Romanian elections: How a few hundred accounts coordinated on telegram can sway the algorithm and an election.

https://i.redd.it/d5pejzlkyz2e1.png

by forrestgrin

49 comments

  1. Disgrace! This is how elections all around the EU are manipulated and we do nothing against it.

  2. That Mf got 2 million votes being an independent candidate with just tik tok bots that’s just sad how can he get so many votes

  3. Yes, He only showed himself a few times an never spoked to the people, only spreading russian propaganda trough TikTok, he’s willing to start what the people died for in 1989

  4. we need to ask ourselves why nothing is being done about baning and criminalizing trol farms? IMO – because all sides are using them…

  5. Btw if you check the vote count it seems this guy will have a different challenger than expected… This election is full of surprises

  6. Is Telegram popular in Romania? Here its pretty much only used by the migrants/refugees from the ex-Soviet East and drug dealers

  7. Time to speed a tiktok ban through the EU parliament, I would argue.

  9. I am a Romanian. I don’t use Tik Tok. And I’ve barely heard about this person. Last time I heard about him was 2-3 years ago when he said that some communist and legionary criminals are heroes 💀

    This Georgescu person said he supports Putin and he spreads anti-NATO and anti-UE ideologies.

    edit: our TV stations were all wondering all night who is this Georgescu and why nobody heard of him.

  10. I guess you’ve all seen the comments on the previous posts from flabbergasted Romanians. Quickly translated a few posts from one of the telegram channels run by “volunteers”.

    They contained instructions on how to modify the messages so that the algorithm would not flag them as spam and to make them appear as genuine. Also included were instructions such as “groups of 30 with a 15 minute break and then another 30 groups and so on” (rough translation).

    They are very helpful, with a guide on how to edit and post videos before posting them on various social media platforms so that the views get counted and that each video appears as an original clip.

    It may be legal to spoon-feed people on how to post for a certain candidate (no idea) but I find it highly unethical for a presidential candidate to entirely fake the interactions with his electorate and to milk an algorithm to such a degree.

    Everyone on TV and online was wondering where exactly did this candidate appear from? In just a few weeks he went from the bottom of the polls to the top. Even this morning on TV as I am typing this I am listening in the background on how “experts” say they can’t explain how this has happened.

  11. It’s still also very strange if he didn’t show up at all in the opinion polls. In the end 2 million actual real people, almost a quarter of the electorate, voted for him. How can you miss that if you are a serious polling institute?

  12. Just cut The whole russia off from world wide web. Nothing good comes from there anyway.

    Let them have their own siberian wide web instead where they can influence themselves as much as they want to

  13. Russia has perfected this crap, to really exploit populism

  14. Why are bot farms legal? No one benefits from them except the mafias that get paid to spread false information.

  15. Social media has been like this for over a decade all of it needs either banning or regulating, yes Reddit included.

  16. Romania: we are concerned about the way in which Russia manipulates the elections in the Republic of Moldova.

    Russia: wait, in fact, why manipulate the elections in Moldova? if by manipulating those in Romania I automatically win Moldova too😃👍

  17. We are so long overdue for a government created social media platform.
    Open source code, no content algorithms just a chronological feed.

    We need to take back digital public spaces or we risk loosing so much to profit driven entities.

  18. *how a few millions people can be dumb enough to get swayd by a couple of russian accounts*

    (not targetting Romanian here, we have the same shit going in every democracy RN)

  19. Yes, Americans just elected Trump twice so we know what we are talking about here as well.

  20. Has Z written all over it. 2nd round is coming, and he is history now that the general public has woken up.

  22. Gullibility manipulated to favor a specific outcome?

    In something related to politics?

    In an election?

    Such shocking developments in 2024 !

  23. This is the result of people in liberal democracies thinking their civic and political activities stop at voting every now and then for representatives or referendums.

  24. My fear is that China is correct to firewall their internet and have extreme censorship.
    An open internet is amazing but it is also too easy to exploit. It is like any right. You have a responsibility attached to it.

    There is a reason anti-vax, conspiracies, political propaganda aware being spread like crazy. It sucks living in a country and then political propaganda from another country hooks onto the minds of people here.

  25. Why TikTok is not banned in EU already? We can’t influence the elections in China, why do we let them do it?

  26. Were they also using Starlink to co-ordinate electronic votes like the US elections.

    Seems a bit suspect to say the least.

  27. Yeah. A few accounts that get just a few hundred views and a handfull likes decide who people should vote for.

  28. I’m almost literally in shock… the guy’s an absolute nutjob from ANY perspective you can think of. He is pro Putin, anti NATO, anti vax, religious nutjob to only name a few. If posts like this one are true, that’s election tampering and it’s frankly a direct and open attack on a state. No fucking buts about it. Any state that does this directly in the election of another state, is ATTACKING said state and should be considered a national security issue.

