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hen simultaneous lockdowns began worldwide in March 2020, the crisis scenarios predicted by economists largely materialized; unemployment increased, consumption contracted and supply chains were disrupted. However, this same process also accelerated an unexpected transformation. As people were confined to their homes, work, social life and money all transitioned behind the screen. This relocation was not merely a practical adaptation but a fundamental reorganization of humanity’s relationship with the world.

Global internet traffic recorded an average increase of 40 percent in the first half of 2020. Video conferencing platforms, electronic commerce sites and digital finance applications gained millions of new users. According to a report by the McKinsey Global Institute, the pandemic advanced digital transformation by five to seven years across multiple sectors. However, this acceleration was not the product of a controlled and planned transition; it was a leap born out of necessity. Consequently, the vulnerabilities it introduced were just as vast as the opportunities.

The rapid expansion of digital finance profoundly disrupted the relationship people have with money. Traditional financial actions such as visiting a bank, trading through a broker and filling out paperwork gave way to instantaneous, invisible and effortless transactions. Money became a mere digit on a screen. This abstraction also brought with it an illusion of ease, earning money began to seem as effortless and even as entertaining, as spending it.

From a neuroscientific perspective, this process is directly related to the human mind’s perception of risk. Studies conducted by researchers at Stanford University indicate that loss aversion weakens when financial decisions are made through digital interfaces rather than in tangible environments. Along this spectrum advancing from physical money to plastic cards and ultimately to abstract numbers, individuals become increasingly inclined to take higher risks. The fact that a vast majority of society encountered investment instruments either for the first time or intensively during the pandemic coincided exactly with this underlying landscape.

Blockchain technology: Centralization or decentralization?

The foundational promise of the cryptocurrency ecosystem was decentralization. The white paper authored in 2008 by the figure known as Satoshi Nakamoto, whose true identity and whereabouts remain a mystery, aimed to eliminate intermediary institutions in the financial system and enable direct, equal and transparent money transfers between individuals. Blockchain technology was presented as the infrastructure that fulfilled this promise. Records were kept in an encrypted format across a distributed network and no single central authority could independently intervene in this network.

From a theoretical perspective, this architecture was presented primarily on social media platforms as a protective mechanism against state oppression and inflation and interestingly, recommendation algorithms placed this narrative in front of millions of people time and time again. Cryptocurrencies were marketed as both a safe haven and a symbol of resistance against the current system, particularly in countries where people had lost faith in their own national currency. Thanks to social media platforms, this perception eventually transformed into a reality embraced by users.

However, the reality in practice painted a very different picture. Although the blockchain infrastructure remained decentralized, the cryptocurrency market gradually evolved into centralized structures. Major exchanges such as Binance, Coinbase and FTX transformed into multinational corporations that control the vast majority of the global volume. A similar concentration occurred on the supply side of the cryptocurrency market. By the end of 2021, calculations showed that approximately 80 percent of the circulating supply of Bitcoin was held by only 2 percent of the total holders. This structure clearly contradicted the claim of democratization put forward by cryptocurrencies.

In other words, while the technology itself was ostensibly decentralized, from a political economy perspective, the market possessed a power asymmetry dominated by major players. Individual investors considered themselves free within this structure, but in reality, they were participating in a game where they could not determine the prices, liquidity or timing. This paradox constitutes a critical foundation for understanding how the easy money vibe operates.

Earning easy money during the pandemic: Bitcoin and other coins

Prior to the pandemic, Bitcoin was trading at approximately 7,300 dollars. Throughout the pandemic year of 2020, prices began to climb alongside investor interest, driven particularly by the recommendation algorithms of social media platforms and by November 2021, Bitcoin reached 69,000 dollars. This corresponded to an increase of approximately 840 percent. Other major coins, notably Ethereum, recorded similar and even steeper increases. According to an analysis published in 2021 by researchers from Columbia Law School, the total value of cryptocurrency markets was under 200 billion dollars at the onset of the pandemic. By November 2021, this figure had skyrocketed to 3 trillion dollars.

This staggering surge transformed into a narrative. Social media emerged as the most powerful amplifier of that narrative. On Twitter, Instagram and TikTok, stories of individuals becoming rich overnight, accounts claiming to have discovered legendary coins early and portfolio screenshots updated almost daily generated a mass sentiment: Fear of Missing Out or FOMO. A qualitative study conducted by researchers from Selcuk University focusing on cryptocurrency investors revealed that the vast majority of participants discovered this market through social media and their social circles. No one had read a technical paper but they had caught a particular vibe. In other words, individuals were making decisions through their System 1 thinking, acting entirely intuitively and devoid of rationality, yet they perceived themselves as rational decision makers.

Türkiye was one of the countries where this process unfolded most vividly. According to the data, as of 2024, Türkiye ranked third globally in cryptocurrency ownership relative to its population, with almost one fifth of the population holding crypto assets. An academic study conducted in 2023 utilizing a logit model analysis on a sample of 947 individuals revealed that 29,4 percent of the respondents invested in crypto assets. The most frequently cited motivation among investors took the form of statements such as “my income is insufficient” or “I want to earn more income.” In other words, a significant portion of those entering the market opened this door not with a technical expectation but driven by the motive to earn more.

The sharp decline in coins following the pandemic and the capital transfer mechanism

Beginning in late 2021, cryptocurrency markets entered a severe downturn. By the summer of 2022, the total market capitalization plummeted from 3 trillion dollars to below 900 billion dollars. Many altcoins lost 90 percent or more of their value. The bankruptcy of FTX, the collapse of Terra and Luna and the successive liquidity crises initiated a brutal liquidation process in which ordinary investors exited the market with massive losses.

At this point, the global monetary policy of the pandemic era requires a separate evaluation. The United States announced a COVID relief package of approximately 5,2 trillion dollars between 2020 and 2021, while the Federal Reserve carried out 4,5 trillion dollars of quantitative easing through bond purchases. According to an analysis published on Nasdaq, the total volume of new money injected into circulation reached 13 trillion dollars by the middle of 2021, constituting an unprecedented sum in historical terms. Normally, a money supply expansion of this magnitude would have triggered severe inflation. However, this time, a portion of the excess liquidity was channeled into global asset markets via digital interfaces, with the cryptocurrency ecosystem functioning as one of the major destinations for this influx.

The ability of cryptocurrency markets to attract the masses was achieved by rapidly inflating the value of certain coins during the period referred to as the bull market phase. The value of some coins multiplied astronomically, and all of these developments were subjected to intense propaganda. The fact that internationally recognized figures such as Elon Musk traded in the cryptocurrency market, launched coins, made positive statements regarding the markets and expressed optimistic expectations heavily captivated the masses.

During this period, a multitude of social media influencers, some operating behind anonymous profiles, emerged to conduct cryptocurrency analyses and offer purchasing recommendations. While not applicable to all of them, a vast majority of these profiles were actually executing paid promotions for coins or artificially inflating the value of their own assets. Their vocalization of expectations for an uninterrupted upward trend in this manner, coupled with the intermittent rise of the coins they recommended, constituted the primary reasons why individuals flocked to these markets.

For investors in economies like Türkiye, the mechanism operated as follows, as the Turkish Lira depreciated, individuals converted their savings first into dollars and subsequently into crypto assets pegged to the dollar. These crypto assets were purchased predominantly in dollars through exchanges headquartered in or regulated by the United States. The capital effectively exited the country. When the price of a coin purchased for 80 dollars by a user from Türkiye dropped to 20 dollars, 60 dollars out of the initial 80 dollars that had left the country vanished with no possibility of return. When this scenario is multiplied across millions of users and hundreds of different assets, a concrete picture emerged demonstrating that tens of billions of dollars in value draining from countries like Türkiye ultimately financed Western markets.

This process represents a narrative not merely of individual losses, but of a structural capital transfer. The 2021 Global Financial Stability Report published by the IMF clearly documents that crypto assets can be utilized as a mechanism for transferring money across borders, particularly in countries experiencing capital flow restrictions. Therefore, the culpability for the regulatory vacuum lies not solely in the naive faith of individual investors, but within the structures that deliberately preserve this vacuum.

I

n the digital age, social media platforms have transformed into tools of social engineering and informal educational spaces that shape the worldview of young people. Content promoted by algorithms has now transcended individual preferences and become a matter of social and national security. TikTok is a striking example of this. Launched in 2016 by the China-based company ByteDance, it surpassed 1 billion users worldwide within a few years and became the most popular platform among young people. The secret to its unique success lies in its special recommendation algorithm, which captivates users from the very first moment by offering an endless stream of videos. Unlike classic social networks, the platform offers an independent viral discovery mechanism, allowing videos from unknown content creators to reach millions.

However, perhaps the darker side of this algorithmic power lies in content selection and allegations of invisible censorship. Leaked communications from 2020 revealed that TikTok applied filters to ‘create a desirable vibe’, hiding users deemed unattractive, poor or disabled from the feed. Similarly, leaks revealed that videos with dilapidated or slum-like backgrounds were deemed ‘not cool enough’ and not shown to a wider audience. Interestingly, many news sites around the world that reported on these leaks were forced to remove their articles in 2021 and 2022. Without this information about the 2020 TikTok leaks, we might not have found these articles.

How does the TikTok algorithm work?

TikTok’s recommendation algorithm, which offers personalized video streams, is the most important factor that makes the app so popular and addictive. But how well is this algorithm developed in relation to neural networks? How does it trigger the neural system? Is it solely related to social psychology or is there an algorithm and content system compatible with the hormonal system? How does it create the cycle that causes a dopamine surge in the brain? Is there a new system that deciphers the neural system directly, replacing the film, television, and advertising industries shaped by archetypes? These are topics for other articles.

Returning to our research topic, the “For You” page on TikTok is designed to offer each user new videos tailored to their interests. When a new user joins the platform, the algorithm gathers interest signals by initially showing popular videos in different categories. Interactions, such as which videos the user watches and how much they like or share, quickly create a profile. If a user watches a video all the way through or rewatches it, the algorithm assumes they are interested in that content and recommends similar videos more frequently. Thus, TikTok’s recommendation algorithm creates a kind of “vulnerability map” of the user by analyzing every micro-interaction.

