The US military is developing
software that will let it secretly manipulate social media sites by using fake
online personas to influence internet conversations and spread pro-American
propaganda.
A Californian corporation has been awarded a contract with United States Central
Command (Centcom), which oversees US armed operations in the Middle East and
Central Asia, to develop what is described as an "online persona management
service" that will allow one US serviceman or woman to control up to 10 separate
identities based all over the world.
The project has been likened by web experts to China's attempts to control and
restrict free speech on the internet. Critics are likely to complain that it
will allow the US military to create a false consensus in online conversations,
crowd out unwelcome opinions and smother commentaries or reports that do not
correspond with its own objectives.
The discovery that the US military is developing false online personalities –
known to users of social media as "sock puppets" – could also encourage other
governments, private companies and non-government organisations to do the same.
The Centcom contract stipulates that each fake online persona must have a
convincing background, history and supporting details, and that up to 50
US-based controllers should be able to operate false identities from their
workstations "without fear of being discovered by sophisticated adversaries".
Centcom spokesman Commander Bill Speaks said: "The technology supports
classified blogging activities on foreign-language websites to enable Centcom to
counter violent extremist and enemy propaganda outside the US."
He said none of the interventions would be in English, as it would be unlawful
to "address US audiences" with such technology, and any English-language use of
social media by Centcom was always clearly attributed. The languages in which
the interventions are conducted include Arabic, Farsi, Urdu and Pashto.
Centcom said it was not targeting any US-based web sites, in English or any
other language, and specifically said it was not targeting Facebook or Twitter.
Once developed, the software could allow US service personnel, working around
the clock in one location, to respond to emerging online conversations with any
number of co-ordinated messages, blogposts, chatroom posts and other
interventions. Details of the contract suggest this location would be MacDill
air force base near Tampa, Florida, home of US Special Operations Command.
Centcom's contract requires for each controller the provision of one "virtual
private server" located in the United States and others appearing to be outside
the US to give the impression the fake personas are real people located in
different parts of the world.
It also calls for "traffic mixing", blending the persona controllers' internet
usage with the usage of people outside Centcom in a manner that must offer
"excellent cover and powerful deniability".
The multiple persona contract is thought to have been awarded as part of a
programme called Operation Earnest Voice (OEV), which was first developed in
Iraq as a psychological warfare weapon against the online presence of al-Qaida
supporters and others ranged against coalition forces. Since then, OEV is
reported to have expanded into a $200m programme and is thought to have been
used against jihadists across Pakistan, Afghanistan and the Middle East.
OEV is seen by senior US commanders as a vital counter-terrorism and
counter-radicalisation programme. In evidence to the US Senate's armed services
committee last year, General David Petraeus, then commander of Centcom,
described the operation as an effort to "counter extremist ideology and
propaganda and to ensure that credible voices in the region are heard". He said
the US military's objective was to be "first with the truth".
This month Petraeus's successor, General James Mattis, told the same committee
that OEV "supports all activities associated with degrading the enemy narrative,
including web engagement and web-based product distribution capabilities".
Centcom confirmed that the $2.76m contract was awarded to Ntrepid, a newly
formed corporation registered in Los Angeles. It would not disclose whether the
multiple persona project is already in operation or discuss any related
contracts.
Nobody was available for comment at Ntrepid.
In his evidence to the Senate committee, Gen Mattis said: "OEV seeks to disrupt
recruitment and training of suicide bombers; deny safe havens for our
adversaries; and counter extremist ideology and propaganda." He added that
Centcom was working with "our coalition partners" to develop new techniques and
tactics the US could use "to counter the adversary in the cyber domain".
According to a report by the inspector general of the US defence department in
Iraq, OEV was managed by the multinational forces rather than Centcom.
Asked whether any UK military personnel had been involved in OEV, Britain's
Ministry of Defence said it could find "no evidence". The MoD refused to say
whether it had been involved in the development of persona management
programmes, saying: "We don't comment on cyber capability."
OEV was discussed last year at a gathering of electronic warfare specialists in
Washington DC, where a senior Centcom officer told delegates that its purpose
was to "communicate critical messages and to counter the propaganda of our
adversaries".
Persona management by the US military would face legal challenges if it were
turned against citizens of the US, where a number of people engaged in sock
puppetry have faced prosecution.
Last year a New York lawyer who impersonated a scholar was sentenced to jail
after being convicted of "criminal impersonation" and identity theft.
It is unclear whether a persona management programme would contravene UK law.
Legal experts say it could fall foul of the Forgery and Counterfeiting Act 1981,
which states that "a person is guilty of forgery if he makes a false instrument,
with the intention that he or another shall use it to induce somebody to accept
it as genuine, and by reason of so accepting it to do or not to do some act to
his own or any other person's prejudice". However, this would apply only if a
website or social network could be shown to have suffered "prejudice" as a
result.
• This article was amended on 18 March 2011 to remove references to Facebook and
Twitter, introduced during the editing process, and to add a comment from
Centcom, received after publication, that it is not targeting those sites