Twitter received intelligence reports from U.S. agencies raising concerns about foreign influence by flagging users and posts focused on Ukraine “propaganda,” COVID vaccines, and much more, according to the latest disclosure in “The Twitter Files.”
Journalist Matt Taibbi shared on Saturday excerpts in a thread responding to the FBI defending as “traditional” and “longstanding” its correspondence with Twitter in the face of concerns that the bureau was going out of its way to pressure social media companies to censor content.
“Many people wonder if Internet platforms receive direction from intelligence agencies about moderation of foreign policy news stories. It appears Twitter did, in some cases by way of the” FBI and its Foreign Influence Task Force (FITF), Taibbi said. “These reports are far more factually controversial than domestic counterparts,” he added.
The journalist shared screenshots of what he said were some of these intelligence reports, including one listing accounts “tied to ‘Ukraine ‘neo-Nazi’ Propaganda.” This document discussed the monitoring of a suspected Russian troll farm “propagating disinformation on Twitter about the U.S. and Ukrainian governments to support Russian actions in Ukraine” right around of the start of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February.
One of the “key findings” talked about “prevailing narratives” that “blame the U.S. for ‘Nazification’ of the Ukraine.” A bullet point underneath asserts that President Joe Biden helped orchestrate a coup in 2014 and put his son, Hunter Biden, on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company.
“Another report asserts a list of accounts accusing the ‘Biden administration’ of ‘corruption’ in vaccine distribution are part of a Russian influence campaign,” Taibbi said. The screen shot of this other report he shared included breakdowns on suspected “narratives,” including that the “Biden administration was selling better places in the COVID-19 vaccine queue to countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America and therefor, U.S. corruption was influencing the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.”
48. Another report asserts a list of accounts accusing the “Biden administration” of “corruption” in vaccine distribution are part of a Russian influence campaign: pic.twitter.com/RPDDFNWaji
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) December 24, 2022
Over the course of his 56-point thread, which also noted reports bearing lists of links and accounts suspected to bots and linked to foreign regimes, Taibbi said government agencies shared intelligence through the FBI and FITF with Twitter and other technology companies. Taibbi said Twitter did not always block flagged accounts, but he posited, “The line between ‘misinformation’ and ‘distorting propaganda’ is thin. Are we comfortable with so many companies receiving so many reports from a ‘more aggressive’ government?”
50. One report says a site “documenting purported rights abuses committed by Ukrainians” is directed by Russian agents: pic.twitter.com/2uzXLGP6CG
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) December 24, 2022
Though the provenance of each intelligence report was not so clear, Taibbi cited former CIA agent and whistleblower John Kiriakou expressing the belief that he recognized some of the formatting.
“‘Looks right on to me,’ Kiriakou says, noting that ‘what was cut off above [the ‘tearline’] was the originating CIA office and all the copied offices,” Taibbi tweeted. The journalist added that the CIA “has yet to comment on the nature of its relationship to tech companies like Twitter. Twitter had no input into anything I did or wrote.”