: Rachel Kaser, “Twitter Claims It’s Removed 95% of Extremist Content with No One Noticing,” The Next Web, September 19, 2017, https://thenextweb.com/socialmedia/2017/09/19/twitter-claims-removed-extremist-content-no-one-noticing/.

236 used the advertising space: “Google’s Clever Plan to Stop Aspiring ISIS Recruits,” Wired, September 9, 2016, https://www.wired.com/2016/09/googles-clever-plan-stop-aspiring-isis-recruits/.

237 150-person counterterrorism force: Seth Fiegerman, “Facebook Grows Its Counterterrorism Team,” CNNMoney, June 15, 2017, http://money.cnn.com/2017/06/15/technology/business/facebook-terrorism-content/index.html.

237 “knowingly provided material support”: Gwen Ackerman, “Facebook Accused in $1 Billion Suit of Being Hamas Tool,” Bloomberg, July 11, 2016, http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-07-11/facebook-sued-for-1b-for-alleged-hamas-use-of-medium-for-terror.

237 feared they might suffer: Jonathan Stempel, “Facebook Wins Dismissal of U.S. Lawsuits Linked to Terrorism,” Reuters, May 18, 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-lawsuit/facebook-wins-dismissal-of-u-s-lawsuits-linked-to-terrorism-idUSKCN18E2GF.

237 “Facebook and Twitter”: Harriet Salem, “Facebook Is Being Sued by 20,000 Israelis for Inciting Palestinian Terror,” https://news.vice.com/article/facebook-is-being-sued-by-20000-israelis-for-inciting-palestinian-terror.

237 prompted further lawsuits: Nina Iacono Brown, “Should Social Networks Be Held Liable for Terrorism?,” Slate, June 16, 2017, http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/06/a_new_legal_theory_for_holding_social_networks_liable_for_terrorism.html.

237 ultranationalists, white supremacists: J. M. Berger, “Nazis vs. ISIS on Twitter: A Comparative Study of White Nationalist and ISIS Online Social Media Networks” (paper, Program on Extremism, George Washington University, September 2016), https://cchs.gwu.edu/sites/g/files/zaxdzs2371/f/downloads/Nazis%20v.%20ISIS%20Final_0.pdf.

238 “Smith” became “(((Smith)))”: Cooper Fleishman and Anthony Smith, “(((Echoes))), Exposed: The Secret Symbol Neo-Nazis Use to Target Jews Online,” Mic, June 1, 2016, https://mic.com/articles/144228/echoes-exposed-the-secret-symbol-neo-nazis-use-to-target-jews-online.

238 use of the same language: Herrman, “How Hate Groups Forced.”

238 Milo Yiannopoulos: Charlie Warzel, “Twitter Permanently Suspends Conservative Writer Milo Yiannopoulos,” BuzzFeed, July 20, 2016, https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/twitter-just-permanently-suspended-conservative-writer-milo?utm_term=.eneo0AG0O4#.gwQ4zmjzkn.

238 Ghostbusters remake: Ibid.

239 “LongKnives1290”: Joseph Bernstein, “Alt-White: How the Breitbart Machine Laundered Racist Hate,” BuzzFeed, October 5, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstein/heres-how-breitbart-and-milo-smuggled-white-nationalism?utm_term=.eekpAwn4E#.xuoQnyPGK.

239 more than 700 hate crimes: Carter Evans, “Hate, Harassment Incidents Spike Since Trump Election,” CBS News, November 19, 2016, https://www.cbsnews.com/news/hate-harassment-incidents-spike-since-donald-trump-election/.

239 a dramatic rebuttal: “The Knight of Long Knives,” YouTube video, 03:13, uploaded by NPI/Radix, November 15, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiADHzBOqZ0.

239 “a great purge going on”: David Scharfenberg, “Should Twitter Ban the Alt-Right? The Case for Online Censorship,” Boston Globe, December 11, 2016, https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2016/12/11/should-twitter-ban-alt-right-the-case-for-online-censorship/aTt7la90S2krWhQEYHKM7J/story.html.

