Twitter-Bots mix in the US election with

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US elections

Twitter-Bots mix in the US election with

The US election campaign plays out in social media. In the presidential race, Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, who has more Twitter Followers compete. But not always people are tweeting.

The Internet is full of automated programs, called Bots. Often their number is underestimated, but This robot will cause about 50 percent of all Internet traffic. In its simplest Form, you take a harmless and mundane tasks. For example, if you automatically the latest headlines to tweet. The Deutsche Welle, and many other media to use Bots for these purposes.

The policy relies on Bots to spread your information through social media. But not always, Bots are used in good faith. Probably the best known opposite case is that of a Mexican hacker who claims to have several elections in Latin America with Bots manipulated. On the government side used Bots should also have a role in the recent elections in Russia played.

In view of the increasing perfection of these automated programs it is hardly surprising that political Bots also play in the presidential campaign in the United States. After all, the USA is the home of Twitter, Facebook and co.

Almost every second Tweet or Post on the Internet originating from a Bot

Fake Followers

“The candidates definitely have some fake Followers, bots or Bot-armies can assign,” says Dhiraj Murthy, a Social Media expert at Goldsmiths, University of London, has written a book on social communication in the Twitter age. The number of Followers had become a “very important unit of measurement” for the voters. Therefore, it is important to know what the Followers of Trump or Clinton were real.

Services such as
Twitter audit and
BotOrNot trying to figure out how many of Trumps more than nine million Twitter followers, and Clinton’s are more than seven million followers are real or fake, and which of these “fake” Followers are not just inactive Accounts, but Bots.

A recent analysis by Andrew McGill in the magazine “The Atlantic” suggests that 75 percent of the respective Followers of the two presidential candidates could be real people. Less than four percent of the Twitter followers showed “obvious Bot behavior”. This number may appear relatively small. In absolute Numbers this translates to at least Behind more than 200,000 Twitter followers from Trump and Clinton are stuck in reality Bots.

Large Range

And that has impact, explains Murthy. “If you look at any Tweet, Trump just deposited, and then observed, who retweeted the content, then some of the Bots are always there.” Because the Bots are programmed for this mechanism.

To spread opinions, and to strengthen, is a core function of social media, where Posts or Tweets are quickly replaced by new content and completely disappear. “Bots ensure that certain content will remain on the Agenda and you can generate a fairly large range, depending on how your networks are configured,” says Murthy. Bots played in the election campaign, an important role, when it comes, content to redistribute.

Twitter is one of the main places of the US election campaign

But Bots can also be used to drown out critical voices, Philip Howard, one of the researchers, Oxford University political Bots. “We know that you have successfully been used to stifle debate in the Bud, the run under certain Hashtags,” the Internet researchers.

An example of the beginning of the Syria-war, as the Assad Regime had hired a company out of Bahrain to spread Bots with the Hashtag #Syria. In this way, Howard, flooded the Regime of the social media, with tourist images of beaches, results of football games and stories of Syrian soap operas. “For several days, it was mainly what the world out there – even journalists – news from Syria has got,” says Howard.

Trumps rhetoric – food for Bots

In the US election Donald Trump is considered by many as the undisputed master of social media. For good reason, says Murthy, because Trumps provocative Statements to supply plenty of material – not only for media but also for Bots. There are numerous really malicious Bots on the Internet, the search for sexist, homophobic and racist language. “These Bots will find such Statements on Twitter, then follow Trump, retweet its content and mention him,” said Murthy.

Of course, all the political Bots are not evil. There are parodies, such as @DeepDrumpf or @Clinton_Bot that the candidate funny. Such Bots make it clear that it is not a real Person. It is difficult when Bots pretend to be real people.

“A very important distinction to be made is whether or not people understand that it is a Bot,” says Cornelius Puschmann from the Alexander von Humboldt Institute for Internet and society in Berlin. “If the Bot is trying to, as a man, and in the context of policy happens, it will be problematic.”

Robots on the rise

Who is behind the hundreds of thousands of Twitter Bots that follow Trump and Clinton? The question is the great price and hard to figure out, says Murthy. It is also unclear whether Bots fighters, directly or indirectly, of the Choice as part of your Social Media strategy used to have more Followers and Posts, or to attack the opponent. On demand neither the leaders of the Trump – the Clinton campaign wanted to say something.

It is clear, however, that political Bots are now an indispensable part of the social networks – be it the US elections, or elsewhere. “We have to get used to the fact that in the social media of non-human actors exist, and that is becoming increasingly common,” says Puschmann.

Political Bots are clearly on the rise. The more important it is, therefore, about regulation of thinking, says Howard: “I think, for Bots, the rules should apply, which normally apply to election campaigns.” Political Bots would have to make it clear who’s paid you and which camp you’re in.