[There are obviously lots of real people who are (in my opinion, legitimately) furious with Labour for their Brexit stance but this is a different beast]
Mike Hind
@MikeH_PR
Be aware.
- There is a new twist in the Brexity disinformation black ops playing out on Twitter.
It appears to be imported from Trumpkin America, where similar efforts to divide the anti-Trump 'resistance' have been quite successful.
It's 'Fake #FBPE'
- I first became aware of attempts to divide the anti-Brexit movement back in the late summer. It began with an approach by one 'Barry G's Ghost' - a supposed anti-Trump Republican who was now turning his/her/their attention to Brexit Britain.
I played along, to learn more.
- 'Barry' made a slightly cloak and dagger approach to me via DM, with 'information' concerning certain high profile anti-Brexit accounts.
It was at the height of the Russia hysteria
We switched to secure double-encrypted email to discuss this revelation in a safer environment
- 'Barry' then fed me, over several weeks, 'intelligence' that people like @Rachael_Swindon @EmporersNewC & other high impact anti-Tory/Brexit accounts were Kremlin assets.
It was clearly horsesh*t but I played along.
I fed 'Barry' some more 'suspects' to investigate...
- I chose people I know personally - or could easily verify as real - telling 'Barry' I suspected they were Internet Research Agency shills.
Soon 'Barry' was confirming that @markpalexander @bobreeduk and others are Putin agents.
But why was he doing this?
- 'Barry' wanted me to stop amplifying them. I guess I was perceived by someone as an 'influencer' whose retweets of and engagement with these people was inconveniently promoting their strong anti-Brexit messages.
I will post our exchanges one day, but back to Fake #FBPE now
- Soon after #FBPE started a large number of new 'Remain' Twitter accounts began to appear - all identifying as #FBPE.
Many of them were low quality, bot-like or programmatic sharers of other accounts' content. They just added noise. Others were genuine new anti-Brexit people
- And a significant number of #FBPE accounts turned out to be pretenders to the pro-European position. Fake #FBPE.
They were inserting themselves into exchanges and raising the temperature. Egging on genuine pro-Europeans and introducing troll-like rhetoric and behaviour,
- Some of my followers are onto this now and have been privately sharing suspect accounts (thanks @i400s @dwatchorn et al) since they noticed some of the weirder interactions I was having over the past few days.
I am building a list of them.
- Just like 'Barry' it seems their intention is to isolate (in typical troll fashion) certain voices and messages, sow discord and introduce an element of paranoia into the #FBPE community.
But who are they? Who would do this?
- A clue comes from the political developments of the past few weeks.
They are predominantly anti-Labour, while often pretending to be Labour supporters.
It's fertile ground for them, given the intrinsic dislike of Labour's Brexit stance for many.
They're onto a winner here.
- #FBPE has been compromised in the classic way - by playing on the natural inclinations of a community, amplifying the rhetoric and creating division. It's working brilliantly for them.
How well? Because they are being amplified by real #FBPE people now.
- I smell the hand of Farage/Bannon at play here, in their usual unholy alliance with the Tories. Others will doubtless assume it's another Kremlin op. Still others will refuse to see it at all, because they've been had - and that's hard to admit.
But it's happening.