239 “free speech” events: Terrence McCoy, “The Road to Hate: For Six Young Men, Charlottesville Is Only the Beginning,” Washington Post, August 19, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/social-issues/the-road-to-hate-for-six-young-men-of-the-alt-right-charlottesville-is-only-the-beginning/2017/08/19/cd1a3624-8392-11e7-b359-15a3617c767b_story.html.

239 “We have been spreading”: Herrman, “How Hate Groups Forced.”

239 Facebook removed pages: Associated Press, “Facebook Bans White Nationalist’s Accounts over Hate Speech,” AP News, August 16, 2017, https://apnews.com/3e725b8c8f62460cb71d576edc6ca61c?utm_campaign=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP.

239 Reddit rewrote: Brianna Sacks, “Reddit Is Removing Nazi and Alt-Right Groups as Part of a New Policy and Some Users Are Confused,” BuzzFeed, October 25, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/briannasacks/reddit-is-banning-nazi-and-alt-right-groups-as-part-of-a?utm_term=.iqY2oE0odK#.aydLp5Vp2X.

239 room-sharing service: Matt Stevens, “After Charlottesville, Even Dating Apps Are Cracking Down on Hate,” New York Times, August 24, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/24/technology/okcupid-christopher-cantwell.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur%20Most%20deeply%20impacted:%20; https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-employees-pushed-to-remove-trump-posts-as-hate-speech-1477075392.

240 Most deeply impacted: Deepa Seetharaman, “Facebook Employees Pushed to Remove Trump’s Posts as Hate Speech,” October 21, 2016, https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-employees-pushed-to-remove-trump-posts-as-hate-speech-1477075392.

240 “a pretty crazy idea”: Mark Zuckerberg, “Live from the Techonomy Conference,” Facebook, November 17, 2016, https://www.facebook.com/zuck/videos/10103248351713921/.

240 a private scolding: Adam Entous, Elizabeth Dwoskin, and Craig Timberg, “Obama Tried to Give Zuckerberg a Wake-Up Call over Fake News on Facebook,” Washington Post, September 24, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/obama-tried-to-give-zuckerberg-a-wake-up-call-over-fake-news-on-facebook/2017/09/24/15d19b12-ddac-4ad5-ac6e-ef909e1c1284_story.html.

240 tried to reassure users: Mark Zuckerberg, https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10103253901916271.

240 crowdsource solutions: Sheera Frenkel, “Renegade Facebook Employees Form Task Force to Battle Fake News,” BuzzFeed, November 14, 2016, https://www.buzzfeed.com/sheerafrenkel/renegade-facebook-employees-form-task-force-to-battle-fake-n?utm_term=.pqkjwVXwK0#.lp00RvnRBr.

241 fear of violating: Mike Isaac, “Facebook, in Cross Hairs After Election, Is Said to Question Its Influence,” New York Times, November 12, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/14/technology/facebook-is-said-to-question-its-influence-in-election.html?_r=0.

241 “Information Operations and Facebook”: Jen Weedon, William Nuland, and Alex Stamos, “Information Operations and Facebook” (report, Facebook Security, April 27, 2017), https://fbnewsroomus.files.wordpress.com/2017/04/facebook-and-information-operations-v1.pdf.

241 named its adversary: Alex Stamos, “An Update on Information Operations on Facebook,” Facebook Newsroom, September 6, 2017, https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2017/09/information-operations-update/.

241 a crucial nine months: Seetharaman, McMillan, and Wells, “Tone-Deaf.”

241 French and German governments: Dustin Volz and Jonathan Landay, “Twitter to Brief Congress on Possible Russia-Backed Ads: U.S. Senator,” Reuters, September 7, 2017, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-twitter-propoganda/twitter-to-brief-congress-on-possible-russia-backed-ads-u-s-senator-idUSKCN1BI22R.

241 Zuckerberg apologized: Sam Levin, “Mark Zuckerberg: I Regret Ridiculing Fears over Facebook’s Effect on Election,” The Guardian, September 27, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/sep/27/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-2016-election-fake-news.