Although personalization enables users to swiftly discover content they may enjoy, it can also foster a hazardous cycle of dependency. Rather than being about digital platform loyalty, it is more accurate to say that this is an addiction involving the brain’s stimulation centers. Because the TikTok feed is designed for endless scrolling, users have difficulty controlling their content consumption. Each video is optimized to be short and attention-grabbing, constantly triggering the brain’s reward mechanism and releasing dopamine. Young people, especially children, have not yet fully developed impulse control, making it easier for them to get caught up in this rapid reward cycle and spend hours on the app. The platform constantly prompts users with the question, “What will the next video be?” This makes them lose track of time. Indeed, research shows that compared to other platforms, TikTok users lose control of their time more quickly and stay on the app much longer than planned.

This can be explained by TikTok’s psychological use of a “variable reward” principle. With each scroll, users experience uncertainty about what the next video will be. Although some mundane content appears occasionally, the frequent appearance of entertaining or interesting videos reinforces addictive behavior similar to pulling the lever on a slot machine in the hope of winning a big prize. The Washington, D.C., attorney general’s indictment also describes the TikTok algorithm as “intentionally addictive”, emphasizing that it keeps young people online for hours, which can lead to mental health issues such as depression, anxiety and attention deficit disorder.

Another concerning aspect of TikTok’s algorithm is its tendency to show users sensitive and harmful content. Various studies have revealed weaknesses in the platform’s content moderation. For instance, Global Witness’s 2025 experiment involved creating new accounts that appeared to belong to 13-year-olds. Even with “Restricted Mode” enabled, sexually explicit terms were suggested to these accounts in the search bar. After a few clicks, the platform itself suggested pornographic and inappropriate content. The suggestions were so inappropriate that researchers had to report videos featuring individuals who appeared to be under 16 to the relevant authorities for suspected child abuse. In short, not only does TikTok fail to fully implement the rules it claims to have introduced to protect young users but its algorithm also directs them toward objectionable content.

Persona experiment

To understand how the TikTok algorithm influences users, we conducted an experiment with fictional users who had different profiles and interests. We created 12 distinct personas that varied in age, gender and interests and opened a new TikTok account for each persona. These personas included children, teenagers, young adults and middle-aged individuals. Their interests ranged from humor and gaming to music, religious content, news, history and recipes. On the first day, each persona signaled their interests to the algorithm by searching for or watching a few related videos. For the next week, each persona passively watched content that appeared on their “For You” feed. On the third and seventh days, we recorded and compared the algorithm’s suggested content profiles for each persona. This allowed us to observe how the algorithm constructed user profiles and trapped them in specific content bubbles over the course of a week.

The findings at the end of the experiment were quite striking. In particular, the initial interests of children and adolescents quickly shifted towards inappropriate and potentially harmful content. For instance, a 13-year-old male persona initially watched gaming videos and innocent jokes but by the third day, his feed was dominated by crude humor and dangerous “challenge” videos. By the seventh day, he was being exposed to violent content, including street fights and the glorification of carrying knives and other sharp objects.

Similarly, a 15-year-old female persona initially watched popular dance trends and posts from high school students. Within a few days, however, the algorithm pulled her toward more sexually suggestive dance videos and erotically suggestive content. Even with “Restricted Mode” enabled, TikTok was showing sexually explicit search suggestions in the young account’s search section. After a week, the girl’s feed was filled with lewd jokes, exhibitionist dances and advertisements for adult dating apps. These examples clearly demonstrate how inadequate TikTok’s content filtering mechanisms are for children and teenagers.

Extreme content among young people

The algorithm was also seen pushing users toward increasingly extreme content, particularly among young adults and middle-aged individuals. An 18-year-old female user, who was initially interested in makeup tutorials and college entrance exam preparation videos, found that her feed was soon filled with videos promoting consumption and the luxurious lifestyles of popular influencers. By the seventh day, she was inundated with perfectionist beauty trends, cosmetic surgery advertisements and content glorifying wealthy lifestyles. This led her to question her own appearance and living standards.

A 30-year-old male user who initially consumed tech news and economic content was bombarded with conspiracy theory-like political videos by the third day. His feed was flooded with unverified and sensationalist claims about topics such as the pandemic or the global economic crisis. By the end of the week, this person was overwhelmed with ideologically polarizing and provocative content. In fact, an independent test by Guardian Australia reported that even a completely new TikTok account, created without any interaction, was quickly flooded with violent, far-right content and racist videos, which is parallel to our research.

One of our religiously inclined personas underwent a complete transformation. Initially, the 40-year-old conservative woman watched content related to religious discussions and family values. However, by the third day, TikTok began presenting her with increasingly nationalistic yet secular content. There was an increase in posts with racist and Turkish nationalist themes, and Islamic references were relegated to the background in the videos. After a week, this devout profile was confronted with harsh Turkish nationalist discourse that largely relegated religious identity to the background. These findings suggest that the platform prioritizes content that serves a specific agenda in Türkiye. Some news pages on social media have been accused in the press of being controlled by Zionist groups that promote “Turkishness without Islam.” Similarly, despite her religious sensibilities, this persona was exposed to anti-religious, nationalist content by the algorithm.

T

The idea that YouTube’s algorithm steers users towards increasingly extreme content has long been debated. Brenton Tarrant, the perpetrator of the Christchurch attack, confessed during his investigation that YouTube had inspired him. The Prime Minister of New Zealand also stated that the platform’s algorithm was the source of radicalisation. Similarly, it is known that Anders Breivik, who killed 77 people in Norway in 2011, had contact with racist and far-right circles online long before carrying out the attack, and adopted and tried to spread an ideology of violence through manifestos and videos. Academic studies also show that a significant proportion of videos recommended to right-leaning users promote extremist ideologies. In short, these examples reveal that YouTube’s algorithm can gradually bring users of different ideologies closer to extremism. YouTube adapts its content distribution and visibility algorithms according to pressure points in different countries.

In Türkiye specifically, marginal radical content with religious motifs is spreading rapidly among young people. Some Salafist preachers on YouTube define the current socio-political order in terms of the concept of ‘taghut’ (tyranny/false gods), constructing a language that justifies violence through theological concepts such as jihad and martyrdom. The romanticization of death and martyrdom in this content in Turkey can pave the way for the glorification of armed struggle against state institutions and trigger processes of individual radicalization.

Young people can easily encounter such propaganda online without any control. Given all this, it is inevitable to ask whether the YouTube algorithm can rapidly radicalise a young person who starts out with pure religious curiosity.

Experimental research method

For our research, we created personas of conservative young people who are interested in Islam but not violent. Using three different phones and clean YouTube accounts with no search history, we conducted daily religious content queries (e.g. ‘What is Islam?’, ‘What does Sharia mean?’, ‘What is martyrdom?’, ‘What is Jihad?’) in different locations over the course of a week. We watched the first videos that appeared and continued by clicking on the new videos suggested after each one. In this way, we observed and recorded the content recommended by the algorithm based on the user’s viewing history, day by day.

Initially, the videos watched contained more moderate religious discussions and basic religious information. However, the suggested content gradually became more severe in the following days. By the end of the week, the person’s viewing history had reached an extremely “extreme” point: “fighting against taghut’ “. At this stage, we changed our search strategy, searching for terms such as ‘fighting against taghut’. Based on the videos we watched, we then searched for terms consistent with them, such as ‘weapon making’, ‘bomb making’, ‘how to use’ and ‘how to fight against taghut’. Our goal was to test whether the algorithm would present violent content to a user with this profile. Using this methodology, we were able to demonstrate how a user with innocent curiosity can quickly become caught up in a cycle of radicalization.

The radicalization cycle in the suggested content

In the first few days, the suggested videos were balanced and moderate. They mostly consisted of sermons by renowned preachers, explanations of Islamic jurisprudence and interpretations of the Quran. However, by the second and third days, the algorithm had learned about the user’s preferences from the videos watched, and the recommendations became more extreme. By the end of the third day, the main page was dominated by content from preachers of the Salafi school of thought. These videos criticized the existing regime as ‘taghut’ and urged true believers to oppose it.

On the fourth and fifth days, the suggested videos became even more extreme. We came across videos of sermons by preachers who are known in Turkey for their Salafist leanings, and who have previously been arrested for radical propaganda. Videos of a preacher known for his violent views were also consistently suggested.

By the end of the week, the suggested videos were almost entirely focused on a single ideology. However, during the experiment, we never searched for terms such as ‘ISIS’ or ‘al-Qaeda’; we only followed the videos suggested by the algorithm. This demonstrates the power of the algorithm to create an echo chamber.

Based on our viewing history, YouTube assigned a Salafi identity to the persona and shaped its recommendations accordingly. Consequently, the user encountered increasingly extreme videos instead of traditional Islamic content. At each stage, the algorithm shifted the threshold of interest to a slightly more extreme point. Our observations showed that the ‘filter bubble’ effect observed on social media was also present on YouTube. As the user was surrounded by like-minded content, they began to normalise increasingly extreme views.

Left-tilted content experiment

Using a similar method, we experimented with creating a persona who was young, left-leaning, interested in justice and equality, and concerned with social issues, but not violent. Using a newly created account, we conducted general left-wing searches, such as ‘social justice’, ‘equal society’, ‘what is the left’ and ‘left-wing thought in Türkiye. The first videos to appear were educational content about social inequalities and labour rights, or mainstream left-wing discourse. After watching these videos, similar, balanced left-wing content also appeared on the YouTube homepage. Over the course of a week, we did not observe the extreme tendencies seen in right-wing personas in the left-wing persona. Videos from radical left-wing organizations such as DHKP-C or MLKP did not appear in the suggested content list. The suggested content remained focused on mainstream topics such as inequality, labour struggles and historical left-wing leaders.

These results show that the YouTube algorithm in Türkiye can promote some ideologies to a greater extent than others. While significant radicalization was observed in right-wing conservative content over a short period, a similar process did not occur in left-wing content. This difference may be due to radical left-wing content having less visibility on the platform, or it may stem from the algorithm’s interaction dynamics. Nevertheless, these findings suggest that the risk of radicalization, particularly along the religious-right axis, is higher in Türkiye.

F

ollowing Elon Musk’s acquisition of Twitter in late 2022 and its subsequent rebranding as “X,” expectations emerged that the platform would undergo fundamental changes in the way it delivers content. The algorithmic “For You” feed, which largely replaced the chronological timeline, became the default main feed presented to users. That algorithm was introduced with the stated aim of ranking posts that users might find engaging regardless of whom they follow. However, over time, intense debates arose, particularly regarding political content in Türkiye, over whether the algorithm operates in a neutral and genuinely personalized manner.

