are rented to politicians, the administrators of these pages often receive monthly salaries from these politicians (2019 ,‫)خلود العامري‬. Other pages, however, are directly affiliated with politicians or political groups and act as advertising platforms (Niqash, 2018b). However, there now exists a more varied cyber troop landscape, and pages have since emerged that are designed to criticise the former Prime Minister. One such page titled “Siyasi Hashash” (Addict Politician) reached a following of 331,000 in 2017, and other pages such as “Al-Abadi Wadihan” (Al-Abadi is Clear) continue to publish critical content (2019 ,‫)خلود العامري‬. One of the groups spending the most on Facebook cyber troops is Kata’ib Hezbollah, a Shia paramilitary group that is part of the Popular Mobilisation Forces (Crisp & al-Salhy, 2020). Table 1: Organizational Form and Prevalence of Social Media Manipulation in Iraq Initial Government Politicians Private Contractors Civil Society Citizens & Report Agencies & Parties Organizations Influencers 2010 Military A wide Private bloggers Kata’ib range of Hezbollah political actors and parties Source: Authors’ evaluations based on data collected. Blank spaces indicate no evidence was found. Strategies, Tools, and Techniques A report by the local media monitor Iraqi Media House (IMH) into cyber troop activity found that political Iraqi cyber troops pursued three main goals: (1) generating inauthentic engagement to give the impression of widespread public support; (2) defaming political adversaries through the generation of false information; (3) diverting online discussion away from politically sensitive discussions (Al-Badeel Iraq, n.d.). Of these goals, defaming political adversaries is the one most frequently pursued by Iraqi cyber troops. There are many reported examples of Iraqi political groups using false information to defame opponents. One such example of an “aggressive campaign using fabricated news”, in the words of Kurdistan Democratic Party’s Iraqi presidential candidate Fouad Hussein, is a series of reports by local media regarding Hussein’s links to the Israeli Mossad intelligence service, and further claims that his wife is Christian rather than Jewish (Al-Quds al-Arabi, 2018b). It is important to note that this publication cannot speak to the accuracy of these claims. In another example, former Iraqi Prime Minister Adel Abdul Mahdi denied claims that he had given away land in the fortified Green Zone to Hezbollah militia (Iraqi News Agency, 2020). In contrast to these examples of defamation attempts, the Iraqi military attempted to use cyber troops for reputation-building. The website Al-Sumaria News published a story claiming that the Iraqi army had been awarded a prize for the best army in the world. Furthermore, the article claimed that the award for the best military commander in the world had been given to deputy Iraqi Council-Terrorism Service, Abdul-Wahab al-Saedi (Al-Badeel Iraq, n.d.). These rumours were later refuted by the media (Al-Badeel Iraq, n.d.). 205