Chinese Internet users have turned to YouTube as part of Beijing’s attempt to influence the Taiwanese public, a Taiwanese academic cautioned yesterday.
Numerous YouTube channels that appear to have been recently set up by Chinese netizens had 5,000 subscribers almost as soon as they were launched, said Puma Shen (沈伯洋), an assistant professor at National Taipei University’s Graduate School of Criminology.
The YouTube channels could be trying to influence Taiwan’s presidential and legislative elections next month, Shen added.
Photo: Peter Lo, Taipei Times
Chinese “Internet armies” have shifted the front line from Facebook to YouTube, after efforts on Facebook proved ineffective, he said, adding that Facebook closed 118 fan pages, 99 groups and 51 “sock puppets” believed to have originated in Taiwan.
The YouTubers and vloggers using the newly created accounts talk about issues in Taiwan and the Jan. 11 elections using Chinese vernacular, and the subtitles are peppered with the type of errors that commonly occur when converting simplified Chinese to traditional Chinese, suggesting that the content was created by Chinese and the YouTubers are reading from scripts, Shen said.
Before last year’s nine-in-one elections, Chinese Internet users created disinformation that they uploaded using IP addresses in Greece or other locations, he said.
The users mobilized their followers to click on the videos or share them through instant messaging apps such as Line to help them accrue hits, causing YouTube to recommend the pages to a Taiwanese audience, he said.
This time, Chinese Internet users have commissioned Taiwanese Internet personalities to create the content and videos, Shen said, adding that it has been rumored that some YouTubers have received training in China.
In April, online advertisements surfaced in Taiwan that sought to hire “political influencers” to promote “harmony and unification between the two sides of the Taiwan Strait,” Shen said, adding that the ads promised a minimum monthly salary of 5,000 to 10,000 yuan (US$714 to US$1,427).
Some Taiwanese YouTubers are not sponsored by China, but aim to make money by uploading content that appeals to a Chinese audience, which is made obvious by the WeChat and Alipay accounts superimposed on their videos, Shen said.
The operations carried out by Chinese Internet users on Line are of a similar scale as during last year’s elections, but the disinformation seems less organized than last year, suggesting that it is not coming from Beijing, but from other unification supporters in the region, Shen said.
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