In 2023, several journalists and researchers, together with Daily Sabah, argued that X’s recommendation algorithm was manipulating the content flow in Türkiye. According to those claims, X disproportionately amplified opposition-leaning content regardless of users’ interests or political preferences, to the extent that even pro-government users were consistently exposed to opposition posts in their feeds. In response to those criticisms, Elon Musk acknowledged that the algorithm had shortcomings and pledged to open the code for the sake of transparency and to implement improvements.

So what has changed since then? Does X’s content recommendation algorithm in Türkiye genuinely operate with political bias? And how does this affect user experience and public discourse? To address these questions, I conducted a series of experiments toward the end of 2025. From the final days of November 2025 through early December 2025, I closely examined X’s “For You” feed using a total of eight accounts that were created from scratch on entirely new devices. Those accounts were configured with different locations and distinct political orientations. The findings obtained indicate that X’s recommendation algorithm exhibits serious problems with both technical and societal dimensions.

The “for you” feed: Personalized or a uniform digital enforcer?

In our experiments, the situation Ix encountered when logging into X with zero-profile accounts (no followers, likes or prior activity) offered a striking illustration of this issue. Despite the complete absence of user data, the algorithm immediately presented political content and accounts belonging to political actors. Approximately 90 percent of the initially recommended accounts to follow were users known for opposition-oriented views. Of the remaining 10 percent, roughly half consisted of official accounts such as the Presidency and ministries, while the other half included one or two pro-government accounts.

Unless users explicitly switched to the “Following” tab, without having expressed any interests, new accounts were directly exposed to popular tweets featuring government criticism and accounts widely recognized for their oppositional stance in Türkiye. This pattern suggests that the algorithm prioritizes currently trending and sensational political debates on the platform rather than attempting to assess user preferences through gradual interaction signals.

Within the scope of the experiment, four of the accounts I created followed only pro-government politicians, journalists, and affiliated accounts. The remaining four accounts followed exclusively figures and accounts aligned with the opposition. Despite this deliberate differentiation, all eight profiles were predominantly presented with content featuring the rhetoric of opposition politicians, government criticism, and posts from popular opposition-oriented accounts, as well as misleading or false news that framed the political authorities in a negative manner. Pro-government profiles were rarely exposed in their feeds to posts from the accounts they explicitly followed. In some cases, even when a journalist’s original tweet from an account that the user followed was not shown in the feed, the user was nonetheless exposed to an opposition-oriented post because that same journalist had replied to it, thereby amplifying the visibility of the oppositional content.

Conversely, the profiles designed with an opposition-oriented stance were exposed to a similar feed structure. While posts from the opposition accounts they followed were consistently displayed, those were frequently supplemented by content from additional opposition-aligned accounts that the users did not recognize or follow. Notably, those opposition-oriented profiles were almost never recommended pro-government content. As a result, in both scenarios, the algorithm effectively enclosed users within a bubble dominated by opposition discourse.

That situation points to two possible explanations. The first is that the algorithm attempts to introduce viewpoint diversity by presenting opposing content but fails to maintain a meaningful balance. The second is the presence of a structural bias embedded within the system’s underlying architecture. Although X engineers argue that the recommendation system operates not on the basis of political labels but according to interaction networks and aggregate engagement metrics, the higher levels of engagement typically generated by opposition content in Türkiye inadvertently transform the algorithm into a one-directional echo machine.

The misinterpretation of comment-based engagement: the algorithm’s affective blindness

X’s algorithm interprets all forms of user interaction including likes, reposts, comments, and even views; as signals of interest. However, it does not differentiate between positive and negative forms of engagement. Following changes implemented after 2023, the tendency to treat all types of interaction as inherently positive has become even more pronounced. During the experiments, it was observed that when a pro-government profile commented on an opposition tweet with a remark such as “This information is false,” the algorithm did not reduce the visibility of similar content; on the contrary, it increased it. Even the act of commenting alone led to a higher volume of recommendations related to the same topic. Likewise, merely clicking on a controversial post or viewing that briefly was sufficient to cause similar content to proliferate within the feed.

At the core of those outcomes lies X’s failure to analyze the semantic content of posts and the qualitative nature of user engagement. This form of affective blindness causes undesirable content to cascade onto users’ feeds. In particular, posts that provoke anger or political polarization tend to generate large volumes of comments and quote reposts. The system interprets thas pattern as “high engagement equals high relevance” and consequently rewards such content.

Misinformation and algorithmic amplification

Perhaps the most alarming aspect of X’s recommendation algorithm is its capacity to enable the rapid and large-scale dissemination of posts containing misinformation. The claim examined in 2025 that “Türkiye donated 7,000 police vehicles to Syria” constitutes a striking example. Although this post lacked any official basis, it received millions of views, while subsequent corrections circulated only minimally. Whereas the false content exceeded 7 million views, the corrective post reached only 211,000 views. Moreover, when accounts that continued to amplify the false claim through quote reposts are taken into account, the total number of views was estimated to surpass 10 million.

A similar pattern emerged in a post shared by a politician affiliated with the İYİ (Good) Party. The user presented footage from a Christian religious ceremony as if it had been recorded in Türkiye’s İznik district, accompanying the video with a provocative message asking, “Are we christianized?” In reality, the video was neither recent nor filmed in Türkiye. It was older footage recorded in Spain, a fact that was uncovered shortly thereafter. Nevertheless, many users reacted with anger and outrage, initially accepting the fabricated “scandal” as genuine and responding emotionally before the correction became widely known.

These examples demonstrate how algorithmic amplification can pose serious risks to the information ecosystem. In psychology, the phenomenon known as the “truth effect” refers to the tendency for false information to be perceived as true through repeated exposure. X’s recommendation algorithm appears to intensify precisely this mechanism by repeatedly presenting the same false narratives to users, effectively imprinting them onto their cognitive frameworks. Users with low levels of media literacy or those unable to critically assess information to which they are repeatedly exposed are particularly susceptible to such waves of misinformation. In this way, “vibes” initially shape emotions and subsequently translate into behavior as an outcome of identity formation.

A

ustralia on Wednesday became the first country in the world to ban social media access for children under 16, implementing a sweeping new law that compels major tech platforms to block young users or risk hefty penalties. The policy, which took effect at midnight, is poised to reshape online habits across the nation and influence global regulatory debates.

Under the legislation, ten of the world’s largest platforms — including TikTok, YouTube, Instagram, Facebook and Elon Musk’s X — must remove or deny access to underage users or face fines of up to A$49.5 million (US$33 million). X became the last major platform to confirm its compliance just hours before the deadline, stating it had “no choice” but to follow Australian law.

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese hailed the rollout as “a proud day for families”, describing the ban as one of the most transformative social policy reforms in decades. “This will make an enormous difference,” he said. “It’s a profound reform that will reverberate around the world.”

Teens say goodbye online

In the hours leading up to the ban, many of the approximately one million affected children posted farewell messages to their followers.

“No more social media… no more contact with the rest of the world,” wrote one teenager on TikTok, while others shared the tag #seeyouwhenim16.

Some young users have voiced concerns about losing essential support networks, particularly LGBTQ+ teens and those who rely on online communities to discuss mental health. “It’s going to be worse for queer people and people with niche interests,” said 14-year-old Annie Wang. “For some, it could actually worsen their mental health.”

Platforms will use a mix of age-inference algorithms, selfie-based age estimation, and optional ID or bank-linked verification. Officials say the list of regulated platforms will expand as new apps emerge and children move to different online spaces.

The law follows growing concerns about the impact of social media on young teens, including rising anxiety, cyberbullying, misinformation, and harmful body-image content. Countries such as Denmark, New Zealand, and Malaysia have already signalled interest in studying or emulating Australia’s approach.

Australia’s eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman Grant said she was hearing increasing demand for similar reforms in the United States. “Parents tell us they wish they had a government putting tween and teen safety before technology profits,” she said.

With global regulators watching closely, Australia’s experiment may shape the future of online child protection — and the limits of government intervention in digital life.

(Source: The Assosiated Press)

T

he fact that large language models harbour serious security vulnerabilities and can be easily fooled using clever methods necessitates a fundamental paradigm shift in our approach to these technologies. Currently, technology companies are racing to release and commercialize these models as quickly as possible, often treating ethical and security testing as mere formalities. However, the risks we face cannot be mitigated with a simple software update.

Presented as the new oracles of the modern world, large language models are permeating every aspect of daily life at an astonishing pace, and humanity is captivated by the allure of the bright future promised by this technology. These systems, which instantly answer our questions, generate complex texts, and even create works of art, are marketed as digital panaceas. However, on the flip side, a deep and systemic weakness lies at the heart of these dazzling capabilities. Artificial intelligence’s greatest strength, namely its ability to understand human language and carry out instructions to the letter, is also its most dangerous Achilles heel.

These models, though programmed like loyal servants, are fragile systems incapable of distinguishing between a well-intentioned instruction and malicious manipulation. They can easily be thrown off course by a cleverly crafted story or a devious prompt. This situation is far more than a simple software bug. The problem points to an illusion of control stemming not from a few lines of faulty code in these systems, but from their foundational architecture /core design.. As the weakness of the control mechanisms behind these technologies becomes apparent, the potential for difficult-to-reverse problems across a broad spectrum, from individual privacy to national security, also becomes clear.

Simple prompt threat

The most basic form of this new generation threat manifests itself through a method known as prompt injection. In the simplest form of this method, known as direct injection, a malicious user instructs the artificial intelligence to forget all previous prompts and obey new instructions given to it. Indeed, in 2023, a Stanford student succeeded in exposing the model’s secret internal guidelines, codenamed ‘Sydney,’ with a simple prompt such as ‘Ignore previous instructions’ directed at Microsoft’s Bing chatbot, proving how fundamental this vulnerability is. This incident demonstrated how vulnerable artificial intelligence is not to complex cyberattacks, but to simple and clear statements.

However, the threat does not end there. In the much more insidious and dangerous indirect injection method, malicious prompts are hidden within external data sources, such as a website, email, or PDF file, that are presented for the artificial intelligence to process. For example, an email containing the prompt ‘delete all my emails’ in invisible text, which the AI assistant unknowingly executes when asked to summarise the email, turns every piece of data the AI interacts with into a potential minefield.

