That page typically published dozens of posts each day, some featuring outlandish claims, with most of the stories linking to the stand-alone website for Right Wing News or to the publication’s YouTube channels. One recent headline read, “Over A Dozen C.I.A. Agents May Have Died After Hillary Was Caught Red-Handed.”
Facebook said the Right Wing News page on the social network was redirecting traffic to the Right Wing News website to drive up its ad revenue, and that administrators for the page appeared to change regularly. Facebook said some of the administrators ran multiple Facebook accounts under the same names, which the social network does not allow.
Over the past few months, Right Wing News’ Facebook page has increased its activity, researchers said. During the time that then-Judge Kavanaugh testified in Congress, Right Wing News — and several Facebook pages that mirror it by posting the same content — pushed out numerous articles that questioned the veracity of a lie-detector test that Dr. Blasey had taken and why she had come forward with her accusations.
Right Wing News also used Facebook ads to spread its content through other Facebook pages. In June, the Daily Vine, an American-run Facebook page linked to Right Wing News, published a Facebook ad for a false story that claimed that 412 Muslim men in Michigan had been arrested in the “largest bust in U.S. history.” (The Department of Justice investigation on which the story was based revealed a network of 412 people involved in opioid-related crimes, but they were neither exclusively Muslim nor based in Michigan.)
Facebook said the ad was paid for by Right Wing News and was allowed according to its rules, which let American citizens and residents place political ads. Though Facebook has since taken down the Daily Vine page, and the ad is no longer running, it was viewed as many as 50,000 times between June 19 and June 20, according to Facebook’s metrics. The Daily Vine could not be reached for comment.
Ms. Martinez said Facebook’s actions against Right Wing News and other domestic disinformation networks would stem some of the flow of false content — but only for a little while.
“There is little to stop them from spawning off as a new page, or account, and just starting to build their network again,” she said. “They can just keep trying to get around Facebook’s rules.”
Article source: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/11/technology/fake-news-online-disinformation.html?partner=rss&emc=rss
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