Microblogging platform Tumblr, perhaps best known for its memes and fan communities, is sending emails to users who interacted with accounts linked to the Internet Research Agency (IRA), a propaganda group tied to the Russian government that spread political messages on social media designed to disrupt the 2016 presidential election.

“Democracy requires transparency and an informed electorate and we take our disclosure responsibility very seriously,” reads an email from Tumblr to one of its users obtained by The Outline. “We’ll be aggressively watching for disinformation campaigns in the future, take the appropriate action, and make sure you know about it.”

According to the email, the company terminated 84 accounts associated with the IRA. The email listed a number of specific accounts linked to the IRA:

1-800-gloup

bellygangstaboo

lagonegirl

mooseblogtimes

morningwoodz previously known as: 5cubes, bangbangempire, empireofweird, gifemprireohh, innerpicsempire, picsempire

rebellloudwiththecrowd previously known as: massivelystrangetyrant

sumchckn previously known as: blondeinpolitics, blvckcommunity, classylgbthomie, hwuudoin, politixblondie

thetrippytrip previously known as: matrixpath, themostpost

thingstolovefor previously known as: the-inner-mirror

Most reporting on the IRA has focused on Facebook and Twitter, where it is believed to have used large botnets and popular political pages to support then-candidate Donald Trump, as well as other perceived underdog causes including Democratic contender Bernie Sanders and the activist group Black Lives Matter.

But the organization was also active on other platforms. In addition to Tumblr, Reddit co-founder Steve Huffman recently disclosed that the site had identified and banned “a few hundred accounts” suspected of being run by Russian operatives.

Earlier this month, Congressional investigators called on Tumblr earlier this month to provide information about how the IRA might have used its platform.

Sign up for our newsletter Subscribe The NSA will be in touch.</s>Tumblr deleted 84 accounts that it says were linked to the Russian Internet Research Agency and were “used as part of a disinformation campaign leading up to the 2016 U.S. election.”

The company is “taking steps to protect against future interference in our political conversation by state-sponsored propaganda campaigns,” Tumblr announced in a Friday post on its staff blog.

Tumblr, which is owned by HuffPost’s parent company Oath, says it uncovered this information last fall and is only alerting users now after investigations have been completed. It added that it is now working to “protect Tumblr in the future.”

During the investigation, the company notified law enforcement, terminated the IRA-linked accounts and deleted all of their original posts. It also said the company worked with the Department of Justice, providing officials information that ultimately helped indict 13 people who worked for the agency.

The blog post also gives readers a run-down of what the Russian agency did, what Tumblr is doing in response to the investigation and how the company plans to stop future disinformation campaigns.

“First, we’ll be emailing anyone who liked, reblogged, replied to, or followed an IRA-linked account with the list of usernames they engaged with,” the post says.

Tumblr also said it will begin keeping a public record of usernames linked to the IRA and that it will “be monitoring Tumblr for signs of state-sponsored disinformation campaigns.” It also encouraged users to keep an eye out for propagandists, be skeptical of what they’re reading and call out people who are spreading misinformation.

“Transparency won’t mean a thing if we don’t participate in the process. Whatever your political stance, voting ensures a government that represents your interests,” the post reads.

The announcement comes after much speculation that Tumblr, like Facebook and Twitter, was facilitating trolls working for the Russia-backed agency. BuzzFeed News reported last month that Russian online trolls posing as black activists on Tumblr had created “hundreds of thousands of interactions for content that ranged from calling Hillary Clinton a ‘monster’ to supporting Bernie Sanders and decrying racial injustice and police violence in the US.”

Many on Twitter praised Tumblr for transparency. Others shared the emails they received from the company:

among the social platforms, i think @tumblr is doing an admirable job taking a clear stance against disinformation and being transparent about what that involves, including this email i got notifying me which russia-linked accounts i had interacted with previously pic.twitter.com/wn927WwaoW — Jenny G. Zhang (@jennygzhang) March 23, 2018

I think it should be pointed out that due to the way Tumblr's platform works, it's highly unlikely this Russia-linked blogs were able to accomplish much. Individual users are incredibly unimportant on Tumblr. Virality on the site doesn't really work the way it does on Twitter. — Ryan Broderick (@broderick) March 23, 2018

As BuzzFeed’s Ryan Broderick notes in his tweet, it is highly unlikely that these Russia-linked blogs were able to do much with their accounts as the platform doesn’t facilitate viral content in the same way Twitter does.</s>Tumblr has confirmed that Kremlin trolls were active on its platform during the 2016 US presidential elections.