This situation shifts the attack surface from a finite number of code vulnerabilities to the infinite potential for creativity and deception inherent in human language. While traditional cybersecurity paradigms make a clear distinction between code and data, this distinction disappears in large language models. In other words, every piece of data becomes a potential prompt, and every prompt becomes a potential threat.

Manipulation techniques not only distort specific tasks of artificial intelligence but also aim to eliminate its entire moral and ethical compass. These methods, known as jailbreaking, are designed to break the model’s security and ethical barriers. One of the most striking examples of this is the technique known as the ‘Grandma Exploit’ or ‘Dead Grandmother Trick’.. A user crafted an innocent and emotional story by telling the AI that his late grandmother was a chemical engineer at a napalm factory and that when he was little, she would lull him to sleep by singing him a lullaby about the steps involved in making napalm. Faced with this emotional manipulation, the AI, which would normally refuse to disclose dangerous information, bypassed its security protocols and provided the requested harmful information.

This example demonstrates how easily AI defence mechanisms can be manipulated and bypassed using human emotions and fictional narratives rather than logical arguments. The model can easily stray in the wrong direction when faced with a moral dilemma because it can only process the surface meaning and emotional tone of a prompt, not the intention behind it.

Perhaps the most worrying and fundamental attack on large language models is data poisoning carried out during the model’s training phase. Attackers deliberately inject false, biased, or malicious information into the massive datasets used to train artificial intelligence. One study showed that poisoning just 0.001% of a medical AI’s training data could cause the model to produce dangerous and incorrect medical diagnoses.

Detecting and correcting this type of manipulation, which has the potential to transform the system into a permanent disinformation tool by corrupting its fundamental information source, is nearly impossible. Once the model learns the poisoned data, it accepts this error as correct and repeats it in all future outputs.

I

n today’s age of ubiquitous social media influence, The Social Dilemma remains a chilling reminder of the strong impact of big social media companies on society. It paints a simultaneous picture of dystopia and utopia. The documentary adeptly highlights the addictive nature of social media and the profit-driven motives of giants like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, even at the expense of promoting questionable content. This raises significant ethical concerns, especially for vulnerable young users.

Through interviews with tech industry insiders, engineers, ethicists, and psychologists, the documentary exposes the algorithms and design choices responsible for turning social media into an addictive and polarizing force. These insiders provide firsthand accounts of how tech giants prioritize engagement and profit over user well-being and societal harmony.

The Social Dilemma raises vital ethical questions about tech companies’ power and responsibility. It underscores how the race for user attention and ad revenue has fueled the spread of misinformation, conspiracy theories, and divisive content on these platforms. Now, the burden falls on individuals, companies, and governments to chart a path forward.

Greatest Risk of Social Media: Imperceptible Change

There is an ironic transition from the information age to the disinformation age, even though we have greater access now to information than ever before, we still find it difficult to reach the truth. “Imperceptible change” is planted within us, obstructing our intellectual defense as to whether an information that we get is true or not.

In The Social Dilemma, “imperceptible change” refers to the gradual and often subtle ways in which social media platforms and their algorithms manipulate and influence user behavior without the users themselves being fully aware of it. This concept highlights how these platforms are designed to keep users engaged and addicted by making subtle, unnoticeable adjustments to what content is shown and when it’s shown to maximize user interaction and time spent on the platform.

For example, the algorithms might show you certain posts or ads at specific times when they predict you are most likely to engage with them, or they might prioritize content that aligns with your existing beliefs and interests. Over time, these imperceptible changes can have a significant impact on how users perceive the world, reinforcing their existing beliefs and preferences and keeping them hooked on the platform.

The documentary introduces the concept of “imperceptible change,” illustrating how social media subtly manipulates user behavior through algorithmic adjustments. These alterations, like showing content at specific times or prioritizing like-minded content, shape users’ perceptions over time. It serves as a warning about these platforms’ power and the need for users to be more aware of their online experiences.

Social media companies will soon have to go further 

For a really long time, the users’ only real weapon against the detrimental effects of social media was their willpower and media literacy. Basically, they were on their own.

In 2018, when Mark Zuckerberg testified in the congress over the Cambridge Analytica scandal, he stated, “It’s clear now that we didn’t do enough to prevent these tools from being used for harm. That goes for fake news, foreign interference in elections, and hate speech, as well as developers and data privacy.” Has anything changed since then?

Succumbing to pressure, platforms are beginning to pay attention to their users’ experience. Instagram, YouTube and TikTok have introduced various tools that alert users of their extended usage and even put parental controls. YouTube and Instagram remind teens to take breaks since 2021. Meanwhile, TikTok announced a passcode entry regulation for minors after an hour on the app.

The documentary’s interviews with experts and industry insiders emphasize the urgent need for more substantial regulation and responsible use of technology. The exploration of the addictive pull of social media, akin to the stimulating effects of slot machines on our brains, mirrors the concerns that various countries are now addressing.

China’s has taken measures to limit screen time for children under eight and Utah’s imposition of a digital curfew for minors are just two examples of this growing trend. France’s requirement for manufacturers to install parental control systems also underscores the global recognition that action is needed. In June, France passed a law that prohibits the promotion of certain practices – such as cosmetic surgery and smoking. The penalties for non-compliance can go up to two years in prison and a fine of €300,000.

However, the most recent and thorough move yet comes from the European Union. The EU is leading the charge with its Digital Services Act —overseen by the European Commission. The EU’s Digital Services Act, which became effective on August 25, imposes new rules on platforms, including assessments of societal impact and measures to prevent addictive behavior and targeting of vulnerable groups. The Act aims to make platforms more responsible and protect minors.

The new EU rules will allow researchers to access data inside company servers. The platforms will undergo a yearly assessment of the impact of their design, algorithms, advertising and terms of services on a range of societal issues. Then, according to the findings of the assessment, propose and implement measures inspected by the European Commission, researchers and an audit company.

The EU is actively teaming up with tech firms, industry groups, and organizations focused on children to figure out how to create platforms that better protect minors. They’re working towards a set of guidelines by 2024 called the Code of Conduct on Age-Appropriate Design. This code would lay out a list of steps that the European Commission wants big social media companies to take in line with the new laws.

However, as The Social Dilemma suggests, there is no one-size-fits-all solution to the complex problems posed by social media. A nuanced approach is crucial, focusing on specific people, platforms, and features that are most risky. Additionally, the call for more data and a precautionary principle when it comes to minors is both reasonable and responsible.

Only time will reveal the effectiveness of these measures and potential loopholes, but the Act open a chapter of thorough examination of social media companies’ practices.

Reviewed by Batuhan Aça, Şeymanur Melayim, Muhammet Ali Oruç, Shahd Qaid, and Ezgi Yaramanoğlu.

Written by Dilara Özer

L

ove him or loathe him, there’s no denying that Donald Trump brought a whole new level of spectacle to the world of international relations through his unique approach. In the age of social media, Trump wielded his Twitter account like a magician’s wand, conjuring up tweets that sent shockwaves through the global stage. From the moment he stepped into the political arena, he turned traditional diplomacy on its head, replacing dignified speeches with 280-character proclamations.

It was a rollercoaster ride of mixed messaging, unexpected U-turns, and moments that left even the most seasoned diplomats scratching their heads. One moment he’d be locking horns with world leaders, engaging in diplomatic smackdowns with the best of them. The next, he’d be cozying up to erstwhile adversaries like long-lost buddies.

In his book, Donald Trump’s Digital Diplomacy and Its Impact on US Foreign Policy Towards the Middle East, Ahmed Y. Zohny skillfully delves into the intricate relationship between history, political science, and the digital age. With a meticulous blend of content analysis and critical discourse analysis, Zohny examines the profound implications of Trump’s statements and tweets, that explain the often puzzling nature of his foreign policy decisions. At the same time, Zohny’s analysis unveils the intricacies of this unique form of diplomacy, shedding light on its influence on global politics.

While the American public remained primarily engrossed in the domestic implications of Trump’s presidency, people around the world were deeply curious about how his foreign policy choices would reshape the geopolitical landscape. What emerged from Zohny’s research was a deeper understanding of Trump’s communication style, marked by mixed messaging and impulsive decision-making.

One of the most significant areas of focus in the book is the United States’ withdrawal from the Iran Accord. Zohny compellingly argues that this decision not only guaranteed the collapse of the agreement but also added to the volatility in the already turbulent Middle East. Through detailed analysis, he highlights how this move significantly impacted regional dynamics and strained diplomatic relations.

T

hroughout history, misinformation was a powerful weapon in the hands of people who fought to maximize their interests. Atrocity fabrication—the invention and reporting of atrocities committed by an adversary without knowledge that they ever occurred—has a centuries-long history at the heart of propaganda and power politics as an effective means of moving public and international opinion.

Now more than ever, the role and scope of misinformation has been able to expand and become an entrenched practice, almost a default extension to any given conflict. Understanding atrocity fabrication and its effects has become crucial to understanding contemporary geopolitics.

Geopolitics expert A.B. Abrams compiles the most significant cases of atrocity fabrication in eleven major conflicts shaping the world order from the Cold War to the present. These include Vietnam and Cuba, the Korean War, Tiananmen Square, the Yugoslav wars, the Gulf War, Iraq, Libya, Syria, and the emerging U.S.-China rivalry. The information sphere currently dominated by Western powers has roots tracing back to early colonial days, which the author initially touches upon to pinpoint a starting point for the evolution of its current-day form.

Atrocity Fabrication and Its Consequences: How Fake News Shapes World Order demonstrates atrocity fabrication in its many forms and varieties, the keys to its success, with the roles played by media and both government and non-governmental organizations in misleading the public, often engrained into larger self-reinforcing metanarratives that form a backdrop to new bits of information.

Abrams highlights how atrocity fabrication is used, and the consequences it has for the populations of the targeted countries, often paving the way for real atrocities such as military interventions committed against them on even larger scales of depravity than those described in the fabricated narratives. Furthermore, atrocity fabrication enforces an interventionist “World Order 2.0” by furthering Western geopolitical interests, an order of conditional sovereignty held by Western opinion of affairs elsewhere in the world, which, conceptually and in practice, has disastrous consequences.

Case by case, Abrams shows how its use can provide pretext for a range of hostile measures against its targets by triggering public moral outrage, transforming wars of unprovoked aggression into those of liberation, turning blockades to starve enemy civilians into humane efforts to pressure abusive governments under the moralistic label of sanctions, and delegitimizing and silencing criticism of one’s actions under accusations of siding with injustice.

