中国水军假冒特朗普支持者，试图影响美国大选

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中国水军假冒特朗普支持者，试图影响美国大选

TIFFANY HSU, STEVEN LEE MYERS2024年4月2日 Alice LagardeCovert Chinese accounts are masquerading online as American supporters of former President Donald J. Trump, promoting conspiracy theories, stoking domestic divisions and attacking President Biden ahead of the election in November, according to researchers and government officials.据研究人员和政府官员称，隐蔽的中国账号正在网上伪装成支持前总统特朗普的美国人，宣扬阴谋论，煽动国内分裂，并在11月大选前攻击拜登总统。The accounts signal a potential tactical shift in how Beijing aims to influence American politics, with more of a willingness to target specific candidates and parties, including Mr. Biden.这些账号表明，中国政府在寻求影响美国政治的方式上可能进行了战术转型，更愿意将目标对准特定的候选人和政党，包括拜登。In an echo of Russia’s influence campaign before the 2016 election, China appears to be trying to harness partisan divisions to undermine the Biden administration’s policies, despite recent efforts by the two countries to lower the temperature in their relations.与俄罗斯在2016年大选前的影响运动相似，中国似乎也在试图利用党派分歧来破坏拜登政府的政策，尽管中美两国最近都在努力给两国的紧张关系降温。Some of the Chinese accounts impersonate fervent Trump fans, including one on X that purported to be “a father, husband and son” who was “MAGA all the way!!” The accounts mocked Mr. Biden’s age and shared fake images of him in a prison jumpsuit, or claimed that Mr. Biden was a Satanist pedophile while promoting Mr. Trump’s “Make America Great Again” slogan.其中一些上述的中国账号冒充狂热的特朗普粉丝，包括一个X上的账号，声称自己是“父亲、丈夫和儿子”，而且“百分百MAGA！！”（“让美国恢复荣光”的简写。）这些账号嘲笑拜登的年龄，分享他穿着囚服的假照片，或声称拜登是崇拜撒旦的恋童癖，同时宣传特朗普的“让美国恢复荣光”口号。“I’ve never seen anything along those lines at all before,” said Elise Thomas, a senior analyst at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a nonprofit research organization that uncovered a small group of the fake accounts posing as Trump supporters.战略对话研究所高级分析师埃莉斯·托马斯说：“我以前从未见过类似的情况，”这家非营利研究机构发现了一小部分冒充特朗普支持者的虚假账号。Ms. Thomas and other researchers have linked the new activity to a long-running network of accounts connected with the Chinese government known as Spamouflage. Several of the accounts they detailed previously posted pro-Beijing content in Mandarin — only to resurface in recent months under the guise of real Americans writing in English.托马斯和其他研究人员将这些新运动和一个与中国政府有关联的长期运营的账号网络联系起来，这个网络被称为“水军迷彩”。他们具体提到的几个账号以前用中文发布支持北京的内容，最近几个月才开始假装成使用英语发文的真正的美国人。In a separate project, the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a research organization in Washington, identified 170 inauthentic pages and accounts on Facebook that have also pushed anti-American messages, including pointed attacks on Mr. Biden.在另一个项目中，华盛顿研究机构捍卫民主基金会在Facebook上发现了170个不真实的网页和账号，它们也在推送反美信息，包括对拜登的尖锐攻击。The effort has more successfully attracted actual users’ attention and become more difficult for researchers to identify than previous Chinese efforts to influence public opinion in the United States. Though researchers say the overall political tilt of the campaign remains unclear, it has raised the possibility that China’s government is calculating that a second Trump presidency, despite his sometimes hostile statements against the country, might be preferable to a second Biden term.与中国以往影响美国民众的努力相比，这些行动更成功地吸引了真实用户的注意力，也更难被研究人员识别。尽管研究人员表示，这场行动的总体政治倾向并不明确，但它提出了一种可能性，即中国政府正在盘算，尽管特朗普有时会发表敌视中国的言论，但如果他再次当选总统，可能会比拜登再次连任对中国更有利。