China is deploying thousands of fake social media profiles to influence the outcome of the 2024 U.S. presidential election.
Harlan Report appeared to be a startup news program like many others. Its bio on TikTok promised to make American media great again.
“No opinions, just facts,” it said.
Like so many insurgent media profiles, the videos posted by Harlan seemed genuinely aimed at exposing government corruption and pushing back against an otherwise left-wing-dominated mediascape.
That much was clear when a video Harlan shared went viral, earning more than 1.5 million views. It claimed to show President Joe Biden making a sexual remark at the annual NATO Summit in Washington.
But something was off.
The transcript used in the video was wrong, and Biden never said what was claimed.
There were also other red flags.
The owner of the Harlan Report account originally claimed to be a U.S. military veteran who had lost faith in Biden. Soon after, they claimed to be a 29-year-old Trump supporter in New York. Months later, they claimed to be a 31-year-old Republican social media influencer from Florida.
Then, the account’s handle was later changed to “Harlan_RNC,” insinuating an official link to the Republican Party.
But Harlan was neither a legitimate news source nor run by an American citizen.
According to the findings of a report released last month by Graphika, a social network analysis company, Harlan Report was one of thousands of accounts linked to the world’s largest online influence operation.
That operation, dubbed “Spamouflage,” is a state-backed campaign from communist China with links to Chinese law enforcement.
Unlike the Harlan Report, most of Spamouflage’s efforts are not focused on targeting American conservatives but on amplifying existing criticisms toward American society and government at large.
There are other accounts that create similar content, but tailored for Democrats, and others that aim to anger and polarize independents, further disenfranchising them from the political process altogether.
Some have impersonated American anti-war activists, sharing memes calling former President Donald Trump a “fraud” and showing him in an orange prison uniform. Others question the legitimacy of Biden’s presidency.
What makes the Harlan Report persona unique is its success in finding a following and its pioneering role in targeting a niche audience the same way any advertiser would.