241 “I don’t want anyone”: Kurt Wager, “Read Mark Zuckerberg’s Full Speech on How Facebook Is Fighting Back Against Russia’s Election Interference,” Recode, September 21, 2017, https://www.recode.net/2017/9/21/16347036/mark-zuckerberg-facebook-russia-election-interference-full-speech.

241 “the biggest risk we face”: Steve Huffman, “In Response to Recent Reports About the Integrity of Reddit, I’d Like to Share Our Thinking,” Reddit, March 5, 2018, https://www.reddit.com/r/announcements/comments/827zqc/in_response_to_recent_reports_about_the_integrity/.

241 $57 million: Melissa Eddy and Mark Scott, “Delete Hate Speech or Pay Up, Germany Tells Social Media Companies,” New York Times, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/30/business/germany-facebook-google-twitter.html.

242 Federal Election Commission disclosure rules: Heather Timmons, “The US Want to Regulate Political Advertising on Social Media,” World Economic Forum, October 19, 2017, https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2017/10/the-us-want-to-regulate-political-advertising-on-social-media.

242 same exemptions as skywriting: Donie O’Sullivan, “Facebook Sought Exception from Political Ad Disclaimer Rules in 2011,” CNNMoney, September 27, 2017, CNN Money, http://money.cnn.com/2017/09/27/technology/business/facebook-political-ad-rules/index.html.

242 As Zuckerberg confessed: Kevin Roose and Sheera Frenkel, “Mark Zuckerberg’s Reckoning: ‘This Is a Major Trust Issue,’” New York Times, March 21, 2018, https://www.nytimes.com/2018/03/21/technology/mark-zuckerberg-q-and-a.html?mtrref=www.theringer.com.

242 “violence to resist occupation”: Angwin and Grassegger, “Facebook’s Secret Censorship Rules.”

242 A Chinese billionaire: Alexandra Stevenson, “Facebook Blocks Chinese Billionaire Who Tells Tales of Corruption,” New York Times, October 1, 2017, https://www.nytimes.com/2017/10/01/business/facebook-china-guo-wengui.html.

243 Rohingya Muslim minority: Betsy Woodruff, “Exclusive: Facebook Silences Rohingya Reports of Ethnic Cleansing,” The Daily Beast, September 18, 2017, https://www.thedailybeast.com/exclusive-rohingya-activists-say-facebook-silences-them.

243 every bot made Twitter: Selina Wang, “Twitter Is Crawling with Bots and Lacks Incentive to Expel Them,” Bloomberg, October 13, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-10-13/twitter-is-crawling-with-bots-and-lacks-incentive-to-expel-them?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social.

243 “more concerned with growth numbers”: Selina Wang, “Twitter Sidestepped Russian Account Warnings, Former Worker Says,” Bloomberg, November 3, 2017, https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-11-03/former-twitter-employee-says-fake-russian-accounts-were-not-taken-seriously.

243 conservative users: Seetharaman, “Facebook Employees Pushed.”

243 “It is difficult”: Upton Sinclair, I, Candidate for Governor, and How I Got Licked (Farrar & Rinehart, 1935), 105.

244 26 million subscribers: Keith Collins and David Ingold, “Through Years of Tumult, AOL Sticks Around,” Bloomberg, May 12, 2015, https://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-verizon-aol-deal/.

244 “500 Hours Free!”: Today, there is a thriving collectors’ market for AOL free-trial CDs. See Arielle Pardes, “Inside the Intense, Insular World of AOL Disc Collecting,” Vice, October 7, 2015, https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/kwxngw/inside-the-weird-world-of-aol-disc-collecting-511; “AOL,” Yard Sale, The Beanie News, http://thebeanienews.com/Yardsale/AOL.html.

244 half of all the CDs: Dan Lewis, “Remember All Those AOL CDs? There Were More Than You Think,” Now I Know, December 10, 2012, http://nowiknow.com/remember-all-those-aol-cds-there-were-more-than-you-think/.

245 special screen names: Lisa Margonelli, “Inside AOL’s ‘Cyber-Sweatshop,’” Wired, October 1, 1999, https://www.wired.com/1999/10/volunteers/.

