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The world ’s richest man buys out one of the most pop social medium platform and uses it as a propaganda and disinformation simple machine in reinforcement of a presidential nominee . What could go wrong ?
Ananalysisfrom the Center for foresee Digital Hate ( CCDH ) , a nonprofit that track misinformation , chance that Elon Musk put up at least 87 call this yr about the U.S. election on X that fact - checker have denounce as simulated or misleading .
Those false and misleading posts have mother more than 2 billion perspective , and not just because Musk is an influential person . He has also been see totweak X ’s algorithmsso his own posts reach everyoneon the platformbecause plainly , having 203 million followers just is n’t enough .
A 404 Media report found in the last dyad of weeks , the PAC increased its Facebook ad spend by 1,000 % . Meta expect until the last of last hebdomad toban adsabout social emergence , elections , or political science .
On X , political ads are still pumping alongside Musk ’s megaphone .
Anyone with an X invoice has witness the onslaught of political electronic messaging from Musk , much of which is in favor of Trump and far - right political narratives . The CCDH found Musk ’s political Charles William Post have pull together more than 17.1 billion purview since the billionaire executive officially indorse Trump in July . That ’s twice as many prospect as all political ads on the platform combined during the period , which is roughly the same as spend $ 24 million in campaign advertizement , per the CCDH .
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research worker identified a total of 746 mail Musk made between July 13 and October 25 that mention terms associated with the U.S. election , like Donald Trump , Kamala Harris , voting , and ballots . The analysis comes from in public uncommitted information from X about Musk ’s office and political campaign spending to promote ads on the platform .
Among the example of false or misleading claims that Musk made on X is one that claims , “ treble - digit increase of illegals in golf shot state over the preceding 4 eld . Voter importing at an unprecedented musical scale ! ” The mail saw21 million views .
Another claim , “ If the Democratic Party bountiful government auto wins this election , they will ostracise elector ID across the nation , not just in California . ” It saw11.9 million views .
The research found that Musk ’s claims that Democrats affirm “ importing voters ” were consider intimately 1.3 billion metre .
Musk has also push narrative about unreliable vote systems that have been viewed 532 million times , per the analysis .
For the book , there is little to no evidence to patronize the claim that illegal voters are “ import ” to plump for picky political parties . Voter pseudo is uncommon in the U.S. due to stern check measures at the res publica and federal levels . Expertssaymail ballot are verified when being bespeak by a voter and aver again when yield a voting .
Like any organization that criticize Musk , CCDH has become a aim for the billionaire , who recentlycalledthe group a “ criminal organization . ” Musk , a self - draw barren speech advocate , attempt to process the CCDH last year , but the guinea pig wastossedby a federal judge who said the litigation was aimed at “ penalize ” the organization for criticizing X.
Imran Ahmed , CEO of CCDH , state in a argument that X has “ drop into a hellscape of hate and disinformation ” after Musk transfer many of the site ’s guardrail that protected against false information . Musk has claimed thatX ’s Community Notesfeature allows biotic community members to fact - cheque posts , but Ahmed says the feature article is “ little more than a bandaid . ”
“ Elon Musk has show through his personal conduct his contempt for truth — is it any admiration that his solution to the disinformation crisis on X was so lackluster ? ” said Ahmed .
Ahmed was also onstage atTechCrunch Disruptlast calendar week where he admonish of the utilization of generative AI to come down the borderline price to develop and distribute a piece of disinformation to zero .
“ So what you have , theoretically , is a pure loop organisation in which procreative AI is producing , it ’s distributing , and then it ’s assessing the performance — A / B testing and better , ” he read . “ You ’ve got a ageless bulls — simple machine . That ’s quite distressing . ”
TechCrunch has get hold of out to X for gossip .
