admitted to sharing false news via social media or WhatsApp, even though they thought that the information was untrue (CIEP, 2019). Another group of civil society actors that has frequently and deliberately spread false information to manipulate public opinion online is a group of xenophobic activists, with a network of six to eight different Facebook pages16 that publish similar information, roughly at the same time.17 In August 2018, following an influx of Nicaraguan migrants, the group placed a series of untrue claims related to Nicaraguan immigrants on their social media sites within the same week (Artavia, 2018).18 The images and messages also circulated via WhatsApp, triggering a violent anti-immigration manifestation at the Merced Park, a traditional meeting point of Nicaraguans in the Center of San José. Of the 400 protestors, 44 were arrested (Artavia and Solis, 2018 and Tico Times, 2018). This unprecedented aggression against Nicaraguans in Costa Rica led to a national televised presidential address calling for calm as well as a special session in parliament during which the executive explained how it was managing the situation with the Nicaraguan refugees. A legislative advisor to PRN deputy Carmen Chan subsequently used the incident to share videos and xenophobic audios of the manifestation on the legislator’s Facebook page “Costa Rica Unida” (“United Costa Rica”) and critique the government’s immigration policy (Alfaro, 2018). Another politician exploited the incident to advocate for the withdrawal of the policy of extending Costa Rican citizenship to children born in Costa Rica to Nicaraguan parents. Since the Merced Park incident, the number of both xenophobic and homophobic Facebook accounts have grown further in Costa Rica, with around 165,000 followers combined (Robles, 2019 and Loaiza, 2019). Private Contractors Political parties in Costa Rica have not only worked with polling agencies, but also with private firms whose services include developing trolls. Some of the known cases involve “Soluciones Digitales” and “OW Marketing Agency”. The head of OW Marketing, Iván Barrantes, was President Guillermo Solis’ digital campaign advisor when the PAC was elected to form government for the first time in 2014. He was paid around USD 190,000 (CRC 111 million) for his services19 before continuing to work ad honorem for President Solis while maintaining his private clients. This caused an outcry and he resigned his post as special presidential advisor. Since then Barrantes has worked for various other parties in Guatemala and Costa Rica (including the PLN, ML and PRN) during national and municipal elections. A firm believer in “political marketing” (Murillo, 2015), his most recent emphasis seems to be opposition work.20 In sum, various political parties, trade unions and other civil society organizations as well as private actors have been implicated in spreading disinformation deliberately during and after elections following an anti-establishment populist discourse or homophobic and xenophobic lines. The growth of the religious right, represented by the PRN and its spin off NR as well as Juan Diego Castro, have visibly contributed to this phenomenon and to an ever more toxic public discourse.21 Since 2014, private digital marketing companies or strategists have been hired during elections to “develop stories” and “place ideas” (Chinchilla Cerdas, 2018a). Table 1 summarizes the organizational form and prevalence of social media manipulation in Costa Rica. 89