245 three-month training process: Jim Hu, “Former AOL Volunteers File Labor Suit,” CNET, January 2, 2002, https://www.cnet.com/news/former-aol-volunteers-file-labor-suit/.

245 minimum of four hours: Ibid.

245 14,000 volunteers: Margonelli, “Inside AOL’s ‘Cyber-Sweatshop.’”

245 “cyber-sweatshop”: Ibid.

245 $15 million: Lauren Kirchner, “AOL Settled with Unpaid ‘Volunteers’ for $15 Million,” Columbia Journalism Review, February 20, 2011, http://archives.cjr.org/the_news_frontier/aol_settled_with_unpaid_volunt.php.

245 a thousand graphic images: Olivia Solon, “Underpaid and Overburdened: The Life of a Facebook Moderator,” The Guardian, May 25, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/may/25/facebook-moderator-underpaid-overburdened-extreme-content.

246 a million pieces of content: Buni and Chemaly, “The Secret Rules of the Internet.”

246 a 74-year-old grandfather: Olivia Solon, “Facebook Killing Video Puts Moderation Policies Under the Microscope, Again,” The Guardian, April 17, 2017, https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/apr/17/facebook-live-murder-crime-policy.

246 an estimated 150,000 workers: Benjamin Powers, “The Human Cost of Monitoring the Internet,” Rolling Stone, September 9, 2017, https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/features/the-human-cost-of-monitoring-the-internet-w496279.

246 India and the Philippines: Adrian Chen, “The Laborers Who Keep Dick Pics and Beheadings out of Your Facebook Feed,” Wired, October 23, 2014, https://www.wired.com/2014/10/content-moderation/.

246 bright young college graduates: Sarah T. Roberts, “Behind the Screen: The People and Politics of Commercial Content Moderation” (presentation at re:publica 2016, Berlin, May 2, 2016), transcript available at Open Transcripts, http://opentranscripts.org/transcript/politics-of-commercial-content-moderation/.

247 reduced libido: Brad Stone, “Policing the Web’s Lurid Precincts,” New York Times, July 28, 2010, http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/19/technology/19screen.html.

247 regular psychological counseling: Abby Ohlheiser, “The Work of Monitoring Violence Online Can Cause Real Trauma. And Facebook Is Hiring,” Washington Post, May 4, 2017, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2017/05/04/the-work-of-monitoring-violence-online-can-cause-real-trauma-and-facebook-is-hiring/?utm_term=.3fb95a5143da.

247 “compassion fatigue”: Greg Hadley, “Forced to Watch Child Porn for Their Job, Microsoft Employees Developed PTSD, They Say,” McClatchy, January 11, 2017, http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/article125953194.html.

247 “internal video screen”: Ibid.

247 just 55 employees: Cade Metz, “Why WhatsApp Only Needs 50 Engineers for Its 900m Users,” Wired, September 15, 2015, https://www.wired.com/2015/09/whatsapp-serves-900-million-users-50-engineers/.

247 none of whom spoke Arabic: Heather Timmons, “Why It Remains Difficult to Shut Down Jihadist Propaganda Online,” Defense One, January 12, 2015, http://www.defenseone.com/threats/2015/01/why-it-remains-difficult-shut-down-jihadist-propaganda-online/102684/.

247 500,000 new comments: “The Top 20 Valuable Facebook Statistics—Updated March 2018,” Zephoria Digital Marketing, accessed March 18, 2018, https://zephoria.com/top-15-valuable-facebook-statistics/.

247 400 hours of video: Meeting (not for attribution), Washington, DC, May 4, 2016.

247 300,000 tweets: “Twitter Usage Statistics,” Internet Live Stats, accessed March 18, 2018, http://www.internetlivestats.com/twitter-statistics/.

248 regenerating Twitter network: Rita Katz, “Want to Know How Isis Cheats Death on Twitter? Read This,” International Business Times, April 10, 2015, http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/want-know-how-isis-cheats-death-twitter-read-this-1495750.

248 “pissing in the ocean”: Christopher Mims, “Facebook Is Still in Denial About Its Biggest Problem,” Wall Street Journal, October 1, 2017, https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-is-still-in-denial-about-its-biggest-problem-1506855607.

