Troll farm

Internet trolls are people that want to influence the public opinion on on certain subjects. When the government, or people who are close to the government hire such people, this is known as troll farm, or troll factory.  Such trolls also want to interfere with decision making. 

In 2017, Freedom House punlished a report that showed that 32 of the 65 governments covered by the study paid keyboard armies to spread propaganda and attack critics.

According to the report, these governments use paid commentators, trolls, and bots to harass journalists and erode trust in the media. Attempts were made to influence elections in 18 of the countries covered by the study.

 Non government entities 

 Facebook 
In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, Facebook found that troll farms from North Macedonia and the Philippines pushed coronavirus disinformation. The publisher, which used content from these farms, was banned.

In the run-up to the 2020 United States elections, Eastern European troll farms operated popular Facebook pages showing content related to Christians and Blacks in America. They included more than 15,000 pages combined and were viewed by 140 million US users per month. This was in part due to how Facebook's algorithm and policies allow unoriginal viral content to be copied and spread in ways that still drive up user engagement. As of September 2021, some of the most popular pages were still active on Facebook despite the company's efforts to take down such content.

 Harassment of Jessikka Aro 
Finnish investigative journalist Jessikka Aro interviewed workers at a “troll factory” in Saint Petersburg. Aro was harassed online after she published her story. A court in Helsinki convicted three persons who had harassed Aro on charges of defamation and negligence. Aro has stated that online trolls can negatively affect freedom of speech and democracy.

 Pro-Trump misinformation 
In the Macedonian city of Veles, locals launched at least 140 United States political websites supporting Donald Trump.

 Turning Point 
During the 2020 United States presidential election and the COVID-19 pandemic, Turning Point USA and its affiliate Turning Point Action were described as troll farms for paying young conservatives in Phoenix, Arizona, some of them minors with parental support, to post misinformation about the integrity of the electoral process and the threat of COVID-19. The payout included bonuses for posts that generated greater engagement. They used their own social media accounts or fake accounts without disclosing their relationship with Turning Point and were instructed by Turning Point to slightly alter and repost the modified messages a limited number of times to avoid automatic detection.

 See also 





 Fraud factory

 References 

Category:Mass media