In a blog post today the social platform writes that it is “taking steps to protect against future interference in our political conversation by state-sponsored propaganda campaigns”.

The company has also started emailing users who interacted with 84 accounts it now says it has linked to the Russian trollfarm, the Internet Research Agency (IRA).

In the blog post it says it identified the accounts last fall — and “notified law enforcement, terminated the accounts, and deleted their original posts”.

“Behind the scenes, we worked with the Department of Justice, and the information we provided helped indict 13 people who worked for the IRA,” it adds.

In an email sent to a user, which was passed to TechCrunch to review, the company informs the individual they “either followed one of [11] accounts linked to the IRA, or liked or reblogged one of their posts”.

“As part of our commitment to transparency, we want you to know that we uncovered and terminated 84 accounts linked to Internet Research Agency or IRA (a group closely tied to the the Russian government) posing as members of the Tumblr community,” the email begins.

“The IRA engages in electronic disinformation and propaganda campaigns around the world using phony social media accounts. When we uncovered these accounts, we notified law enforcement, terminated the accounts, and deleted their original posts.”

Last month Buzzfeed News — working with researcher, Jonathan Albright, from the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University — claimed to have unearthed substantial Kremlin troll activity on Tumblr’s meme-laden platform — identifying what they dubbed as “a powerful, largely unrevealed network of Russian trolls focused on black issues and activism” which they said dated back to early 2015.

The trolls were reported to be using Tumblr to push anti-Clinton messages, including by actively promoting Democrat rival Bernie Sanders.

Decrying racial injustice and police violence in the US was another theme of the Russian-linked content.

Since then The Daily Beast has also reported on leaked data from the IRA which also implied agents at the trollfarm had used Tumblr — and also Reddit — to spread political propaganda to target the 2016 US election.

Those IRA leaks suggested the IRA had created at least 21 Tumblr accounts — and included names replete with slang terms, including some accounts listed in the user email we’ve reviewed.

Tumblr, which is owned by TechCrunch’s parent company Oath, did not respond to an email we sent to their press office last month asking about possible Kremlin activity on its platform.

In today’s public post, the company writes: “As far as we can tell, the IRA-linked accounts were only focused on spreading disinformation in the U.S., and they only posted organic content. We didn’t find any indication that they ran ads.”

As well as emailing affected users, Tumblr says it will be keeping a public record of usernames linked to the IRA or “other state-sponsored disinformation campaigns”.

The full list of 84 Kremlin accounts on its public page is as follows:

It also suggests users step in and “correct the record” when they see others spreading misinformation, regardless of whether they believe it’s being done intentionally or not.

Concluding its email to the user who had unwittingly engaged with 11 of the identified IRA accounts, Tumblr adds: “We deleted the accounts but decided to leave up any reblog chains so that you can curate your own Tumblr to reflect your own personal views and perspectives.

“Democracy requires transparency and an informed electorate and we take our disclosure responsibility very seriously. We’ll be aggressively watching for disinformation campaigns in the future, take the appropriate action, and make sure you know about it.”

Asked how he feels to learn Kremlin trolls had unknowingly infiltrated his Tumblr feeds, the user told us: “It’s unsettling, although maybe not surprising, that we legitimize and signal boost bad actors on social platforms by ‘liking’ or reposting content that doesn’t appear to have any political agenda at first glance.”</s>Tumblr is the latest social media service to uncover Russian state-sponsored efforts to spread propaganda during the 2016 presidential election.

On Friday, Tumblr said it linked 84 accounts to the Internet Research Agency, an organization accused of running an internet troll farm for the Russian government.

Tumblr uncovered the fake accounts last fall and shut them down. "What makes them so difficult to spot is that they're not spambots. They're real people who get trained and paid to spread propaganda," the company said.

BuzzFeed reported on the problem in February, when a researcher noticed that Russian-controlled Tumblr accounts were posing as black activists. The accounts offered critical takes on Hillary Clinton, local police, and white people via memes, animated GIFs, and shared tweets written in English—leaving little reason to suspect the content came from Russia.