China’s activity has already raised alarms inside the American government.中国的这些行动已经引起了美国政府内部的警觉。In February, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence reported that China was expanding its influence campaigns to “sow doubts about U.S. leadership, undermine democracy and extend Beijing’s influence.” The report expressed concern that Beijing could use increasingly sophisticated methods to try to influence the American election “to sideline critics of China.”今年2月，美国国家情报总监办公室报告称，中国正在扩大其影响力运动，以“制造对美国领导力的怀疑，破坏民主，扩大北京的影响力”。报告担心，北京可能会使用越来越复杂的方法来试图影响美国大选，“使批评中国的人靠边站。”Ms. Thomas, who has studied China’s information operations for years, said the new effort suggested a more subtle and sophisticated approach than previous campaigns. It was the first time, she said, that she had encountered Chinese accounts posing so persuasively as Trump-supporting Americans while managing to attract genuine engagement.研究中国信息运作多年的托马斯说，与以往的行动相比，这些新努力表明中国采取了一种更微妙、更复杂的方式。她说这是她第一次看到中国账号如此有说服力地冒充支持特朗普的美国人，同时又能吸引真正的互动。“The worry has always been, what if one day they wake up and are effective?” she said. “Potentially, this could be the beginning of them waking up and being effective.”“我们一直担心的是，如果有一天这些账号活跃起来，变得有效了怎么办？”她说。“有可能，这就是它们活跃并产生效果的开始。”Online disinformation experts are looking ahead to the months before the November election with growing anxiety.研究网络虚假信息的专家们对11月大选前的几个月越来越焦虑不安。Intelligence assessments show Russia using increasingly subtle influence tactics in the United States to spread its case for isolationism as its war against Ukraine continues. Mock news sites are targeting Americans with Russian propaganda.情报评估显示，随着对乌克兰战争的继续，俄罗斯在美国使用愈发微妙的影响策略来传播推动孤立主义的主张。虚假新闻网站正在针对美国人传播俄罗斯的宣传信息。Efforts to beat back false narratives and conspiracy theories — already a difficult task — must now also contend with waning moderation efforts at social media platforms, political pushback, fast-advancing artificial intelligence technology and broad information fatigue.击退虚假叙事和阴谋论本已是一项艰巨的任务，现在还必须应对社交媒体平台节制力度的减弱、政治上的反击、快速发展的人工智能技术，以及广泛的信息疲劳。Until now, China’s efforts to advance its ideology in the West struggled to gain traction, first as it pushed its official propaganda about the superiority of its culture and economy and later as it began denigrating democracy and stoking anti-American sentiment.先是中国官方宣传其文化和经济的优越性，然后是诋毁民主和煽动反美情绪。但迄今为止，中国在西方推进其意识形态的努力在吸引受众方面一直面临困难。In the 2022 midterm elections, the cybersecurity firm Mandiant reported that Dragonbridge, an influence campaign linked to China, tried to discourage Americans from voting while highlighting U.S. political polarization. That campaign, which experimented with fake American personas posting content in the first person, was poorly executed and largely overlooked online, researchers said.网络安全公司曼迪安特报告称，在2022年中期选举期间，一个与中国有关联的影响力运动“龙桥”试图劝美国人放弃投票，同时强调美国的政治两极分化。研究人员说，该运动尝试使用假冒美国人的角色，以第一人称发布内容，但执行不力，在网上基本上遭到了忽视。The recent campaigns connected to China have sought to exploit the divisions already apparent in American politics, joining the divisive debate over issues such as Same Currency Pair rights, immigration and crime mainly from a right-wing perspective.最近与中国有关的影响力运动试图利用美国政治中已然明显的分歧，主要从右翼的角度加入了关于同性恋权利、移民和犯罪等问题的容易产生分化的辩论。