Middle East Eye: Saudi flies extend and Twitter fails to hunt

One of the oldest and most misleading information networks in the Middle East is still active on Twitter, and no one seems to know why, according to an article published in the British Middle East Eye website.

The author, author Mark Owen Jones, argues that the so-called "Diavolo" network, which mostly promotes content related to "24 Saudi News" and its sister channels, was responsible for spreading sectarian hate speech and conspiracy theories about the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

"Diaavolo", in Italian, means "devil", which is the name of a program used to automate tweets through the "TweetDeck" app.

Very coordinated effort

In his article, Jones says that searching for the tag related to a country in the Middle East leads you to find one of the robot accounts known as electronic flies that usually copy and paste the same content, and displayed a video with the distinctive "Saudi 24" network logo in the lower right corner.

The author added that the related accounts were designed to appear relatively reasonable, as they often include page images of real people, although it is difficult to deduce the exact numbers, but analyzes indicate that the network is likely to consist of up to 3,700 automatic or semi-automatic accounts.

In fact, for the purpose of this study, two samples were used, both of which were created by downloading about twenty thousand tweets containing the phrase "Channel 24 Analyzer", which is a phrase commonly used by the Android network.

It is mentioned that factors such as similarity in the account creation date, the statute used by the account, the number of followers and similarities in the content published by these accounts, determine the ability to know if the account is suspicious.

The author explained that the analysis of accounts indicates a very coordinated effort, on average, 34 new Twitter accounts have been created every month since 2009, but sometimes this number has increased. In May 2016, 335 accounts were created, and last November, approximately 382 accounts were created.

If these accounts are organic, one can expect a more balanced distribution of construction dates. On the other hand, while some fly networks work only intermittently, the network itself is constantly active, producing more than 2,500 tweets per day.

Iran, Turkey and Qatar .. Popular Topics

The writer stated that the network is constantly focusing on issues related to Iran, Turkey and Qatar. According to his analysis, about a third of all tweets last week contained the tag "# Iran", while the tag "# Turkey", "# Qatar" and "# Saudi Arabia" won about 17% of the total tweets.

Back in 2016, the Saudi 24 network was working to spread anti-Shiite hate speech in the Arabic language. After receiving the complaints, Twitter suspended 1,800 accounts, but the network was much larger, and the measure did not hinder its activity. At that time, the network likely contained tens of thousands of accounts.

The writer indicated that although the network has undergone a liquidation process since then, it has maintained its influence, as it continues to publish pro-Saudi propaganda and misinformation. The network also addresses many common issues, especially when it defended Saudi Arabia in the face of criticism.

During 2018, this network was very active in disseminating conspiracy theories about Turkey's involvement in the murder of Khashoggi, who was killed at his country's embassy and by government officials, according to a Middle East article.

On the anniversary of this crime in October 2018, the network enclosed the tag "# Jamal Khashoggi" with videos promoting Saudi companies, while Aramco's initial public offering made headlines.

The writer added that after a Saudi conscript shot and killed three American soldiers in Florida, the electronic flies network of "Saudi 24" penetrated the "# fire in Florida" tag by spreading Saudi support messages to combat terrorism.

The mysterious point of Twitter

The writer stated that due to the process of filtering Arab Twitter accounts that post “unwanted political messages” from the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia, it seems inconceivable that this network will remain active.

Indeed, it is difficult to determine the network’s impact, but videos posted on Twitter often get thousands of views. However, it is almost certainly implicated in platform manipulation, which Twitter defines as "using Twitter to mislead others or disrupting their experience by engaging in aggressive or deceptive activity" and could include cyber soot or the malicious use of robots or fake accounts.

The writer emphasized that the continued existence of the network raises questions about Twitter's ignorance of turning the application into a weapon connected to Saudi Arabia. In fact, the US government recently accused Saudi spies who worked on Twitter with spying for Riyadh. However, even after Twitter learned of the hacking, CEO Jacques Dorsey met Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Finally, the author said that Twitter did not explain why he had hidden the archive of Saud al-Qahtani, a former royal adviser whose account was banned due to tampering with the platform. Although Twitter accounts are filtered out, without accountability and transparency about the technology company's specific relationships with certain countries, platform manipulation is likely to remain an acceptable form of control in the Middle East.