Tumblr remained quiet on the matter until Friday when the service explained it had been helping the Department of Justice investigate the fake accounts. This culminated in a federal indictment last month that charged the Internet Research Agency and 13 suspects of trying to meddle in the US election through fake social media accounts.

Tumblr now plans on emailing users who liked, reblogged, replied to, or followed any of the Russian-controlled accounts. "Second, we're going to start keeping a public record of usernames we've linked to the IRA (Internet Research Agency) or other state-sponsored disinformation campaigns," the service said.

The account names include "bleepthepolice," "4mysquad," "swagintherain," "black-to-the-bones," and "stopropaganda." Tumblr is also advising its users to be on guard against future misinformation campaigns. US intelligence officials have warned that foreign agents could very well strike social media again, it said.

In the meantime, Tumblr said it'll monitor account activity for signs of bad actors, and remove the offending accounts. "Disinformation campaigns work because they know people don't fact check," Tumblr said. "Look for reliable sources, and double-check that the source really says the same thing as the post."</s>On Friday, Tumblr published a list of accounts that it said were linked to "state-sponsored disinformation campaigns."

The list of 84 accounts appeared to have been suspended or deleted, and they are believed to be linked to Russian efforts to influence Americans in the run-up to the 2016 presidential election. Other tech companies, including Twitter, Facebook, and Google, have previously come forward and even testified before Congress concerning what they experienced on their platforms. However, Tumblr, which is owned by Oath (a Verizon subsidiary), has not.

In February, Special Counsel Robert Mueller released a 37-page indictment against the Internet Research Agency, a well-known Russian bot and troll factory, and named 13 Russians on charges of "conspiracy to defraud the United States," wire fraud, and bank fraud, among others. Tumblr, however, was not specifically named.

"Last fall, we uncovered 84 Tumblr accounts linked to the Russian government through the Internet Research Agency, or IRA," the company wrote in a statement. "These accounts were being used as part of a disinformation campaign leading up to the 2016 US election. After uncovering the activity, we notified law enforcement, terminated the accounts, and deleted their original posts. Behind the scenes, we worked with the Department of Justice, and the information we provided helped indict 13 people who worked for the IRA."

Tumblr spokesman Charles Stewart did not respond to Ars’ request for comment as to whether this list was comprehensive or why it took so long to be released. He simply referred us to the company's blog post.

In February 2018, BuzzFeed News reported on these Tumblr accounts largely based on research done by Jonathan Albright, the research director of the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University. But Tumblr never responded, despite opening the email BuzzFeed News sent nearly 300 times.

In a brief interview, Albright told Ars that of the accounts listed, one known as 4mysquad was "far and away the most influential account on Tumblr" that was controlled by IRA. (That Tumblr page also had a Twitter account under the same name.)

When Ars briefly went through some of the old posts saved on the Internet Archive, it seemed that relatively few posts were directly pertinent to the presidential campaign. Many of the posts, for instance, touched on black-oriented social justice topics. We did find one post that specifically advocated in favor of Democratic candidate Bernie Sanders.

"Routinely you’ll see the pattern where they post conversational things and then when it’s time to drive in something, they will basically push something really hard, but they’re not always pushing out very explicit messages," Albright said. "The amount of stuff that was put out was staggering. It takes a lot of work to do that."

We have posted a few images captured from 4mysquad’s account below.</s>After months of silence, Tumblr Friday released a list of 84 usernames and their aliases that it says were connected to "state-sponsored disinformation and propaganda campaigns." It's the first time the company has publicly acknowledged what journalists and researchers have known now for months: Russian trolls also used Tumblr to spread their divisive memes and gifs, reportedly to the tune of hundreds of thousands of interactions.

"Democracy requires transparency and an informed electorate, and we take our responsibilities very seriously," Tumblr wrote in a brief introduction to the list. "We aggressively monitor Tumblr for signs of state-sponsored disinformation campaigns, and take the appropriate action when we uncover anything." A company spokesperson declined to answer follow-up questions about what form that monitoring takes, how comprehensive the current list is, and what took Tumblr so long to make this information public.

While Facebook, Twitter, and Google have all testified before Congress about the ways trolls from the Russian Internet Research Agency abused their platforms to create political chaos during the 2016 election, Tumblr has remained remarkably silent on the matter. In fact, when researcher Jonathan Albright told Buzzfeed about IRA-related content on Tumblr, the blogging company and its parent business Oath offered no comment at all, despite reportedly opening Buzzfeed's emails more than 290 times.