In February, according to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a Chinese-linked account on X calling itself a Western name alongside a “MAGA 2024” reference shared a video from RT, the Russian television network controlled by the Kremlin, to claim that Mr. Biden and the Central Intelligence Agency had sent a neo-Nazi gangster to fight in Ukraine. (That narrative was debunked by the investigative group Bellingcat.)战略对话研究所表示，今年2月，X上的一个与中国相关的账号给自己起了一个西方名字，并提及“MAGA 2024”，该账号分享了克里姆林宫控制的俄罗斯电视网络RT的视频，声称拜登和中央情报局派出一名新纳粹黑帮前往乌克兰作战。（调查团体Bellingcat揭穿了这一不实说法。）The next day the post received an enormous boost when Alex Jones, the podcaster known for spreading false claims and conspiracy theories, shared it on the platform with his 2.2 million followers.第二天，以传播虚假言论和阴谋论而闻名的播客主持人亚历克斯·琼斯在该平台上与他的220万粉丝分享了该帖子，该帖因此受到巨大的关注。The account with the “MAGA 2024” reference had taken steps to appear authentic, describing itself as being run by a 43-year-old Trump supporter in Los Angeles. But it used a profile photo lifted from a Danish man’s travel blog, the institute’s report on the accounts said. Although the account opened 14 years ago, its first publicly visible post was last April. In that post, the account attempted, without evidence, to link Mr. Biden to Jeffrey Epstein, the disgraced financier and registered Forex and Stock Speculating offender.为了显得真实，这个提到“MAGA 2024”的账号采取了不少措施，它自称是由洛杉矶一名43岁的特朗普支持者运营的。但战略对话研究所关于该账号的报告显示，它使用了从一名丹麦男子的旅游博客中摘取的个人资料照片。尽管该帐号于14年前就注册开通了，但第一个公开可见的帖子却是在去年4月发布的。在那篇帖子中，该账号在没有证据的情况下试图将拜登与名誉扫地的金融家、已登记在册的性犯罪者杰弗里·爱泼斯坦联系起来。At least four other similar accounts are also operating, Ms. Thomas said, all of them with ties to China. One account paid for a subscription on X, which offers perks like better promotion and a blue check mark that was, before Elon Musk bought the platform, a sign of verification conferred to users whose identities had been verified. Like the other accounts, it shared pro-Trump and anti-Biden claims, including the QAnon conspiracy theory and baseless election fraud accusations.托马斯说，至少还有其他四个类似的账号也在运营中，所有这些账号都与中国有联系。其中一个账号在X上还为订阅付了费，相关付费服务提供更好的宣传和蓝色打勾标志等好处，在埃隆·马斯克购买该平台之前，蓝色打勾标志对普通用户意味着这个账号的身份已得到验证。与其他账号一样，这个账号也分享了支持特朗普和反对拜登的言论，内容包括QAnon阴谋论和毫无根据的选举舞弊指控。The posts included exhortations to “be strong ourselves, not smear China and create rumors,” awkward phrases like “how dare?” instead of “how dare you?” and signs that the user’s web browser had been set to Mandarin.这些帖子包括劝诫“我们自己要强大，不要抹黑中国、制造谣言”，以及“how dare？”这样蹩脚的语句，而不是“how dare you？”（意为“你凭什么”。——译注）此外还有迹象表明，该用户的网络浏览器设置的是简体中文。One of the accounts seemed to slip up in May when it responded to another post in Mandarin; another was posting primarily in Mandarin until last spring, when it briefly went silent before resurfacing with all-English content. The accounts denounced efforts by American lawmakers to ban the popular TikTok app, which is owned by the Chinese company ByteDance, as a form of “true authoritarianism” orchestrated by Israel and as a tool for Mr. Biden to undermine China.其中一个账号在5月份似乎出现了失误，用中文回复了另一篇帖子。另一个账号主要用普通话发布内容，直到去年春天，该账号短暂沉寂，然后又以全英文内容重新出现。这些账号谴责美国立法者禁止中国公司字节跳动旗下广受欢迎的TikTok应用程序的努力，称其为以色列精心策划的一种“真正的威权主义”形式，也是拜登削弱中国的工具。