Not only is understanding atrocity fabrication important to debunk misinformation about a set of events, but it is also reading how challengers of Western power will continue to be assailed. Atrocity Fabrication and Its Consequences provides an important selection of atrocity fabrication history which is crucial to understanding this mode of action on a broader context of international affairs. The book is a revealing account of how perception is reality by providing history, context, and analysis for a trend that is here to stay.

A.B. Abrams, Atrocity Fabrication and Its Consequences: How Fake News Shapes World Order (Clarity Press, 2023) ISBN: 978-1-949762-70-9, 424 pages

E

lon Musk, the world’s wealthiest person until recently, has become one of the most controversial figures in the U.S. media especially after he acquired Twitter in October 2022. With the $44 billion buyout of the mega social media company, Musk has opened a new political front in an already divided country. His very first decisions, including reinstating former U.S. President Trump’s Twitter account, have made conservatives very happy while liberals have unleashed their anger against him.

As the tension is getting higher, Musk has begun to uncover some buried files related to Hunter Biden, U.S. President Joe Biden’s son, and his alleged business relations with China. Musk’s decision to float the relations between the ex-Twitter management and the Biden administration by releasing Hunter Biden’s story has shaken the social media platform. Under the Twitter Files tag, Twitter released ten different files to the public so far, and the fight between liberals and conservatives has just got more intense.

Musk’s Twitter takeover

Elon Musk completed his $44 billion buyout of Twitter on October 28, and immediately started to reshape the company. He fired some high-level managers and executives on the very first day, and told the human resources department to prepare for a widespread layoff. After paying $44 billion, Musk aimed to take the company to a profitable financial level by reshaping it.

As the CEO of Tesla and SpaceX, many people expected Musk to do a great job at Twitter too, even if his $44 billion buyout was thought to be risky. In trying to make Twitter thoroughly profitable, Musk has a challenging financial mission ahead of him – “Mission Impossible” for some market analysts.

From the beginning, Musk aimed to change Twitter’s policies from a far-left approach to a more balanced one. Musk’s “recalibration” approach is a kind of balance between the liberal and conservative wings, Democrats and Republicans, LGBTQ communities and anti-gay groups, abortion rights activists and pro-life advocates, etc. Mainstream American media has labeled him a pro-conservative antihero, yet Musk has described himself as a champion of free speech even if it needs a positive discrimination in favor of some groups.

Musk’s Twitter reinstated Trump’s banned account and did the same for hundreds of leading conservative figures whose accounts were suspended after the January 6 United States Capitol attack.  It’s still a matter of debate whether Musk is an antihero for liberal values or a champion for free speech.

Twitter Files bombshell

Elon Musk made a promise before he acquired the company: he would release buried internal Twitter files to the public in line with his transparency policy. Musk fulfilled his promise and released ten Twitter files, including internal messages, emails, and screenshots of journalists such as Matt Taibbi, Bari Weiss, Lee Fang, and Michael Shellenberger.

The first part, “Twitter Files-1” was released on December 2, and the last part, “Twitter Files-8.” was released on December 20, 2022. Starting with “Twitter Files-1,” which was about how Twitter handled Hunter Biden’s laptop controversy in October 2020, every file has shaken social media platforms and the media.

The first file was about how Twitter internally suppressed the Hunter Biden story through the platform in coordination with the FBI. As the U.S. presidential elections were approaching, the Hunter Biden story had the capacity to hurt Joe Biden’s election campaign. At the time, Twitter, alongside the whole mainstream media, chose to suppress the allegations by advocating that the material source was a hacked laptop so it shouldn’t be used.

Meanwhile, half the country believed that they had the right to be informed about the Hunter Biden allegations. Musk stated that he believes the same thing and released the details of how Twitter suppressed the story. After the first reveal, American media immediately blamed Musk with stoking the fire in an already divided America. Musk responded to liberal media by saying that it would be hypocritical on his part not to reveal the files exposing the corruption of the then Twitter management.

The second and the third files were about how Trump and certain conservative figures were shadow banned from Twitter starting in 2018. The following file concerned Twitter’s decisions in the days surrounding the January 6 Capitol attack, including Trump’s indefinite ban from the platform. The files have clearly shown that the company managers were leaning towards far-left political tendencies. The uncovering of such internal deliberations in Twitter, offered conservatives the proof that the company was shadow banning Trump and his supporters, and acting against conservatives.

The next two files were about the influence of the FBI over the company especially regarding sensitive political and/or national security issues. According to the files, the FBI helped shape the company narratives related to both the Hunter Biden story and the U.S. military campaign in Syria. In October 2020, the FBI reportedly guided Twitter on how to suppress the Hunter Biden story.

More interestingly, but not surprisingly, the FBI files have also revealed that Twitter has easily (even voluntarily) agreed with the FBI to allow some U.S.-backed fake accounts to promote American foreign policy and military interests. The FBI-Twitter “brotherhood” promoted widespread publications in the media and drew a backlash from different groups. According to the released files, the FBI set up a team of 80 agents to monitor suspicious accounts while Twitter made sure to help them as much as possible. If Musk hadn’t decided to make these files public, we wouldn’t know about the close FBI-Twitter cooperation.

As our lives migrate further online and the public sphere becomes increasingly digitized, cybersecurity and issues with internet governance come more often to the fore.

Acting as a double-edged sword, the internet proved its power repeatedly with social movements such as the Arab Spring or on the eve of elections in any given country.

Governments, which have provided or facilitated access to the internet with no or minimal interference, are beginning to consider the implications of open internet due to its impact on public, national, and economic matters.

Trolls, cybersecurity threats, censorship, and echo chambers all threaten our personal use and state of democracy. Yet, there is another layer where the internet reveals itself as an effective tool: power politics.

In 2021, the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation (ITIF) published a report advising the United States to adopt a new strategy grounded in digital realpolitik with a more pragmatic focus on protecting and advancing key U.S. interests – and the government seems to be listening.

With the shifting global balance and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the United States’ digital doctrine appears to be evolving from being a pioneer in pushing internet openness to tracking constraining digital adversaries, such as Russia and China, and projecting U.S. leadership.

COVID and e-commerce volume

Associate Professor Ali Burak Darıcılı of Bursa Technical University told Politics Today that by adding internet economy to the mix, the COVID-19 pandemic significantly increased e-commerce volume, and that now there is a lot to lose from the fragmentation of the internet.

Countries like Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea challenge the status quo for a variety of reasons and with a variety of tools. The most radical scenario would be setting up national cyberspaces, and thus fragmenting the internet.

However, to avoid losing e-commerce value and curb any other detrimental consequence, the challenging nations call for the multilateral governance of the internet while fighting for a piece of the digital hegemony pie.

Rather than cooperating with Russia and China following their calls for a deal, the U.S. chooses to keep the status quo and to move forward with its own initiative with like-minded partners.

The transatlantic united against Russian cyberattacks

In case of further heated conflicts, Russia’s “hybrid warfare” approach, which utilized confusion and destabilization alongside cyberattacks, needs to be tackled. The invasion of Ukraine has allowed the U.S. to experiment and assert its digital advantages without abandoning its principle of internet openness.

The U.S. was able to harness and revitalize its transatlantic relations with its allies to protect itself against Russian cyberattacks and to engage in information war, launching offensives of its own and countering online repression with the Freedom Online Coalition and the Open Technology Fund.

A U.S.-EU Trade and Technology Council meeting in May this year emphasized the role governments have in protecting the digital information space in a crisis, implying a collaborative counteroffensive against Russia’s propaganda efforts and setting a framework for future conflicts.

Meanwhile, U.S. sanctions and intelligence deployment cut off Russia’s military from sensitive U.S. technology exports, and Russia itself from the internet economy, without cutting off its citizens’ access.

Amid the escalating war between Russia and Ukraine, a major brawl is taking shape over the control of content on social media. On March 4, 2022, Moscow blocked access to social media platforms such as Facebook and Twitter within its federation. This step was taken in response to what it said were actions of Meta and Twitter to restrict the access of Russian state-owned/affiliated media outlets such as the Zvezda television channel, RIA Novosti news agency, Sputnik, RT (formerly Russia Today), Lenta.ru, and Gazeta.ru.

While initiating the blockade, Roskomnadzor the Russian federal executive agency that acts as the state’s communication watchdog cited “26 [alleged] discrimination cases toward Russian media” by Facebook. It was further stated that platforms like Facebook had been blocked to “prevent violations of the key principles of the free flow of information.”

In addition, the Russian Duma also introduced a “fake news” law imposing imprisonment of up to 15 years for spreading fake news that could lead to severe consequences. As this law came into force, social media platforms such as TikTok suspended options for new video uploads and live streaming services.

In a similar vein, numerous international media outlets such as the BBC, CNN International, ABC News, CBS News, Bloomberg, etc., stopped airing in Russia. The companies stated they are worried about the safety of their employees. Other blocked platforms in Russia include the U.S. government-funded Voice of America, German broadcaster Deutsche Welle, and Latvia-based website Meduza. As the information crackdown intensifies in Russia, concerns are raised about the ongoing censorship, aptly labelled by Bloomberg columnist Parmy Olsen as “Putin’s Iron Firewall.”

Social Media Giants and Russia in the Past

Prior to the complete blockade of Facebook, Russia had limited its access while accusing social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook of censoring Russian media content of censoring Russian media content. Nick Clegg, vice-president of global affairs and communication at Meta, stated that “Russian authorities ordered us to stop the independent fact-checking and labelling of content posted on Facebook by four Russian state-owned media organizations. We refused.” The refusal to stop fact-checking Russian news, irked the Russian authorities.

It is interesting to note that before Moscow’s ban on social media platforms, Meta itself had proposed to pull Facebook out of Russia. The rationale behind it was to punish Moscow for its actions against Ukraine. However, it was later realized that this move would only limit the ability of Russian people to access information that isn’t affiliated with Russian state-backed media.

With the exception of Western platforms blocked by Moscow, many technology companies have suspended their operations and services in Russia as a sign of support to Ukraine. These companies include, among others, Apple, Dell, Google, Netflix, and Ikea. Snapchat has announced that it will “not accept revenue from Russian state-owned entities.”

How Social Media Companies Joined the War in Ukraine

As Russia blocked access to social media platforms, the usage of virtual private networks (VPNs) in Russia escalated immediately. However, numerous attempts have been made by Moscow over the last couple of years to ban virtual private networks. Last year, Russia blocked close to six virtual private networks, NordVPN and ExpressVPN being among the most notable ones.