Albright, who has amassed a trove of IRA-linked content from across the web, stumbled on the Tumblr posts while he was analyzing Russia's trolling Facebook and Twitter content. He noticed a large percentage of posts on those sites linked to Tumblr. In particular, he found an account called 4mysquad that he says, "brought out a universe of propaganda."

"It was huge," Albright says. "It was one of the biggest components of trying to reach young black youth in urban communities."

Tumblr's list of usernames, which includes 4mysquad, bears out both that influence and focus. Among the accounts are names like bleepthepolice, blacknproud, blackness-by-your-side, and black-to-the-bones. One particularly disturbing post Albright unearthed from 4mysquad featured a GIF of a black girl being sexually assaulted by a police officer. The description for the video said that the officer in question was a member of NYPD; he was in fact a police officer in South Africa.

While the accounts are no longer active, several of them were archived by the Wayback Machine, offering at least a partial glimpse into the strategy behind the disinformation campaigns. As on Facebook and Reddit, the Russian-backed accounts mixed general interest memes and GIFs with more politically charged content. An IRA account that went by "thetrippytrip," for instance, focused largely on race issues in the months leading up to the election, but occasionally posted eclectic artworks as well.

While Tumblr posts often don't require an expansive textual element, the accounts do appear to have had a spotty command of English grammar. The IRA account "bastardpigeon," previously known as "pigeonbastard," appears to have created a meme that includes the just-off phrase "What Motto Do We See On Police Cars."

One language-challenged banned account also stands out as particularly cheeky: stopropaganda, which purportedly "created this blog to dedicate my free time combating the propaganda of terrorism." In a 2015 post, the state-sponsored troll behind stopropaganda crafted a knowing message: "If you have questions or suggestions, please contact me, I am ready to dialogue. Media is a powerful weapon in the hands of terrorists, do not underestimate this tool."

Not surprisingly, the accounts often promoted each others' posts, in an apparently successful effort to expand their reach. They also mostly appear to have continued posting long after the election, a reminder that, as intelligence officials have repeatedly warned, Russia's efforts to subvert US democracy have continued unabated.

Tumblr is not the only tech company that has tried to fly under the radar as its larger counterparts face regular scrutiny in Congress and in the press. Earlier this month, Reddit revealed it too had deleted hundreds of accounts with ties to the Internet Research Agency. A WIRED investigation found more than a thousand links to Russian propaganda websites are still live on Reddit, and unearthed two suspicious accounts that Reddit immediately shut down.

It's unclear how many Russian accounts, if any, continue to operate on Tumblr. Given the number of accounts that flooded Facebook, Twitter, and Reddit, it seems hard to imagine that the IRA's Tumblr efforts stopped at 84. Tumblr says it "will be maintaining" the current list, indicating other accounts may well join it.
• Even after Reddit banned Russia-affiliated accounts, WIRED found that over a thousand links to IRA propaganda sites remained on its platform
• And Facebook still doesn't know how many followers Russian trolls had on Instagram
• Russian ads were so effective because they knew how to push our buttons</s>The company says that the IRA employed more than a thousand people to engage in electronic disinformation campaigns around the world using fake social media accounts. It also reports that the IRA-linked Tumblr accounts were only focused on the US and weren't advertising, but rather organic content. In response, the company will email everyone who liked, reblogged, replied to or followed an IRA linked account with the usernames included. Tumblr will also keep a public record of usernames linked to the IRA or other state-sponsored propaganda groups. It will not remove any reblog chains, stating that this would constitute an encroachment on its users' free speech. The company will continue to monitor its service for similar activity in the future, and will take the same steps if it finds evidence of such. Ultimately, though, Tumblr says that it's also the general public's responsibility to be aware of the possibility of this sort of disinformation and remain skeptical.</s>In an effort to protect Tumblr visitors from state-sponsored propaganda, the microblogging site published a long list of user accounts that it has linked to "disinformation campaigns".

There are 84 accounts listed so far, and it appears that Tumblr will add to the list as more users fit the site's criteria. Tumblr wrote on its website:

"Democracy requires transparency and an informed electorate, and we take our responsibilities very seriously. We aggressively monitor Tumblr for signs of state-sponsored disinformation campaigns, and take the appropriate action when we uncover anything."

