JERUSALEM — A U.S. think tank that analyzes misinformation online said Friday that an Israel-based influence campaign busted by Facebook had stumped for the winning candidate in the February 2019 Nigerian presidential elections.
A new report from the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab highlights sample posts removed from Facebook that appeared to praise incumbent President Muhammadu Buhari and smear his leading opponent, Atiku Abubakar.
Many of the pages and accounts were discovered to be linked to a Tel Aviv-based political consulting and lobbying firm named Archimedes. On its sparse website of African stock images, the company advertises its deliberate efforts to conduct disinformation campaigns, boasting that it takes "every advantage available in order to change reality according to our client's wishes" through "unlimited online accounts operation."
Facebook banned Archimedes from the platform Thursday for its "coordinated and deceptive behavior" and conducted a sweeping takedown of dozens of accounts and hundreds of pages primarily aimed at disrupting elections in African countries, with some scattered activity in Southeast Asia and Latin America. Overall, the misleading accounts had reached some 2.8 million users, and the pages had engaged over 5,000 followers, according to Facebook's estimates.


One of the pages that Facebook cancelled appeared filled with viral misinformation attacking Abubakar, the former vice president of Nigeria. The page's banner image showed Abubakar as Darth Vader, the Star Wars villain, holding up a sign reading, "Make Nigeria Worse Again."
Another page with almost identical visuals, although significantly excluding the Darth Vader mask, purported to support Abubakar, with the slogan "Team Atiku For President." The report identified the page as a covert attempt to infiltrate Abubakar's audience of potential voters and manipulate their views, gradually spamming them with antithetical content and diverting them to the "Make Nigeria Worse" page.

The report also featured a page that explicitly lionized and boosted Buhari, with amateur videos eulogizing the accomplishments of his presidency as though he were not locked in a tight battle for re-election.
Yet another series of pages targeted the local Rivers state elections in Nigeria's turbulent south, which was marred by widespread violence. Several of the removed pages attempted to defame a candidate from Abubakar's People's Democratic Party and boost his opponent. One page with artificially amplified audience engagement, called "Rivers Violence Watch," pumped out political propaganda while posing as a neutral monitor of election violence, using the page description to mask its efforts.
Most of the pages claimed to be run by local Nigerian users, but in fact were managed from Israel.
Fake news flooded Nigerians and played a central role in the recent national election. Rumors, spreading like wildfire in Africa's most populous country, became so outlandish and fevered that Buhari last year was compelled to declare publicly that he had not died and been replaced by a clone. More than a dozen media outlets joined forces before the election for a fact-checking initiative, while government officials acknowledged that fake news could be deadly in a country with multiple ethnic and religious fault lines.
The incumbent Buhari, who ran on promises to clean up government corruption, and his challenger Abubakar, who campaigned more on pocketbook issues, were in a dead heat as the election approached. The vote vaulted Buhari to a resounding victory, but remained clouded in controversy, with each side accusing the other of vote-rigging and Election Day violence halting ballot-counting and sparking dangerous rumors.
Despite the overt political messaging of these inauthentic pages, the Digital Forensics lab could not assign a particular ideological motive to Archimedes' campaigns, given the diversity and scope of its general operations. Rather, the company, which poured over $800,000 into deceptive content over the past several years, appeared profit-driven. The report did not probe the origins of its cash flow, and it was not clear whether political actors in Nigeria or other countries where the campaigns took off had paid for the company's "strategic consulting."
"The fact the pages were operated by a for-profit company is a troubling sign that highly partisan disinformation is turning into a capital enterprise," the report said.
___
Associated Press writer Cara Anna contributed reporting from Johannesburg, South Africa.

https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2019/05/17/world/middleeast/ap-ml-israel-facebook.html

Apparently, while the APC zombies were shouting and spreading lies about a phantom "Dubai strategy" after licking Lai Mohammed's anùs, they were busy implementing an Israeli strategy to steal the mandate of ordinary Nigerians. May a thousand demons torment each and every APC support Amin

This brings to mind the part that the Russian Government played in bringing in Trump against all odds

Jadax:
This brings to mind the part that the Russian Government played in bringing in Trump against all odds

funny enough the talkative Nigerian government have been tongue tied since this scandal broke out, even their BMC rodents haven’t said a word

Lalasticlala, Regina Daniels wants to smoke shisha

We ar aware about the sponsored online warriors who always win every single online poll but in reality they couldn't win their polling unit



Those worriors ar somewhere enjoying the cool cash now while mumu Atiku is hopelessly wondering what went wrong despite all his Dubai strategies with terrorist

Tinubu the Jagaban, I hail you. You have retired several politicians like Goatluck Jonathan, Olusegun Obasanjo, Peter Obituary, Atikuloot Abubakar, Jimi Agbaje, Bode George, Wahab Dosunmu, Adeseye Ogunleye, Olagunsoye Oyinlola, Ademola Adeleke a.k.a. F9 Parallel a.k.a. Ade Dancer, Peter Odilli, Gbenga Daniel, Emmanuel Iwanyamwu, Olu Falae, e.t.c.

And so what? Go and remove Buhari if ona head Dey diar. You people should continue deceiving yourself.

Jadax:
This brings to mind the part that the Russian Government played in bringing in Trump against all odds

sammyj:
And so what? Go and remove Buhari if ona head Dey diar. You people should continue deceiving yourself.

ogogoro is not good for your system

It seems they finally released the useless zombies from their cage the brainless dolts can’t even defend their lord and master without being told what to say by Ogundamisi and his master Bashir Ahmed

....

RZArecta2:
ogogoro is not good for your system

Israel, I know of a popular Nigerian that relocated to Israel few months before the elections..

They mean......??

helinues:
Israel, I know of a popular Nigerian that relocated to Israel few months before the elections..

They mean......??

that is your cup of garri, why dodge the fact that your lord and savior had to hire mercenaries from Israel to manipulate Nigerians online ?