People have been curious about http://BL.com for a while, particularly its connections to Epoch Times (which it has denied) and Falun Gong. To understand more about Epoch and Falun Gong, here’s a backgrounder:https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/trump-qanon-impending-judgment-day-behind-facebook-fueled-rise-epoch-n1044121 …
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Snopes wrote about http://BL.com specifically in October: https://www.snopes.com/news/2019/10/11/pro-trump-outlet-linked-epoch-times/?collection-id=218348 … Last week,
@ExploitingNiche did a great report about BL using GANs generated faces as fake profiles pictures:https://analysis.leadstories.com/3471185-fake-faces-people-Who-Do-Not-Exist-Invade-Facebook-To-Influence-2020-Elections.html …Prikaži ovu nit -
The http://BL.com had 4 Pages on Facebook: The BL, The BL - News, The BL TV, and The BL - Stories. The content was similar but framed slightly differently. Stories was human-interest content, told from the first person. Here's a look at some engagement & post patterns.pic.twitter.com/4gyTDGw4wF
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They made quite a bit of video, which they posted to their Facebook page and hosted on their site. Only 3 videos appear on their YouTube channel. One of the 3 YT videos had 1.8MM views despite having 25 subscribers. They may have used it in ads. (Channel seems down as of now)
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The video content is interesting, and still visible on http://thebl.com . It focuses on current events. The anchors include a voice-over actor and folks who has done work for other Falun Gong-attributed channels in the past.
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One video, ab how D. Trump is a defender of religious freedom, spends 2 minutes on Trump &US freedoms before pivoting to Falun Gong and Chinese suppression. Then it pivots back to praising Mike Pence. This sandwiches in the message between content that is appealing to the target.
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It's worth a look in light of the questions raised in press coverage about to what extent Epoch & BL's targeting of Pres Trump's supporters has been financially vs ideologically motivated.https://thebl.com/video/freedom-of-belief/ …
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The BL - News page was by far the smallest but it interestingly managed around a dozen pro-Trump Groups. These groups had real people in them, but also sockpuppets. These fake profiles posted http://bl.com articles. Some had fake generated faces, as described above.pic.twitter.com/eXExSVx2Ku
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The articles got real lift. A look at BuzzSumo shows millions of engagements. The posts had many comments. A couple commenters did raise the question of whether the Page was foreign.pic.twitter.com/WBlDSqdHNK
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CrowdTangle also shows recent articles getting many thousands of interactions on Facebook. Influencers did tweet/share this content, including million+ Facebook groups like “Hillary 4 Prison,” right-wing figures like Brian Kolfage, and a Republican running for congress in NJ.
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Also of note, there are dedicated apps in the app store, in English, Chinese, and Spanish.pic.twitter.com/3TFH1mv0cx
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One key question people have raised is, why were Epoch Times and the BL doing this? For one thing, they were expanding their reach, presumably increasing revenue. According to NBC they’ve doubled their revenue since pivoting to MAGA-focused content:https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/trump-qanon-impending-judgment-day-behind-facebook-fueled-rise-epoch-n1044121 …
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But from the content it appears that there were political aims at work as well. Some Falun Gong adherents appear to believe Trump was sent to destroy the Communist Party and bring about Judgment Day: https://www.thedailybeast.com/bannon-teams-up-with-chinese-group-that-thinks-trump-will-bring-on-end-times ….
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We will update this thread with more findings as they come up.
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