248 “YOU LOOK LIKE A THING”: Janelle Shane, “The Neural Network Generated Pickup Lines That Are Actually Kind of Adorable,” AI Weirdness (blog), http://aiweirdness.com/post/159302925452/the-neural-network-generated-pickup-lines-that-are.

248 the 1940s: Warren S. McCulloch and Walter H. Pitts, “A Logical Calculus of the Ideas Immanent in Nervous Activity,” Bulletin of Mathematical Biophysics 5 (1943): 115–13.

249 multiple “layers”: Gideon Lewis-Kraus, “The Great A.I. Awakening,” New York Times Magazine, December 14, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/14/magazine/the-great-ai-awakening.html.

249 “giant machine democracy”: Ibid.

249 Google Brain project: Quoc V. Le et al., “Building High-Level Features Using Large Scale Unsupervised Learning,” in Proceedings of the 29th International Conference on Machine Learning (Edinburgh, 2012).

249 pictures of cats: John Markoff, “How Many Computers to Identity a Cat? 16,000,” New York Times, June 25, 2012, http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/26/technology/in-a-big-network-of-computers-evidence-of-machine-learning.html.

249 “We never told it”: Ibid.

250 where to put the traffic lights: Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee, “The Business of Artificial Intelligence,” Harvard Business Review, July 2017, https://hbr.org/2017/07/the-business-of-artificial-intelligence.

250 more than a million: Joaquin Quiñonero Candela, “Building Scalable Systems to Understand Content,” Facebook Code, February 2, 2017, https://code.facebook.com/posts/1259786714075766/building-scalable-systems-to-understand-content/.

250 wearing a black shirt: Ibid.

250 80 percent: “An Update on Our Commitment to Fight Violent Extremist Content Online,” Official Blog, YouTube, October 17, 2017, https://youtube.googleblog.com/2017/10/an-update-on-our-commitment-to-fight.html.

250 “attack scale”: Andy Greenberg, “Inside Google’s Internet Justice League and Its AI-Powered War on Trolls,” Wired, September 19, 2016, https://www.wired.com/2016/09/inside-googles-internet-justice-league-ai-powered-war-trolls/.

251 about 90 percent: Ibid.

251 thoughts of suicide: Vanessa Callison-Burch, Jennifer Guadagno, and Antigone Davis, “Building a Safer Community with New Suicide Prevention Tools,” Facebook Newsroom, March 1, 2017, https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2017/03/building-a-safer-community-with-new-suicide-prevention-tools/%20https://newsroom.fb.com/news/2017/03/building-a-safer-community-with-new-suicide-prevention-tools/.

251 database of facts: Jonathan Stray, “The Age of the Cyborg,” Columbia Journalism Review, Fall/Winter 2016, https://www.cjr.org/analysis/cyborg_virtual_reality_reuters_tracer.php.

251 managing the “trade-offs”: Kurt Wagner, “Facebook’s AI Boss: Facebook Could Fix Its Filter Bubble If It Wanted To,” Recode, December 1, 2016, https://www.recode.net/2016/12/1/13800270/facebook-filter-bubble-fix-technology-yann-lecun.

251 Their more advanced version: For a good overview, see “Cleverbot Data for Machine Learning,” Existor, accessed March 20, 2018, https://www.existor.com/products/cleverbot-data-for-machine-learning/.

252 machine-driven communications tools: Matt Chessen, “Understanding the Psychology Behind Computational Propaganda,” in Can Public Diplomacy Survive the Internet?, ed. Shawn Powers and Markos Kounalakis (U.S. Advisory Commission on Public Diplomacy, May 2017), 41.

252 “RACE WAR NOW”: Sophie Kleeman, “Here Are the Microsoft Twitter Bot’s Craziest Racist Rants,” Gizmodo, March 24, 2016, https://gizmodo.com/here-are-the-microsoft-twitter-bot-s-craziest-racist-ra-1766820160.

252 put to sleep: James Vincent, “Twitter Taught Microsoft’s AI Chatbot to Be a Racist Asshole in Less Than a Day,” The Verge, March 24, 2016, https://www.theverge.com/2016/3/24/11297050/tay-microsoft-chatbot-racist.