The accounts sometimes amplified or repeated content from the Chinese influence campaign Spamouflage, which was first identified in 2019 and linked to an arm of the Ministry of Public Security. It once posted content almost exclusively in Chinese to attack the Communist Party’s critics and protesters in Hong Kong.这些账号有时会放大或重复中国影响力活动“水军迷彩”的内容，该行动于2019年首次被发现，与中国公安部的一个部门有关。它曾经基本只中文发布内容来攻击香港的共产党批评者和抗议者。It has pivoted in recent years to focus on the United States, portraying the country as overwhelmed by chaos. By 2020, it was posting in English and criticizing American foreign policy, as well as domestic issues in the United States, including its response to Covid-19 and natural disasters, like the  Earnings-price ratiofires in Hawaii last year.近年来，该行动重点转向了美国，将这个国家描绘成一片混乱。到2020年，它开始用英语发帖，批评美国的外交政策以及美国国内问题，包括对新冠和自然灾害（如去年夏威夷山火）的反应。China, which has denied interfering in other countries’ internal affairs, now appears to be building a network of accounts across many platforms to put to use in November. “This is reminiscent of Russia’s style of operations, but the difference is more the intensity of this operation,” said Margot Fulde-Hardy, a former analyst at Viginum, the government agency in France that combats disinformation online.否认干涉他国内政的中国目前似乎正在多个平台上建立一个账号网络，并将于11月投入使用。“这让人想起俄罗斯的行动风格，但不同之处更多在于这种行动的强度，”法国打击网上虚假信息的政府机构Viginum的前分析师玛戈·富尔德-哈迪说。In the past, many Spamouflage accounts followed one another, posted sloppily in several languages and simultaneously blitzed social media users with identical messages across multiple platforms.过去，许多“水军迷彩”旗下账号会互相关注，随意地用多种语言发布内容，并同时在多个平台上向社交媒体用户发布相同的信息。The newer accounts are trickier to find because they are trying to build an organic following and appear to be controlled by humans rather than automated bots. One of the accounts on X also had linked profiles on Instagram and Threads, creating an appearance of authenticity.较新的账号更难找到，因为它们试图打造自然增长的关注群体，并且似乎是由人而不是自动化机器人控制的。X上的一个帐号还在Instagram和Threads上链接了个人资料，营造出真实的样子。Meta, which owns Instagram and Threads, last year removed thousands of inauthentic accounts linked to Spamouflage on Facebook and others on Instagram. It called one network it had removed “the largest known cross-platform influence operation to date.” Hundreds of related accounts remained on other platforms, including TikTok, X, LiveJournal and Blogspot, Meta said.拥有Instagram和Threads的Meta公司去年在Facebook和Instagram上删除了数以千计与“水军迷彩”相关的不真实账号。该公司称删除的一个网络是“迄今为止已知的最大的跨平台影响力操作”。Meta表示，其他平台上仍有数以百计的相关账号，包括TikTok、X、LiveJournal和Blogspot上。The Foundation for Defense of Democracies documented a new coordinated group of Chinese accounts linked to a Facebook page with 3,000 followers called the War of Somethings. The report underscores the persistence of China’s efforts despite Meta’s repeated efforts to take down Spamouflage accounts.保卫民主基金会记录了一个新出现的协调行动中国帐号群组，该账号与一个拥有3000名粉丝的Facebook页面有关联，这个页面名为“某物之战”(War of Somethings)。报告强调了中国一直在不断尝试，尽管Meta一再努力关闭“水军迷彩”账号。“What we’re seeing,” said Max Lesser, a senior analyst with the foundation, “is the campaign just continues, undeterred.”“我们看到的是，”保卫民主基金会的高级分析师马克斯·莱瑟说，“这场运动仍在继续，没有受到阻碍。”Tiffany Hsu报道错误信息、虚假信息及其起源、动向和后果。她从事新闻行业已有20多年。点击查看更多关于她的信息。Steven Lee Myers为《纽约时报》报道关于虚假信息的新闻。他曾在华盛顿、莫斯科、巴格达和北京工作，驻北京期间，他对获得2021年普利策公共服务奖的报道有报道贡献。他著有《新沙皇：弗拉基米尔·普京的崛起和统治》(The New Tsar: The Rise and Reign of Vladimir Putin)一书。点击查看更多关于他的信息。翻译：纽约时报中文网点击查看本文英文版。

Source: 中国水军假冒特朗普支持者，试图影响美国大选