As the war in Ukraine continues, some Russians have managed to use VPNs as they look for ways to access sites that are currently blocked in their country.

Data from Top10VPN shows that on March 9, the demand for a VPN in Russia saw an increase of 956% compared to the day before the invasion. Additionally, social media platforms responded to the Russian government’s decision to block access to social media.

Meta released a statement regarding Facebook mentioning that “we will continue to do everything we can to restore our services so that they remain available to people to safely and securely express themselves and organize for action.”

Meta has also made an unusual change in their hate speech policy. According to a recent email received by Reuters, Facebook and Instagram users in some countries will be allowed to call for violence against Russia and Russian soldiers in the context of the Ukraine invasion. The policy change will apply to countries such as Armenia, Azerbaijan, Estonia, Georgia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Russia, Slovakia, and Ukraine.

A Meta spokesperson further stated that “as a result of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, we have temporarily made allowances for forms of political expression that would normally violate our rules like violent speech such as ‘death to the Russian invaders’. We still won’t allow credible calls for violence against Russian civilians.” In response, the Russian embassy in the U.S. demanded Meta stop what is regarded as “extremist activities.”

Twitter has also launched a new service called Onion, allowing users to access Twitter by downloading it on Tor Browser. This service will help the Russian people surpass the surveillance and censorship imposed by Moscow. Similarly, media outlets like the BBC are recommending people access its Ukraine page by using Tor Browser. The BBC is providing safe downloading links to people who are unable to access App stores.

Tor Browser and VPN usage can help users remain anonymous while accessing sites that are currently part of what is regarded as the dark web.

The war between Russia and Ukraine has certainly increased the phenomenon of internet fragmentation. The introduction of temporary changes in Meta’s hate speech policy raised numerous ethical and policy implications. As the military conflict intensifies between Russia and Ukraine, the pressure grows on social media platforms to deal in conformity with their government’s national interests while mitigating the financial damages.

Social media came with a lot of promise. Initially, there was a hope that we may be able to reclaim the public space that traditional, collectivist society had to cede to an increasingly individualist, modern one. But the digital bridges that social media platforms built, made each one of us even more distant, leaving us permanently settling on secluded islands.

In some ways, we parted from ourselves in the process. Today, we write odes to nature, we tweet eulogies to photographers, we sing praises to artists, but hardly ever take the time to live through the delightful experiences delineated in these depictions. The gracious warmth of the sun, the hesitant whispers of the caressing winds, the shy glimmer of the defiant moonlight, almost each and every expression of nature has lost its meaning in “our reality,” eclipsed by the virtual.

The rare instances where we do get a chance to be at one with nature are again taken over by an excruciating impatience to share our experience with our “network.” The obsession with taking the right shot of the ethereal glide of a seagull has taken precedence over absorbing the breathtaking beauty of its carefree flight, clipping our own wings.

Nature has become a mere instrument for our own celebration – a thinly-veiled narcissism. We have lost the ability to be where we presently are. We stay in a state of projection, obsessed with illusive ideations of the “shareability” of a sight, at the cost of appreciation of its subtleties in the present.

Unfortunately, the profound appreciation we crave for, artificial intelligence cannot deliver at its finest mirage. Perversely, more or less, every share on social media brings some form of anxiety. Sometimes it’s from eagerness for more shares. Sometimes it’s a concern about possible reactions. Sometimes it springs from envy, when a friend’s post steals the limelight. It’s like being in the spotlight 24/7.

Perversely, more or less, every share on social media brings some form of anxiety.

As almost all teenagers with access to a smart device use social media, this becomes all the more concerning. According to research, 3 in 4 persons who develop a psychological issue are diagnosed before their 18th birthday.

On the other side of the coin of this bizarre flaunting epidemic lies obnoxious abuse, which social media tends to reward. Anyone is free to say anything, as thoughtless as it might be, about one’s religion, ethnicity, or even appearance, irrespective of the veracity of the contention. The algorithms are sometimes designed to even pick “dislikes” or “angry” reactions as a form of engagement, amplifying the reach of fake, polarizing content.

On the other side of the coin of this bizarre flaunting epidemic lies obnoxious abuse, which social media tends to reward.

A particular form of abuse, “trolling,” is a deliberate attack on a person for maximum “likes” from a specific cluster of users. Much to one’s dismay, a troll could be a 14-year-old anonymous user or a 64-year-old “thinker” who enjoys maintaining a provocative persona. With a bizarre air of righteousness, they could troll someone to prove the superiority of their favorite cartoon character or to establish the inferiority of an ideology that half the world adheres to.

Disrespect, in this appalling virtual world, is a brand; words are a weapon; images are mere toys; and the ability to enrage others is a prized virtue. No wonder, trolling behavior has been found to be correlated with psychopathic tendencies, sadism, and Machiavellianism.

Predictably, instead of constructive engagement and building bridges,  social media have effectively divided people into clusters and subcultures. A person reveling in being celebrated online and drawing consolation from being connected to people around the world is sometimes just networking with the worst of the animal spirits within. They are sinking deeper and deeper into their own cluster, with the outside, diverse world, starting to feel more alien. This becomes a lifestyle eventually and has lifelong effects on a person’s ability to respect differences of opinion and build empathetic relationships.

Social media have contributed to developing an “information superstructure” which is more powerful than the political and judicial institutions of control.

Of course, social media has a potential for good too. It has sometimes shown promise against entrenched power structures in the world. In fact, it has risen as a significant challenge against oppressive states and obscene occupations the world over, sometimes catching them completely off guard.

Nevertheless, social media have contributed to developing an “information superstructure” which is more powerful than the political and judicial institutions of control – noble in name and carriage, but motivated by little other than profits at the base.

At the micro-level, it’s a quagmire, painstakingly developed by “attention engineers” to monetize the adrenaline of unsuspecting users and capitalize on the digital addiction it creates. That benign-sounding “suggested” content may change the course of one’s life, bit by bit, forever – a theme brilliantly covered in the award-winning documentary “The Social Dilemma” featuring a hair-raising, insider account of the nuts and bolts of the Big Tech.

It would take a miracle to go back from how far we have come. But social media companies – motivated by a model aptly described as “surveillance capitalism” by the Harvard professor Shoshana Zuboff – shouldn’t be given a blank check in programming behaviors and reshaping the globe. The world must come together to devise apolitical mechanisms to keep these tech giants in check, focusing foremost on psychological health and well-being at large. On the individual level, relatively active consumption of content, more perceptive interactions, and avoiding being sucked down the rabbit hole of arguing with the ultracrepidarian could be helpful.

In the final analysis, however, it may be said that whether or not we realize it, in this taxing world, every one of us is longing for a break: a deep silence in placid woods somewhere by a river, a moment of heartfelt love and overwhelming appreciation, either from us, or for us – things that social media, at best, can give us only a weak nostalgia for. If Wordsworth were here, he’d perhaps have rather written, “The digital world is too much with us.”

Russia’s “foreign agent” law has provoked a serious debate in the country and abroad – and for good reason. As it is amended on a regular basis, there are new interpretations of the “foreign agent” definition and new categories of legal entities and persons that could become potential targets of the legislation from mass media outlets to ordinary Russian citizens.

A recent update of the “foreign agents” list published by the Russian Ministry of Justice on October 8, 2021, has added twelve more legal entities and citizens bringing the total number of personae non gratae to 85. But are things on the ground as bad as they are on paper? As a former journalist of Russian state-controlled media, Russia Today, and a current independent political and economic observer, I’ve looked at both sides of the coin and tried to provide an objective overview of this controversial law.

“They started it”

It all started in 2017 when the U.S. branch of RT (former Russia Today) media outlet was forced to register as a foreign agent under FARA law. RT’s editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan said this decision was the only choice to keep RT operating. “Our lawyers say that if we don’t register as a foreign agent, the director of our company in America could be arrested, and the accounts of the company could be seized. In short, in this situation the company would not be able to work. Between those consequences and registering as a foreign agent, we are forced to choose registration,” she said.

Shortly after the U.S. requirement, Russian President Vladimir Putin asked the State Duma to prepare a “mirror response.” The result was the law which was supposed to enable the Russian Ministry of Justice to force some (at first only) foreign media outlets to enter the register and mark their materials with a specific note. The adopted bill had nothing to do with Russian media outlets at all and was a response to the U.S. pressure on RT.

Common sense and absurdity

However, one year after another, the bill was amended. While its main target – the foreign media outlets – had to register as legal entities in Russia to be able to report to the Russian Ministry of Justice, the law now also applies to individual journalists and bloggers who receive funding from “foreign agent” organizations or third parties affiliated with them.

The amendments raised a serious debate across media circles while international organizations like Amnesty International and the OSCE claimed the law was a violation of fundamental human rights. The latest version of the law also applies to Russian media outlets and journalists that are suspected of receiving funds from “foreign agents” or parties affiliated with them — a move that has provoked outrage among Russian media outlets, mainly among those supporting the opposition.

In Russia’s “mirror version” law, there are specific definitions of who exactly and under which circumstances can be placed under the “foreign agent” label, while there is a very specific description of the “foreign agent’s political activity.”

Yet, the Russian “foreign agent” law is also far from being perfect and requires revisions. Being amended in order to control the activity of foreign media outlets based in Russia and to suppress any foreign interventions in the national political elections system, its targets could be ordinary citizens who intentionally or unintentionally post provocative content on social media or support “foreign agent” organizations or people, or take part in activities where “foreign agents” are noticed.

Media at risk

The biggest concern of the Russian “foreign agent” law is, of course, expressed by journalists and media outlets. Once labeled a “foreign agent,” the company is limited in its commercial and advertisement activities, which are often the main source of income for most media outlets in Russia.

According to Dmitriy Migalin, a former political journalist of the Russian federal media outlet which is likely to get the “foreign agent” status, the game rules are not transparent.

“Everyone is aware that any media platform could get this unwanted status. On the one hand, it is banding together all journalists and media community like never before, even competitors: today it is them, tomorrow it will be us, we are all on the same boat after all. But on the other hand, the reaction of key investors of a media outlet is highly unpredictable nowadays. Everyone is afraid of shams and unexpected foreign cash inflows to an outlet’s account. As ironic as it may seem, all responsibility is on accounting departments: one ‘accidental’ thousand-dollar inflow not returned in time may get an entity a ‘foreign agent’ status,” adds Migalin.