252 take its prognostication: Will Knight, “The Dark Secret at the Heart of AI,” MIT Technology Review, April 11, 2017, https://www.technologyreview.com/s/604087/the-dark-secret-at-the-heart-of-ai/.

252 steal a page from: Ibid.

252 10,000 different words: Alexander G. Huth et al., “Natural Speech Reveals the Semantic Maps That Tile Human Cerebral Cortex,” Nature 532 (April 2016): 453–58.

253 a “smart” censorship system: Mike Isaac, “Facebook Said to Create Censorship Tool to Get Back into China,” New York Times, November 22, 2016, https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/22/technology/facebook-censorship-tool-china.html.

253 Sun Microsystems and Cisco: Jack Linchuan Qiu, “Virtual Censorship in China: Keeping the Gate Between the Cyberspaces,” International Journal of Communications Law and Policy 4 (Winter 1999/2000): 1–23.

253 free, open-source tools: See, for example, TensorFlow, https://www.tensorflow.org/.

253 mimic a speaker’s voice: Bahar Gholipour, “New AI Tech Can Mimic Any Voice,” Scientific American, May 2, 2017, https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/new-ai-tech-can-mimic-any-voice/.

253 essentially perfect: Ibid.

253 Lyrebird: Natasha Lomas, “Lyrebird Is a Voice Mimic for the Fake News Era,” TechCrunch, April 25, 2017, https://techcrunch.com/2017/04/25/lyrebird-is-a-voice-mimic-for-the-fake-news-era/.

253 “Photoshop for audio”: Craig Stewart, “Adobe Prototypes ‘Photoshop for Audio,’” Creative Bloq, November 3, 2016, https://www.creativebloq.com/news/adobe-prototypes-photoshop-for-audio.

254 a two-dimensional photograph: Shunsuke Saito et al., “Photorealistic Facial Texture Inference Using Deep Neural Networks,” arXiv:1612.00523 [cs.CV], December 2016.

254 captured the “facial identity”: Justus Thies et al., “Face2Face: Real-Time Face Capture and Reenactment of RGB Videos” (unpublished paper, January 2016), http://niessnerlab.org/papers/2016/1facetoface/thies2016face.pdf.

254 “deformation transfer”: Ibid.

254 “hard to distinguish”: “Face2Face: Real-Time Face Capture and Reenactment of RGB Videos (CVPR 2016 Oral),” YouTube video, uploaded by Matthias Niessner, March 17, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ohmajJTcpNk.

254 “generative networks”: Anh Nguyen et al., “Plug and Play Generative Networks: Conditional Iterative Generation of Images in Latent Space,” arXiv:1612.00005 [cs.CV], November 2016.

254 no earthly counterparts: Ibid.

255 same thing with video: Carl Vondrick, Hamed Pirsiavash, and Antonio Torralba, “Generating Videos with Scene Dynamics” (paper presented at the 29th Conference on Neural Information Processing, Barcelona, 2016), http://carlvondrick.com/tinyvideo/paper.pdf.

255 a predictive future: Ibid.

255 the first to respond: Chessen, “Understanding the Psychology,” 42.

255 “determine the fate”: Ibid., 45.

256 “start programming us”: Matt Chessen, “Machines Will Soon Program People,” @mattlesnake (blog), Medium, May 16, 2017, https://medium.com/@mattlesnake/machines-will-soon-program-people-73929e84c4c4.

256 “We are so screwed”: Charlie Warzel, “Infocalypse Now,” BuzzFeed, February 11, 2018, https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/the-terrifying-future-of-fake-news?utm_term=.viEmNOlN3o#.xtPNkBWkwD.

256 “generative adversarial networks”: Cade Metz, “Google’s Dueling Neural Networks Spar to Get Smarter, No Humans Required,” Wired, April 11, 2017, https://www.wired.com/2017/04/googles-dueling-neural-networks-spar-get-smarter-no-humans-required/.

