Twitter has made available millions of tweets attributed to foreign influence operations originating in Russia and Iran, shining a light on previously disclosed interference campaigns waged by weaponizing social media.
“In line with our strong principles of transparency and with the goal of improving understanding of foreign influence and information campaigns, we are releasing the full, comprehensive archives of the Tweets and media that are connected with these two previously disclosed and potentially state-backed operations on our service,” Twitter’s general counsel and head of site integrity wrote in a joint blog post detailing the platform’s decision to publish the data Wednesday.
The trove consists of over 360 gigabytes of data pertaining to thousands of Twitter users previously suspended for violating the platform’s policies, including tweets and media shared by accounts linked to the Internet Research Agency, the Russian “troll farm” accused of meddling in the 2016 U.S. election, as well as activity related to a suspected Iranian operation revealed this past August.
Released following previous actions taken by Twitter in response to Russia’s involvement in the 2016 race, the data dump marks the company’s latest effort to highlight how foreign actors continue to exploit its platform and others amid related concerns being raised 20 days until the Nov. 6 midterm elections.
Twitter previously found that the Internet Research Agency ran thousands of accounts on its platform prior to being detected last year, and in February the company said it had started notifying roughly 1.4 million users who had engaged with content shared by the Russian trolls during the 2016 race.
The Internet Research Agency allegedly meddled in the 2016 race as part of a multi-pronged state-sponsored interference campaign, according to the U.S. Department of Justice, and special counsel Robert Mueller’s office unsealed related criminal charges in February against several supposed Internet Research Agency employees and Yevgeny Prigozhin, a Russian oligarch accused of running its operations.
Twitter revealed in August that it had suspended hundreds of accounts traced to Iran for engaging in “coordinated manipulation,” meanwhile, and U.S. officials have warned that Russia or another country could potentially mount a campaign targeting next month’s midterms.
“It is clear that information operations and coordinated inauthentic behavior will not cease,” Twitter’s Vijaya Gadde and Yoel Roth wrote in the Oct. 17 blog post. “These types of tactics have been around for far longer than Twitter has existed — they will adapt and change as the geopolitical terrain evolves worldwide and as new technologies emerge.”
The trove of Twitter data made public this week consists of material related to 3,841 previously identified accounts associated with the Internet Research Agency, as well as the 770 other accounts flagged in August and described as potentially originating in Iran, including their tweets, shared images, videos and live broadcasts conducted on Periscope, a Twitter-owned video sharing service.
All of the accounts were previously suspended by Twitter, rendering their past activity inaccessible except where archived, effectively complicating efforts to fully understand either campaign.
“We are making this data available with the goal of encouraging open research and investigation of these behaviors from researchers and academics around the world,” Ms. Gadde and Mr. Roth said in the blog post. “We will continue to proactively combat nefarious attempts to undermine the integrity of Twitter, while partnering with civil society, government, our industry peers and researchers to improve our collective understanding of coordinated attempts to interfere in the public conversation.”
Previous research into the Internet Research Agency’s activities found that the group was able to craft content subsequently shared on social media during the 2016 race by by multiple members of President Trump’s election campaign, including White House counselor Kellyanne Conway and Donald Trump Jr., among others.
Roughly two-thirds of Americans believe Russia will use social media to spread misinformation prior to next month’s race, according to the results of an NPR/Marist Poll released last month.
• Andrew Blake can be reached at ablake@washingtontimes.com.
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