Be wary of measuring bot accounts

Re: “Republicans press investigation of FBI while Democrats question GOP motives,” (Politics & Government, Jan. 24).

When discussing the #ReleaseTheMemo the story says that it is Russian bots who are promoting the hashtag, according to the Alliance For Securing Democracy (ASD). This implies a fundamental misunderstanding of the ASD’s method. They track and publish trends in a network of some 600 accounts that derive from three separate networks, only one of which includes bot accounts.

In fact, its method includes legitimate, high-use users who often tweet topics that have been targeted as Russian media campaigns. Simply being incredibly active and sharing political views with Russian interests can land American citizens in this network.

Therefore, while increased activity on this network could mean 100 percent bot activity, it could equally mean no bot activity at all. We have no insight into which parts of the network are active, only that pro-Russian amplification is occurring.

This story was originally published February 2, 2018 at 7:13 PM with the headline "Be wary of measuring bot accounts."