Societal Computing Thesis Proposal
Speaker
JANICE T. BLANE
Ph.D. Student
Ph.D. Program in Societal Computing
Institute for Software Research
Carnegie Mellon University
When
-
Where
Virtual Presentation - ET
Description
Social media platforms have quickly become a primary news source for many users because of their convenience and easy access to information. The increasing reliance on social media as a news source has created an environment where online influencers can manipulate narratives and social network structures, often leading to large-scale influence campaigns with real-world consequences. Previous frameworks developed to characterize these online influence operations provide only generic guidelines for analysis rather than a comprehensive and quantitative approach for assessing and addressing these campaigns. The BEND framework is one such framework that offers an approach through the identification of social-cyber maneuvers, or online methods of influence and manipulation, to accurately characterize and address the operations that support broader influence campaign objectives.
My research goal is to develop a robust framework for identifying the occurrence of social-cyber maneuvers, operationalizing the framework, and creating an influence operations assessment to inform decision-makers and provide possible counter-maneuvers to deter influence operations. This thesis builds on the BEND framework as a comprehensive tool for analyzing influence campaigns and their associated online operations.
To accomplish this, first, I provide refined definitions for the social-cyber maneuvers to better describe each maneuver and its application to influence campaigns. Then I create a set of metrics for detecting these maneuvers on social media by using statistical analysis of real-world data and an iterative process of experimenting with semi-synthetic data. Afterward, I develop a method for implementing the social-cyber maneuver framework on online social networks and creating an assessment of influence campaigns. Through the application of this social-cyber maneuver framework on Twitter datasets related to the COVID-19 Vaccine, the US 2020 Election, and Ukraine-Russia, I validate the BEND framework efficacy while providing insight into how the maneuvers are used in combination over time to support overarching influence campaign objectives. Furthermore, I apply the results from these case studies to develop simulations for countering the maneuvers.
Thesis Committee:
Kathleen M. Carley (Chair)
L. Richard Carley
Hirokazu Shirado
David M. Beskow (U.S. Military Academy)
Zoom Participation. See announcement.