Tumblr's actions come at a time of heightened scrutiny on social engineering through social networks. Facebook, Twitter and other social networks have been sharply accused of allowing fake news and planted opinions to influence voter opinion in the 2016 US presidential campaign. Although not specifically stated here, Russia has been the center of these accusations.

CNET reached out to the Russian Embassy for comment. When asked to comment, Tumblr referred us to this blog post explaining its actions to protect against propaganda campaigns.

Social engineering is also at the heart of a scandal embroiling Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerburg. The personal data of millions of Facebook users were collected through a legitimate app that did not violate Facebook's policies at the time, but then shared with Cambridge Analytica, a UK-based data consultancy identified as misusing the data to sway Brexit and Trump voters.

Zuckerberg and Facebook are under fire for allowing the situation to take place, and for failing to publicly report the discovery of Cambridge Analytica's possession of personal data. Critics in the US House committee are calling for Zuckerberg to testify. Zuckerberg himself admitted that it might be time for regulators to step in.

The results of the scandal could affect every social networking site used in the US, Tumblr included.</s>Tumblr confirmed on Friday that Russian trolls spread misinformation on the blogging service in prelude to the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

Tumbler, part of the Verizon Communications’-owned Oath media group, said it discovered last fall that 84 accounts were linked to the Internet Research Agency. This Russian propaganda outfit was one of the groups identified in a recent Justice Department indictment alleging the Kremlin’s role in spreading fake news through popular social media services to increase division among Americans and interfere with the 2016 presidential elections.

Tumblr’s confirmation that Russia-linked groups misused its service follows a similar admission by social media forum operator Reddit in early March. The IRA and other Russian-linked entities were also alleged by the DOJ to have spread fake news and misleading online advertising on social networks like Facebook (fb) and Twitter (twtr).

Tumblr said that after discovering the questionable accounts, it contacted U.S. law enforcement, terminated the accounts, and deleted the posts, the contents of which Tumblr did not describe. The Russian-linked Tumblr accounts spread misinformation via “organic content,” or conventional postings, rather than online ads, Tumblr said.

The blogging service said it worked “behind the scenes” with the DOJ and provided information that led to the Justice Department’s indictment, revealed in February.

“Remember, the IRA and other state-sponsored disinformation campaigns play off our zero-sum politics,” Tumblr said in a statement. “They want to drive a wedge between us so that we spend our time fighting with each other instead of building towards the future. We’ll be watching for signs of future activity, but the best defense is knowing how they operate and how to judge the content you see.”

Tumblr said it would notify users who interacted with any of the IRA-linked accounts and that it would keep a public record of usernames associated with those accounts. Some of the IRA-linked usernames include 1-800-gloup, best-usa-today, ricordio, and stopropaganda, according to a separate Tumblr post.</s>The blogging platform Tumblr has unmasked 84 accounts that it says were used by a shadowy Russian internet group to spread disinformation during the 2016 US election campaign.

Tumblr said it uncovered the scheme in late 2017, helping an investigation that led to the indictment in February of 13 individuals linked to the Russia-based Internet Research Agency (IRA).

The announcement adds Tumblr to the list of internet platforms targeted in a social media campaign that US officials said sought to disrupt the 2016 election and help boost Donald Trump’s bid to defeat Hillary Clinton.

A Tumblr statement said it discovered the accounts “were being used as part of a disinformation campaign leading up to the 2016 US election”.

The company said it notified law enforcement, terminated the accounts, and deleted the posts while working “behind the scenes” with the US Justice Department.

Tumblr said it is now free to disclose what happened, and unveiled steps to protect the platform against further disinformation campaigns.

The blogging site said it would notify by email “anyone who liked, reblogged, replied to, or followed an IRA-linked account with the list of usernames they engaged with,” the statement said.

It also listed the 84 user names linked to the Russian “troll farm” so users could see if they had interactions with the entities.

“We’re committed to transparency and want you to know everything that we know,” the statement said.

“We’ve decided to leave up any reblog chains that might be on your Tumblrs – you can choose to leave them or delete them. We’re letting you decide because the reblog chains contain posts created by real Tumblr users, often challenging or debunking the false and incendiary claims in the IRA-linked original post.”
Tumblr shuts down 84 accounts linked to the Internet Research Agency.