Digital media is a double-edged sword and many governments around the world now fear that social media may jeopardize their national security. The quick spread of misinformation in social media poses a grave challenge. Disinformation and manipulation operations are rapidly taking over the world and Turkey is no exception.

Let’s go back to early August 2021, last month, when Turkey was fighting wildfires that spread along its Mediterranean coastline. The hashtag #HelpTurkey started trending on Twitter, reaching 2.7 million tweets calling for international help to fight the fires. Although there were real users who used the hashtag with good intentions, the timing, density, and contents raised doubt and questions. Marc Owen Jones, an expert on the subject, considered these hashtags as part of an “influence operation” to pressure the Turkish government by putting it in a difficult situation before the public and the international arena.

Turkish government’s response

The Turkish government believes that the #HelpTurkey campaign was staged abroad  and the ideological motivation behind it was to present Turkey as helpless and incapable President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan condemned the accounts spreading the hashtag. In the same vein, Fahrettin Altun, the Turkish Presidency’s communications director, argued that the campaign’s purpose was not to create a global solidarity behind Turkey but to make the country look incompetent – all this despite the fact that the Turkish government had accepted foreign aid to control the forest fires.

In response to the fake campaigns, the Ankara Public Prosecutor’s Office accused certain groups of seeking to cause fear and panic among the public through fake accounts on Twitter. The government is making plans to take action against those responsible for spreading fake news with a further intention to regulate social media at large. In July 2021, Erdoğan stated that the Turkish government is working on a new law regarding disinformation on social media.

Fake accounts and bots

Marc Owen Jones, an assistant professor at Qatar’s Hamad Bin Khalifa University and an expert on disinformation and social media, explained that the #HelpTurkey hashtag was manipulated by fake accounts. While the #HelpTurkey and #globalcall hashtags have been spread by real people and celebrities, Jones claims that the source of these hashtags was fake accounts and bots. In other words, they were part of a manipulation campaign.

Jones suggested a possible influence operation, even though many people with good intentions also participated in it. Influence campaigns take the form of dissemination of propaganda in pursuit of a competitive advantage over an opponent. For Jones, the messaging and multiple infographics also suggested some form of a campaign.

Natalia Grincheva, an honorary research fellow in the Research Unit in Public Cultures (RUPC) at the University of Melbourne and a scholar of digital humanities, has concentrated on developing new data methods for researching museums as core players in the creative economy and as soft power actors. Her book Museum Diplomacy in the Digital Age, published by Routledge in 2020, considers online museums mainly as places of modern cultural diplomacy and explores how museums can shape and manipulate their audiences. Furthermore, the book discusses museums’ strategic forces through their online environments to create national identities and project messages across boundaries.

The book’s main question is about the digital aspect of the contemporary museum from the viewpoint of its diplomatic effects. To answer this question, the author conceptualizes the notion of “digital museum diplomacy.” Grincheva shows that this responsibility is realized by the museums’ cultural diplomacy that occurs informally by non-state actors online.

To conceptualize this trend the author has interviewed several specialists. She has tried to understand the agency of museums in cultural diplomacy and the dialogical essence of online media now used by museums. To do so, she introduces three online practices started by Western museums during the past decade by examining the Australian Museum, Sydney (Chapter 3); the British Museum, London (Chapter 4); and the Guggenheim Museum, New York (Chapter 5).

These online museum spaces have provided a unique chance to build a cooperative communication system with the visitors. For her, these new technologies incorporated by museums can present a series of opportunities and some sources of revenue needed to extend their abilities and assets.

According to Museum Diplomacy in the Digital Age, contemporary museums can reach unprecedented global power possibilities in expanding museum collections, narratives, and programs. Drawing on many examples in online museum spaces, the book introduces some techniques for “digital museum diplomacy.” Through this diplomacy, online museums can develop values and transfer cultural and political messages to guarantee their nations’ interests.

Natalia Grincheva, Museum Diplomacy in the Digital Age (Routledge, 2020) ISBN 9780815369998, 164 Pages, 22 B/W Illustrations

Death to 2020, which is described as a “mockumentary,” is a critical interpretation of the most important political and social events of 2020 from the perspective of the show’s producers. It is a show, because although the events taking place in it are real events that we all experienced in 2020, the interpretation of these events is fictionalized in a way to make the whole thing a satirical and funny TV show.

In a nutshell, Death to 2020 is a cleverly written, well-executed, and well-produced TV show that reminds us of old-school satirical TV shows that mocked their own times

The plot of the show is as follows: the main political and social events of 2020 are chronologically retold and summarized for the audience while the fictional characters of the show, who are kind of “confused” in their own ways, start commenting on the events as if they were part of an absurd reality show.

The mockumentary takes the U.S. presidential election of 2020 as the most salient event in the regular schedule of a globalized world. The U.S. election is the most commented event in the show along with the outbreak of the COVID19 pandemic. According to the show – and it is hard to disagree – the election was between two candidates who were too old and unqualified to be the president of the world’s last declining hegemon, and created an impossible dilemma for the voters.

The campaign process of the U.S. elections shows two different Americas according to the show. However, polarization and increasing anger between the two sides are not something unique to American society. The whole world is being divided into factions and polarized, while ordinary people are becoming increasingly radicalized. This polarization is exacerbated by social media companies, which sell their users’ private information for a profit. It is, in fact, hard to disagree with these arguments.

Covid-19, which was a shock to everyone in 2020, is dealt with in depth in Death to 2020. In general, the Western world and particularly two leaders – Donald Trump in the U.S. and Boris Johnson in the U.K. – are criticized in the mockumentary. It is true that the timing of the pandemic could not have been worse: both national countries and international institutions were going through a process of dramatic change.

Technology is speeding up everything, polarization and xenophobia have hit a peak, economic recession and trade wars threaten regular people all around the globe, authoritarian tendencies are on the rise even in democratic states, climate change has become ever more serious, and many more problems of the so-called modern age have come together – all this, when the virus hit the world.

As a result, the timing and the scale of the pandemic gained great popularity in conspiracy circles. Although, this is mocked in the show, when one wonders about the origin of the virus and conspiracy theories around it, it is not that surprising that there are suspicions about its origins and timing.

Other issues are mentioned as well such as the massive Beirut port explosion, the Harvey Weinstein legal case which sparked the #MeToo movement, Brexit, Megxit (the break of Prince Harry and his American wife Meghan Markle from the British royal family), the growing popularity of social media and particularly YouTube and Netflix, and the role of WhatsApp groups and other social media platforms like Instagram and TikTok in spreading false information, creating paranoia, and consolidating the age of the post-truth.

When one looks at all these headlines and many other shocking events around the world that are not featured in the show, it is not hard to see what a crazy and perplexing environment we live in. The only conclusion one can reach is that we are all stuck in a powerful whirlpool that resembles a black hole.

Loaded with gallows humor, Death to 2020 is an appropriate retrospective of the year. Reality has become so surreal and absurd that there is nothing left but to mock it all. In the end, Death to 2020 is worth watching in order to come face to face with our new reality.

Most young Palestinians were born after the signing between the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) and Israel of the Oslo Accords in the White House in 1993. The agreement was based on the two-state solution paradigm and promised Palestinians peace and a sovereign state; however, the agreement has never materialized. Palestinian intellectuals such as Edward Said, Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, and Walid Khalidi, foresaw that the Oslo Accords were a trap for the PLO, with Said calling it a “second Nakba.”

Long ago young Palestinians lost any hope in the so-called peace process, which served only to marginalize the PLO’s role by creating a Palestinian Authority (PA) that has a limited sovereignty and power, and that would serve as a barrier between them and the Israeli occupation. The Oslo Accords have turned the West Bank and the Gaza Strip from occupied territories to disputed territories. Israel has not stopped building new settlements in the Palestinian territories and the land of the future Palestinian state has shrunk over time, while the number of Israeli settlers in the West Bank has jumped to over half a million.

Young Palestinians have grown up under this reality of Israeli military occupation. Many are stopped at checkpoints, not allowed to travel, detained and tortured, and displaced to make space for new Israeli settlers. They have completely lost hope in the peace process that was meant to lead to the creation of their own state on 22% of British Mandate Palestine.

Palestinians in Israel are treated as second-class citizens and Israel’s systematic targeting of their presence continues unabated. Palestinians in the West Bank feel that their lands are shrinking and fear for their lives as they are increasingly attacked by Israeli settlers under the protection of Israeli forces.

Moreover, Palestinians in Jerusalem feel strangers in their own city, with Israeli plans underway to displace them in the neighborhoods of Silwan, Sheikh Jarrah, and Batin Al-Hawa. If they are “lucky,” as dozens of instances show, they choose to destroy their houses to avoid paying the high costs imposed by the Israeli municipality to cover the costs of demolition.

Palestinians feel completely lost in this equation, and are losing hope of being able to choose their own leadership and make it more representative of their will.

Today, the PLO, which is meant to represent all Palestinians, rarely has any presence except for some meetings every now and then. The PA, born out of the PLO and which, according to the Oslo Accords, was meant to represent Palestinians in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip in preparation for statehood, has replaced the PLO and currently is the most visible Palestinian entity internationally.

Palestinians feel completely lost in this equation, and are losing hope of being able to choose their own leadership and make it more representative of their will. Many Palestinians today feel that the PA falls short of adopting a discourse that reflects their visions under Israeli military occupation and apartheid.

Mass protests broke out across the West Bank in anger over the murder of Banat. Palestinians, who suffer from Israel’s occupation and fight for their freedom in every possible way, condemned his killing. They took to the streets of Bethlehem, Ramallah, and Hebron calling for accountability. The young Palestinians who took to the streets feel that today the PA is becoming more like an obstacle that separates them from the Israeli occupation.

They believe that there is no need for any Palestinian government that lacks any sovereignty under occupation, and that the situation is no different than handing over the keys to the PA institutions to Israel, the actual sovereign and occupying power. These young Palestinians believe that where there is an occupation, the plan should be liberation rather than statehood.

In the Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, and Batni Al-Hawa neighborhoods of Jerusalem, Palestinians started organizing themselves to protect their houses from imminent Israeli demolition and their families from being displaced (again).

