The recent hack of the National Governance Institute's Integrity Initiative program provided a rare glimpse into a part of the propaganda machine the government doesn't want anyone to see, which raises the question: what else is there?
The Integrity Initiative was set up to deliver on the work of the Foreign Office's Counter-Disinformation and Media Development Programme, led by Andy Price. To carry out its agenda, the National Governance Institute, the “charitable” think tank behind the Integrity Initiative, received £1,233,711 from the Foreign Office throughout 2018.
Other organisations funded by the Foreign Office include BBC Media Action (£6,165,469 in 2018); Thomson Reuters Foundation The British Council (whose total budget in 2018 was £189,568,186; it is unclear how much is spent on media development) has Overseas media development businessIncluding the Baltic States and Ukraine,Russian speakers, wherever they are, have the ability to choose the media they consume and have access to reliable, objective information.“
That's all for efforts overseas. What about efforts to combat the “fake information” that is said to be rampant in Japan?
To address this issue, Prime Minister Theresa May announced in April last year:Emergency Response UnitThe Rapid Response Unit was established as a sub-unit of the Government Communications Service within the Cabinet Office. It was given an initial budget of six months and the Rapid Response Unit was named “A team of analysts, data scientists, media and digital expertsEquipped with cutting-edge software,We work around the clock to monitor breaking news online and social media discussions.“
According to the head of the emergency response unit, Fiona BartoszThe team will respond quickly and intelligently to misinformation and disinformation and help governments evaluate the effectiveness of their communications. This will include:Times of crisis.“
“for example“, Bartosh's Report“Throughout the military operation in Syria, the team continued to work to identify misinformation and, where appropriate, conducted digital communications activities targeted to key audiences.
“RRU analysts were the first to point out cases of misinformation – such as claims by Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov about the origins of the nerve gas used in the Salisbury poisoning – and the low prominence of HMG information when people searched for news about Syria.“
According to Alex AikenExecutive Director of Government Public Relations,Because of how search engine algorithms work, when people searched for information about the Syrian airstrikes, less reliable sources appeared above official UK government information. In fact, no government information appeared on the first 15 pages of Google search results. We know that searches are a good indicator of intent. Searches can reflect the bias of information received from others.
“So the unit started tailoring factual information about the UK's response to people using biased search terms like “false flag”, and the RRU rose from below 200th to number one within hours.“
How did they do that? Any search engine optimization expert will tell you that significantly improving your Google rankings is a long and hard process and not something that can be achieved in “a few hours”. Does the Cabinet Office have a hotline to Google? I can't think of any other explanation.
Two months after the Rapid Response Unit was established, Prime Minister Theresa May attended the G7 Charlevoix Summit in Canada, where she agreed with other G7 countries to set up a “Rapid Response Mechanism” and stated,Collaborative attribution of hostile acts” and “Working together to assert common narratives and responses“
At the time of writing, it is unclear whether the activities of the Cabinet Office's Emergency Response Unit are reflected in the G7 emergency response mechanism. The similarity in the names of the two may be a coincidence. We have asked the Cabinet Office to clarify the situation. However, it is clear that the May government places great importance on censorship.
Fiona Bartosz, the head of the Rapid Response Unit mentioned a few paragraphs ago, also has another job. She also works for the government'sThe most transparent, performance-based media buying agreementMedia buying is the same as advertising.
According to Bartosh, civil servants “Engage directly with creators of false contentWe speculate that this also includes funding creators of “false content,” because in late 2017, the Department of Media and Marketing removed all advertising from YouTube because government ads were appearing on the platform.Proximity to extremist content” It is hosted on the platform.
Soon after, the government announced it would review media buying agreements, resulting in Omnicom replacing Dentsu Aegis as the preferred supplier for managing media buying agreements. GBP 140 millionor GBP 600 millionor perhaps GBP 800 millioncontract. Tender documents state that the contract is worth around £800 million from 2018 to 2020 – a staggering amount for a domestic advertising budget.
last week Announced by Alex Aiken The rapid response unit has received permanent funding. Its start-up phase is over. He told PRWeek: “The Government has identified three communications priorities for the coming year: raising standards, strengthening democracy and making communities feel safe. The Rapid Response Unit's work directly supports these priorities and highlights the need for continued work to counter disinformation.“
Efforts to combat “disinformation” in the country and control of the government's advertising budget are placed in the hands of a single civil servant, Fiona Bartosz.
Ironically, Parliamentary Questions published in June last yearCabinet Office Minister Chloe Smith said the role of the Rapid Response Unit was “News and information being shared and engaged with online, including misinformation and disinformation“Find ways to work together across Whitehall,”Respond promptly, accurately and sincerely.”
Should it have been a capital “i”?