 

 9. CONCLUSION

258 “We are as gods”: Stewart Brand, “We Are as Gods,” Whole Earth Catalog, Fall 1968, http://www.wholeearth.com/issue/1010/article/195/we.are.as.gods. Although the words are now indelibly his, Brand actually lifted the line from the British anthropologist Edmund Leach.

258 Long before the military: Authors’ phone interview with representatives of the Joint Readiness Training Center, November 14, 2014.

260 “built to accomplish”: “Zuckerberg’s Letter to Investors,” Reuters, February 1, 2012, https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-letter-idUSTRE8102MT20120201.

261 youth is no defense: Brooke Donald, “Stanford Researchers Find Students Have Trouble Judging the Credibility of Information Online,” Stanford Graduate School of Education News Center, November 22, 2016, https://ed.stanford.edu/news/stanford-researchers-find-students-have-trouble-judging-credibility-information-online.

263 other nations now look: Michael Birnbaum, “Sweden Is Taking On Russian Interference Ahead of Fall Elections. The White House Might Take Note,” Washington Post, February 22, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/sweden-looks-at-russias-electoral-interference-in-the-us-and-takes-steps-not-to-be-another-victim/2018/02/21/9e58ee48-0768-11e8-aa61-f3391373867e_story.html?utm_term=.3b666b5148d2.

263 clearest “losers”: Ibid.

263 Finland, Estonia: Reid Standish, “Russia’s Neighbors Respond to Putin’s ‘Hybrid War,’” Foreign Policy, October 12, 2017, http://foreignpolicy.com/2017/10/12/russias-neighbors-respond-to-putins-hybrid-warlatvia-estonia-lithuania-finland/.

264 single cabinet-level meeting: Haley Britzky, “Report: Trump Never Held a High-Level Meeting on Russian Interference,” Axios, December 14, 2017, https://www.axios.com/trumps-inability-to-recognize-1513298165-1d94485c-9fd2-4c84-b552-1299706176ec.html.

264 nearly $80 million: Nahal Toosi, “Tillerson Spurns $80 Million to Counter ISIS, Russian Propaganda,” Politico, August 8, 2017, https://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/02/tillerson-isis-russia-propaganda-241218.

264 cannot start early enough: Lisa Guernsey, “It’s Never Too Early to Start Teaching Kids Media Literacy,” Slate, November 8, 2017, http://www.slate.com/articles/technology/future_tense/2017/11/in_the_age_of_fake_news_it_s_never_too_early_to_teach_kids_media_literacy.

264 at least a dozen: Michael Rosenwald, “Making Media Literacy Great Again,” Columbia Journalism Review, Fall 2017, https://www.cjr.org/special_report/media-literacy-trump-fake-news.php.

264 Calling Bullshit: “Calling Bullshit: Data Reasoning in a Digital World” (course syllabus, University of Washington, Autumn 2017), http://callingbullshit.org/syllabus.html.

265 “conscientious objector”: Thuy Ong, “Sean Parker on Facebook: ‘God Only Knows What It’s Doing to Our Children’s Brains,’” The Verge, November 9, 2017, https://www.theverge.com/2017/11/9/16627724/sean-parker-facebook-childrens-brains-feedback-loop.

265 “our children’s brains”: Ibid.

265 Such “technocracy” views: Parag Khanna, “To Beat Populism, Blend Democracy and Technocracy, S’pore Style,” Straits Times, January 21, 2017, http://www.straitstimes.com/opinion/to-beat-populism-blend-democracy-and-technocracy-spore-style.

265 the Flux movement: Mark Kaye and Nathan Spataro, “Redefining Democracy: On a Democratic System Designed for the 21st Century, and Disrupting Democracy for Good” (unpublished paper, January 2017), https://voteflux.org/pdf/Redefining%20Democracy%20-%20Kaye%20&%20Spataro%201.0.2.pdf.

266 “dangerous speech”: “Understanding Dangerous Speech,” Dangerous Speech Project, accessed March 12, 2018, https://dangerousspeech.org/faq/.

268 “The more we connect”: Chris Matyszcyk, “Facebook’s New Ads Aren’t as Friendly as They Seem,” CNET, February 16, 2015, https://www.cnet.com/news/facebooks-new-ads-arent-as-friendly-as-they-seem/.