In light of this reality, the younger generation of Palestinians started defending their homes and towns, and taking matters into their own hands. In the Sheikh Jarrah, Silwan, and Batni Al-Hawa neighborhoods of Jerusalem, Palestinians started organizing themselves to protect their houses from imminent Israeli demolition and their families from being displaced (again). They felt that if there were to wait for the PA and other international parties to intervene, they would likely be displaced before the PA even intervened – as has happened countless times before.

This new approach of facing the occupation forces and using social media to create an international uproar seems to be effective. Recently, Jerusalem was able to present to the world a number of young faces such as Muhammad and Muna Al-Kurd, who made their case clear before the entire world, exposing an Israeli settler named Yaacob Fauci, who took over half of their house and told them on camera, “If I don’t steal it, someone else is gonna steal it.” With pro-Palestinian advocates turning this into an Israeli proverb, his so-called logic describes the life of Palestinians under Israeli military occupation.

In Beita village near Nablus, Israeli settlers built a new settler outpost on the top of Mount Sibeh. Palestinians in the area formed their own guard units, known as Hurras Al-Jabal (Guards of the Mount), in the knowledge that nobody will protect their lands from confiscation. They have imitated a Gaza experience known as Erbak Al-Layli, or the night confusion, where Palestinians use loudspeakers, lights, and fire to pressure Israeli settlers.

Their non-stop 65-day protest every night near Mount Sibeh has proven to be successful. Although they have paid dearly for what they describe as a victory, with five Palestinians killed and hundreds of others from the village injured at the hands of Israeli forces and settlers, they reached an agreement with the Israeli army which entails the settler evacuation from the outpost.

It seems that popular Palestinian resistance against attempts to silence Palestinians is on the rise. What is happening today in Palestine reveals that Palestinians, especially the younger generation, have decided to take initiative without waiting for any other party to act on their behalf.

Palestinians feel that they are suffering more losses on the ground and that the way the Oslo Accords were conceived was intended to keep them strangled and for Israel to have the final say and upper hand. Young Palestinians firmly believe that the only way out is to take things into their own hands and to adopt a discourse that exposes Israel as a settler-colonial country that practices the crime of apartheid against them.

Two events in early January illustrated the growing control of social media and other Internet companies over political discussions and systems. Starting on January 6, hours after supporters of former United States President Donald Trump stormed the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., a series of tech giants, beginning with Twitter, moved swiftly to block the president and his supporters from using their services.

Along with social networks like Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, Reddit, and TikTok, media platforms including Spotify, Twitch, and YouTube, as well as marketing and financial services such as PayPal, Shopify, and Stripe, joined the near-complete embargo. Apple and Google banned Parler, a niche social network favored by the president’s supporters, from their online app stores before Amazon, which had hosted the service on its servers, removed it from the Internet altogether. Within a day, Trump found himself as silenced as effectively as the world’s most powerful man could possibly be.

On January 9, a number of Palestinian media companies and political organizations stopped posting on Facebook for two hours to protest the social media giant’s suspension of their colleagues’ accounts and deletion of their content. The gesture followed years of complaints about Facebook’s collusion with Israel and bias against Palestinians.

Zoom later blocked a number of events organized at various universities to protest its censorship. While these company’s suppression of Palestinian speech may have been nothing new, their obstruction of academic freedom at a public university in their home country certainly was, raising troubling questions about the role of private corporations in educational institutions that have, during the COVID-19 pandemic, largely become reliant on their services.

United States-based social media have previously waded directly into politics outside the country, often in ways seemingly conducive to U.S. foreign policy goals.

In 2018, after a failed attempt to assassinate Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro with a weaponized drone, Facebook suspended the pages of news site Venezuelanalysis and regional broadcaster teleSUR, both broadly supportive of Maduro’s administration, before reinstating them.

In 2019, as the U.S. moved to restrict travel to Cuba, Twitter suspended the accounts of numerous Cuban journalists and government officials. And both Facebook and Twitter have attached labels to content by certain public news agencies, like RT and Press TV, indicating their governmental affiliations, a policy from which Western state media like VOA, PBS, NPR, and BBC seem curiously exempt.

With their embargo against Trump, tech giants intervened more visibly than ever before in the political system of their own country, acting as a cartel to shape not only public debates, but also governmental processes.

Like Facebook, YouTube, and Zoom’s earlier efforts Leila Khaled and her supporters, their actions showed a new willingness to pursue their own collective interests with blunt force, even at the cost of unprecedented, direct confrontations with public institutions.

Critics of social media censorship took several distinct approaches to Trump’s sudden disappearance from cyberspace. Some noted that as private companies, online services are not bound by the United States’ First Amendment or other legal protections of free speech, although as their critics were quick to observe, in an age when nearly all means of communication are controlled by corporate giants, such distinctions offer little comfort.

Others worried that the ban might encourage similar measures against figures and organizations with politics quite different from Trump’s, something that has already happened, but could escalate.

But the significance of corporations, accountable only to their shareholders, acting in concert to effectively control political discussions and outcomes has drawn considerably less attention, despite its obvious importance not only for the quality of contemporary dialogue, but the viability of democracy itself.

In late December 2020, several of Silicon Valley’s most prominent giants, including Microsoft, Google, GitHub, and LinkedIn, asked to join Facebook’s lawsuit at a U.S. federal court against the infamous Israeli spyware firm NSO Group Technologies (“NSO” stands for Niv, Shalev, and Omri, the company’s founders).

The lawsuit, filed in 2019, seeks unspecified damages and demands that NSO be denied access to Facebook’s services after NSO has used highly sophisticated spyware called “Pegasus” to hack into the phones of at least 1,400 individuals at the request of government officials. This includes politicians, diplomats, activists, journalists, and dissidents, some of whom have been arrested, tortured, or murdered as a consequence.

Such a lawsuit by a U.S. tech giant against an Israeli spyware firm with close ties to the Israeli government is unprecedented. Facebook has been notorious in terms of taking Israel’s side and cracking down on Palestinian content. Facebook has been blocking posts and accounts of Palestinian activists critical of Israel or supportive of the resistance to its occupation, while overlooking Israeli incitement against Palestinians – a 2019 study found that Israelis incite hatred of Arabs on social media once every 66 seconds.

Last May, Facebook even hired a former Israeli government official and censorship expert on its Oversight Board, which determines what content to permit or water down.

The reasons why the social media giant along with the world’s biggest tech companies would suddenly sue a prominent Israeli company is clear: NSO is out of control. Its malicious hacking services, which are virtually unconstrained, have become a major security threat in cyberspace.

Aiding Arab Dictatorships and Brutal Regimes

A few days before other tech giants joined Facebook’s lawsuit last December, the cybersecurity watchdog, Citizen Lab, reported that NSO had hacked into the personal phones of 36 journalists, producers, anchors, and executives at the leading Arab media network Al-Jazeera.

Described as the largest concentration of phone hacks targeting a single organization, this NSO spyware operation was conducted on behalf of the governments of Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. It was less than a year after NSO falsely claimed that it will respect human rights and take steps to prevent its tools being used to commit abuses in the future.

NSO’s hack of Al-Jazeera’s phones was merely the latest incident on an extensive list of spyware attacks carried out with impunity by the Israeli firm whose operations are heavily surrounded by secrecy and conducted in the dark. For instance, a 2017 report called “Gobierno Espía” found that NSO stood behind at least 80 hacks between 2015 and 2016 that targeted high-profile Mexican journalists, lawyers, and activists who reported on or campaigned against corruption.

Mansoor’s arrest was shortly after his phone was hacked by NSO on behalf of the UAE’s repressive government, using what’s known as a “zero-day exploit.”

In 2017, an eminent human rights activist in the UAE, Ahmed Mansoor, was arrested by Emirati authorities and sentenced in a sham trial to 10 years in prison on the charge of “using social media platforms to threaten public order.” Ever since, Mansoor has been subjected to brutal treatment, such as denial of medical attention and imprisonment in solitary confinement for inhumanely long periods.

Mansoor’s arrest was shortly after his phone was hacked by NSO on behalf of the UAE’s repressive government, using what’s known as a “zero-day exploit,” a vulnerability unknown to the software owners that hackers can exploit to gain a backdoor access to someone’s device without their knowledge or actions, such as clicking on a spam link.

The Saudi government used NSO’s services to spy on and track the senior Saudi journalist and critic Jamal Khashoggi who was then mercilessly murdered at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in 2018. In the same year, Amnesty International said that NSO was helping the Saudi regime to spy on a member of the organization’s staff.

Amnesty petitioned an Israeli court to revoke NSO’s export license given the damage it is causing; however, the court dismissed the case and argued that Israel’s Ministry of Defense maintains meticulous oversight procedures over defense exports. In October 2019, Facebook took preventative action and blocked the accounts of 100 NSO staff and their families. However, a Tel-Aviv court was quick to order Facebook to unblock some of those accounts.

Netanyahu’s Sacred Cow

So how does NSO wreak havoc freely, unconstrained, and with full impunity? Generally, Israel’s Ministry of Defense claims to maintain stringent criteria for issuing permits for the export of cyber intelligence technologies that come after a strenuous process of extreme vetting. Israel’s defense establishment claims that it then continues to oversee such projects even after a permit is issued. However, NSO is one of a number of cyber firms that get a free pass on their dangerous and destructive exports to repressive regimes.

Israel’s private spyware firms like NSO are the informal arm of Netanyahu’s government that are employed “off the record” to do the dirtiest work , such as espionage and interference in foreign countries. For instance, according to the 2020 report of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, an Israeli cyber intelligence firm, called Psy-Group, ran a $2 million voter suppression operation in support of Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign. The operation was paid by George Nader, an advisor to UAE de facto ruler Mohammed bin Zayed.

Similarly, NSO’s criminal and immoral operations have been an Israeli state-sanctioned bridge towards Israeli-Arab normalization with the UAE and Bahrain, two of the firm’s biggest clients. Recently, NSO helped the government of Morocco spy on a prominent Moroccan journalist a few months before official normalization between Israel and Morocco was announced.

Clearly, Israel’s cybersecurity industry is its competitive advantage to maintain relevance and significance in the international arena and gain the favor and support of client governments. However, with Israel unwilling to hold NSO to account, the company has become an unstoppable force of destruction; a tool that bolsters the power and hegemony of some of the world’s most repressive and brutal regimes; and a source of terror to activists who now fear that absolute cyber insecurity will become the region’s new normal.

Facebook’s lawsuit offers a glimmer of hope to stop NSO’s unconstrained assault on the right to privacy and security in cyberspace.