Latest Twitter Files Reveals Tool to Track “Russian Disinfo” Was a Scam

Hamilton 68, claimed to have been “a new tool to track Russian disinformation on Twitter,” This was a scam to get the accounts of regular people with opposing opinions into question.

At the moment Twitter FilesDropped by Matt Taibbi On Friday, it was revealed Hamilton 68 was an a “scam.” “Instead of tracking how “Russia” influenced American attitudes, Hamilton 68 simply collected a handful of mostly real, mostly American accounts, and described their organic conversations as Russian scheming,” Taibbi wrote.

Hamilton 68 made a list 644 Twitter accounts. They claimed they could “directly attribute to the Russian, Chinese, or Iranian governments or their various news and information channels.” They refused to give the list to the public because it would give these governments the opportunity to pull the accounts down and make new ones.

There was one problem: these accounts were not bots in most cases. They were real people who disagreed to the leftist going Democrat narrative. Twitter was aware of it.

Taibbi sent emails proving that Twitter knew Hamilton 68 was incorrect and that Twitter execs Yoel Roth didn’t feel they could pursue Hamilton 68. Hamilton 68 is part of the Alliance for Securing Democracy. It is located at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

14. In layman’s terms, the Hamilton 68 barely had any Russians. In fact, apart from a few RT accounts, it’s mostly full of ordinary Americans, Canadians, and British.

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 27, 2023

They say that their purpose in life is to create “comprehensive strategies to deter, defend against, and raise the costs of autocratic efforts to undermine and interfere in democratic institutions.”

Hamilton 68 was mentioned in numerous articles in mainstream media as proof of the Russian bot issue on social media.

“Hamilton 68 was used as a source to assert Russian influence in an astonishing array of news stories: support for Brett Kavanaugh or the Devin Nunes memo, the Parkland shooting, manipulation of black voters, ‘attacks’ on the Mueller investigation…

“These stories raised fear in the population and, most importantly, were used to denigrate people like Tulsi Gabrield as foreigners “assets,” and drum up sympathy for political causes like Joe Biden’s campaign by describing critics as Russian-aligned.”

29.Hamilton 68 was used as a source to assert Russian influence in an astonishing array of news stories: support for Brett Kavanaugh or the Devin Nunes memo, the Parkland shooting, manipulation of black voters, “attacks” on the Mueller investigation… pic.twitter.com/GU9UCBLEeO

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 27, 2023

The only issue was that what Hamilton 68 declared about Russian disinfo bots, which was used as evidence by countless media outlets as proof of Russian meddling, was a lie.

Instead, Taibbi writes, “People like Joe Lauria (Sonia Monsour) and Dave Shestokas created the illusion that Russia had support. Virtually every major American news organization cited these fake tales— even fact-checking sites like Snopes and Politifact.”

And Twitter knew it, but didn’t do anything about it.

https://t.co/FAazMoLnTO was a lie. The illusion of Russian support was created by tracking people like Joe Lauria, Sonia Monsour, and Dave Shestokas. Virtually every major American news organization cited these fake tales— even fact-checking sites like Snopes and Politifact. pic.twitter.com/zleliOsckq

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 27, 2023

Yoel Roth, former head of Twitter Trust and Safety, found Hamilton 68’s contention that anyone who disagreed with the going narrative to be “condescending.”

“Hamilton68” was and still is a computerized “dashboard” that can be used by academics and reporters to measure. “Russian disinformation”. Clint Watts, an ex-FBI agent and current MSNBC disinformation expert’, was the one to create it. The Alliance for Securing Democracy (a bipartisan think tank) and the German Marshall Fund supported it. The latter’s advisory panel includes former acting CIA chief Michael Morell, former Ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, former Hillary for America chair John Podesta, and onetime Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol,” Taibbi wrote.

34.Roth was offended by the idea that tweets on certain themes suggested subversion. “Can we talk about how incredibly condescending…? If you talk about these themes, you must have been duped by Russian propaganda.” pic.twitter.com/gxRWq6jr4G

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) January 27, 2023

Taibbi declined to release the list of 644 accounts. He did however say that he was in touch with some of them as Twitter was capable of recreating the list and that they have access to the files.