  29. I read that around 48% of voters simply didn’t show up at the polls. I would argue apathy is as dangerous as stupidity at this point

  31. It’s the same everywhere even since before Cambridge Analytica blew up and changed the political landscape in various countries.

  32. I genuinely believe society will not get better unless we ban social media or heavily restrict what can be posted

  33. Same happened in the Netherlands. Colleague of mine voted for PVV because of fake news on TikTok. Something about foreigners taking all our jobs and money. 

    The fascinating thing is, he really believes every video he sees. For example, he mentioned that he saw a video that nobody is buying electric cars in the US and they sel them to foreign countries for 5-10K. So I said, let’s have a look at used electric cars in the US, and surprise, none of them were 10K or less (and mind you this was 1-2 years ago). TikTok and other social media are a danger do democracies if they are uncontrolled like this. 

  34. WhatsApp, TikTok, Twitter, threads, Instagram, Facebook groups, vk and Telegram are all swamped with misinformation from Russian bot farms to turn elections to the right and/or pro Putin. 

    We’re under attack, please EU, regulate this !

  35. Inflation is rampant all over the world,soulution let’s elect theese pro russian twats…ofc they will fix it😅

  37. TikTok needs to banned NOW.

    Weak democracies like Romania and Bulgaria are the most vulnerable.

  38. we need to ban tiktok and telagram, its clear at this point they are just too dangerous as tools for Russia and China to influence democratic countries they view as opponents

    EDIT: X as well

  39. Calin Georgescu had 43% of the votes in diaspora. In London they were shocked when they opened the box and saw that most of the stamps were on Calin Georgescu. How can you live abroad and vote for a guy that’s anti-EU? Beats the fuck out of me

  40. For all of us clamoring for establishment parties to use the same tactics, I am afraid that there is no way that can work. Campaigns such as this one requires two things; a candidate that has the appearance of being untarnished by “the system” and something to scare the “victims” with.

    I am not Romanian so I’m not familiar with this campaign in particular, but I’ve run an experiment a couple of times where I open up a fresh TikTok account and do nothing but watch whatever I’m served for 10 seconds, and then go on the next video. *Every single time* have I ended up in an anti-immigrant, anti-establishment, pro-Russia, nuclear war-fearmongering rabbit hole, interspersed with cute cat videos and other harmless content. These social media platforms are fine tuned to outrage you maximally unless you carefully curate what you want to see.

    Bog standard social democrats, liberals or whatever can’t possibly hope to compete, as they do not rely on attacking “a threat to the common man” in their messaging. They can maybe drum up fear of these unqualified quacky challengers, but that will only be perceived as them defending *themselves* against this challenger. Green parties can try similar strategies regarding climate change, but as the threat is more abstract and less immediate it won’t lend itself to algorithmic capture either.

  41. Forbidden stories , a consortium of journalist , literally explained how all this work and its real and verified impact 4 years afo but absolutely nobody care. Before that was Cambridge analytica scandal. News , information , literature , education , all of this is useless because people dont care enough about not being manipulated. Entertainment and quick dopamine is more important. We are a specie of moron. Youth voted donald trump in US because they saw reels / tiktok and shorts of some random right wing propagandist and they heard Trump on Joe Rogan’s podcast. Nobody even care about reading program anymore.

  42. So people are mindless drones that vote for someone after watching a TikTok or a. Telegram channel? Oh wait, before it was voting what the TV says, so cry about it.

  43. with the upcomming election in germany in 3 month, i really am worried about this.

  45. Ban of or on social media or discussion forums etc won’t help….only permanent vigilance will defend democracy. History shows it. If people become complacent or unengaged with society said society will self-destruct.
    Starting from Ancient Rome, Greece, China, Franco-German, Mongolia, British Empire….soon America and whoever ends up being the next leading nation.

    Nothing new or internet linked about it.
    Without good, strong leaders that people can gather behind there is a vacuum that will be filled. Whether idiots or not, whoever is most interested in filling it, will.

    So let’s all get interested and engaged and make sure everyone around us is too!

  46. Europeans making fun of Americans, that they are too easy to influence. Meanwhile, we have the same shit happen in our own back yard.

  47. TikTok is a weapon of informational warfare used by foreign powers to wage war on us.

    Europe needs to do two things:

    1. Ban TikTok.

    2. Establish a pan-European agency to deal with these threats.

    There is no “freedom of speech” for foreign powers.

  48. The Romanians who voted him have absolutely no idea who he is, what he did and so on. Around 2.000.000 people said “He looks nice, I’m going to vote him” based on videos on TikTok. They hate Lasconi because she is a single mother with a lesbian daughter but close their eyes when a pro-Russian guy appears.

    I know that we have our problems here, but today I’m ashamed to be a Romanian.

  49. Kamala voters have been doing the same shit on reddit for over a month. And everyone here was fine with it.

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