Truism from Lengthy Report

For those following the UK report on social media, part of the report reads this way:  "

This proliferation of online harms is made more dangerous by focusing specific messages on individuals as a result of ‘micro-targeted messaging’—often playing on and distorting people’s negative views of themselves and of others. This distortion is made even more extreme by the use of ‘deepfakes’, audio and videos that look and sound like a real person, saying something that that person has never said. As we said in our Interim Report, these examples will only become more complex and harder to spot, the more sophisticated the software becomes." 

When people get their news from Facebook, friends, and a biased national media, the tailoring of news to fit a narrative is easier to do.  If the real story does not fit the facts, bend the facts and make new ones. 

We once made a picture of our boss with the Russian President's arm around him.  We circulated it around and eventually he saw it.  About the same time, some guys at Headquarters saw it and went ballistic.  They didn't see the humor in having a Defense Department leader shown in this light.  We thought they were just being funny until we found out they didn't know the picture was a fake.  We thought it was obvious, but that was 25 years ago.