Imagine if, during World War II, the Germans had been able to pay millions of dollars to minor American celebrities to run pro-Nazi short films in U.S. movie theaters. It sounds absurd, but it is actually miniscule compared to what our enemies can achieve today through social media.
On Tuesday night, Alexis Wilkins, the girlfriend of FBI Director Kash Patel, dropped a stunning thread on X alleging that several high-ranking figures in the conservative politics orbit were engaged in a 22-month “foreign-linked influence network” attacking her and the Trump administration.
Wilkins convincingly purports to show that online campaigns in 2024 painting her as an Israeli spy were coordinated through foreign online accounts such as Russia Today. The detailed evidence she provides is confusing to laymen, but what it clearly shows is inorganic growth for the conspiracy.
This same network, she alleges, is operating to undermine the Trump administration’s military efforts in Iran by applying this inorganic pressure to American social media.
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The FBI declined to comment on Wilkins’ post. But just two hours after it went up, X Head of Product Nikita Bier took to the platform to announce that, starting Thursday, the company would update monetization, the payments users receive, to give more weight to “impressions from your home region.”
In this key section of the statement, Bier admitted the reason for this change is to thwart foreign interference in our elections, writing, “While we appreciate everyone’s opinion on American politics, we hope this will disincentivize gaming the attention of U.S. … accounts.”
And, boy, has there been a lot of foreign gaming of late, which no doubt helped to spur the announcement.
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But at 2:30 a.m. Wednesday, X owner Elon Musk posted a message saying, basically, not so fast,. His message was in response to an account claiming to be an American living in France who could see their income stream decline by the move. Musk said the change would be delayed and reviewed.
Wherever the policy finally lands, it is very welcome news indeed that the platform is taking the threat of foreign information operations on American social media seriously.
Thus far, however, the focus of the reaction to this proposed change by X has gotten the priority exactly backwards, celebrating that foreign accounts would be barred from making money by obsessing on U.S. politics.
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That is a benefit, but it pales in comparison to the other consequence of the proposal, which is that foreign foes will no longer be able to use bot farms to funnel millions of dollars to divisive American content creators.
When a Russian bot farm floods an anti-American post with 20,000 impressions and shares, it boosts the income of the account it is juicing, even if the creators themselves have no idea and think the growth is totally organic.
To return to our analogy, imagine if, in 1943, your radio was giving you a steady stream of Nazi-purchased German propaganda every night. The government would have shut it down, of course. But, online, that option doesn’t really exist.
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At least not yet.
At that time, there were barriers and gatekeepers to protect Americans from foreign information operations. Today, there are virtually none, and it is an asymmetric information war.
Hopefully, Musk can find a way to implement this localization of monetization to crack down on enemy propaganda, but if he and the industry can’t close this open informational wound, then the government might have to.
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Recently, for example, X changed its platform to show the country of origin of its accounts, but this is easily overcome by foreign bots with VPNs. Again, a good instinct, but no ability to truly police the platform.
Musk is in a tough spot here. He doesn’t want to censor anyone, but he also doesn’t want X to be a bustling marketplace of foreign-funded anti-U.S. propaganda, and these proposed changes to localize the profits seem like a very good compromise.
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Meanwhile, whether the industry can fix this problem itself or if more state regulation is needed, the government must investigate just what percentage of our political social media is pushed by foreign bots.
This must be done not to punish the social media companies, but to punish the foreign foes who are engaging quite literally in a form of cyberwarfare against our nation.
President Donald Trump ran on strong borders to keep out migrants, tariffs to keep out products that make us less competitive and voter ID to protect elections. Now, he must focus on a strong wall to protect American social media from our adversaries.
Put simply, if we cannot protect our information ecosystem, then we can’t protect anything.
