since 2013. Their centers “have been hit by missiles, barrel bombs and artillery bombardment 238 times between June 2016 and December 2017.”17 As a consequence, the operational capacities of the White Helmets and their partners are eroded, and the disinformation campaign has a net effect of distracting from or covering up activities by Syrian and Russian forces on the ground, including potential war crimes. Case Study 2: Political Manipulation — Elections in the Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte of the Philippines has proven adept at exploiting social media for political gain, leveraging social media to reinforce positive narratives about his campaign and to defame and silence opponents and critics.18 The Philippines-based online news website Rappler has been the target of coordinated and sustained disinformation campaigns after it exposed the systematic use of paid trolls19, bots20, networks of fake accounts and contracted influencers propagating pro-Duterte narratives (including mis- and disinformation) during the 2016 presidential election. Weaponization via political manipulation Political manipulation is similar to information operations, but within the context of a single community or state. Political discourse is systematically manipulated by networked disinformation campaigns modeled after digital advertising approaches and operationalized through exploitative strategies and incentive structures. These practices have the power to set agendas, propagate ideas, debase political discourse and silence dissent, ultimately seeking to change the outcome of political events. These disinformation campaigns play out in three phases: 1) Design: Establishing objectives, branding, core narratives, etc. Mobilization: Onboarding influencers, fake account operators and grassroots intermediaries, and preparing media channels Implementation: Disseminating and amplifying messages and implementing other tactics such as digital black ops, #trending and signal scrambling.21 Technique and tactics Political misinformation and coordinated disinformation campaigns feature a range of operatives who design strategies and implement tactics, and are based on an architecture involving: 17 The Syria Campaign, 2017. 18 Paladino, 16-17. 19 In internet slang, trolls refers to people who post inflammatory content online in order to cause argument or harass an individual or organization, either for their own amusement, or for another form of gain. Trolls are also associated with the presentation of extraneous information that sows or normalizes tangential conversations or narratives. 20 An internet bot, also known as a web robot, robot or simply bot, is a software application that runs automated tasks (scripts) over the internet. Typically, bots perform tasks that are both simple and structurally repetitive, at a much higher rate than would be possible for a human alone. 21 Much like in the Information Operations case study 1, these political messaging campaigns also make use of #hashtag hijacking, astroturfing, and trading up the chain tactics. MERCY CORPS The Weaponization of Social Media: How social media can spark violence and what can be done about it 10