268 like Mark Zuckerberg: Mark Zuckerberg, “I Wanted to Share Some Thoughts on Facebook and the Election,” Facebook, November 12, 2016, https://www.facebook.com/zuck/posts/10103253901916271; Callum Bor-chers, “Twitter Executive on Fake News: ‘We Are Not the Arbiters of Truth,’” The Fix (blog), Washington Post, February 8, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2018/02/08/twitter-executive-on-fake-news-we-are-not-the-arbiters-of-truth/?utm_term=.084a121450e4.

268 “answers to simple questions”: Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchierai, “If Facebook Actually Wants to Be Transparent, It Should Talk to Journalists,” Motherboard (blog), Vice, November 10, 2017, https://motherboard.vice.com/en_us/article/ywbe3g/facebook-should-talk-to-journalists?utm_campaign=sharebutton%3Futm_campaign%3Dsharebutton.

268 the word “transparency”: Charlie Warzel, “Twitter Would Like You to Know It Is Committed to Being More Transparent,” BuzzFeed, October 12, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/twitter-would-like-you-to-know-it-is-committed-to-being?utm_term=.hy109eo63E#.fjV316OXpa.

268 Reddit is the only one: Caroline O., “Russian Propaganda on Reddit,” Arc (blog), Medium, April 17, 2018, https://arcdigital.media/russian-propaganda-on-reddit-7945dc04eb7b.

269 effective information literacy education: John Cook, Stephan Lewandowsky, and Ullrich K. H. Ecker, “Neutralizing Misinformation Through Inoculation: Exposing Misleading Argumentation Techniques Reduces Their Influence,” PLoS ONE 12, no. 5 (May 2017): e0175799, http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0175799.

269 not a single social media firm: Alexis Madrigal, “15 Things We Learned from the Internet Giants,” The Atlantic, November 2, 2017, https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2017/11/a-list-of-what-we-really-learned-during-techs-congressional-hearings/544730/.

269 outside researchers raised concerns: Charlie Warzel, “Researchers Are Upset That Twitter Is Dismissing Their Work on Election Interference,” BuzzFeed, October 3, 2017, https://www.buzzfeed.com/charliewarzel/researchers-are-upset-that-twitter-is-dismissing-their-work?utm_term=.ut379NjnD#.mioWe4mZL.

270 “Facebook is only”: Zeynep Tufekci, “It’s the (Democracy Poisoning) Age of Free Speech,” Wired, January 16, 2018, https://www.wired.com/story/free-speech-issue-tech-turmoil-new-censorship/.

270 the least informed: Christoph Aymanns, Jakob Foerster, and Co-Pierre Georg, “Fake News in Social Networks,” arXiv:1708.06233 [cs.AI], August 2017; Mark Buchanan, “Why Fake News Spreads So Quickly on Facebook,” Sydney Morning Herald, September 1, 2017, https://www.smh.com.au/world/why-fake-news-spreads-so-quickly-on-facebook-20170901-gy8je4.html.

271 “easily manipulated”: Sam Wineburg and Sarah McGre, “Lateral Reading: Reading Less and Learning More When Evaluating Digital Information” (working paper no. 2017-A1, Stanford History Education Group, Stanford University, October 2017), https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3048994.

271 approached the task “laterally”: Ibid.

271 “a maze”: Carrie Spector, “Stanford Scholars Observe ‘Experts’ to See How They Evaluate the Credibility of Information Online,” Stanford News Service, Stanford University, October 24, 2017, https://news.stanford.edu/press-releases/2017/10/24/fact-checkers-ouline-information/.

271 “seeking context and perspective”: Ibid.

271 Reality is one: Paul J. Griffiths, An Apology for Apologetics: A Study in the Logic of Interreligious Dialogue (Wipf and Stock, 2007), 46.

272 most important insights: Plato, “The Allegory of the Cave,” Republic, 7.514a2–517a7, trans. Thomas Sheehan, https://web.stanford.edu/class/ihum40/cave.pdf.

273 “believe whatever you want”: The Matrix, directed by the Wachowski Brothers (Warner Bros., 1999).