Like everyone else around the globe, we at Omelas have been tracking Covid-19, preparing for it, and taking the necessary precautions.
We’ve also been active in using our data sets to see what all major actors, both state and non-state, are saying about Covid-19. It is a critical time for our society to come together and be human as we battle this unprecedented challenge. We are on the lookout for any external threats that have the potential of making the situation worse.
So, every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, we are posting our data analytics for free until the pandemic is deemed over.
Stay healthy. Stay resilient.
MONDAY, APRIL 6, 2020
Of the 68 NATO accounts we track across all social media platforms, RSS feeds, and websites, only 5 posts mentioned Coronavirus on Sunday the 5th out of 56 total posts. For comparison, Russia, NATO’s adversary, pushed out 15,649 pieces of content in the same time period.
From March 23-April 4, 2020, NATO only posted 70 times on Coronavirus, much of which was focused on giving aid to Italy and the Czech Republic. The most recent narrative is about the arrival of German ventilators in Spain. The 129 pieces of content were posted from 20 participating brands on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram in descending order of popularity. The language diversity is also about as stale as the range of platforms.
What’s interesting is that all of NATO’s posts on disinformation around the virus uses the term COVID-19 while the majority of its posts uses “Coronavirus”. Not entirely sure if that is due to a US-European language choice: US prefers COVID-19 while the majority of Europe uses Coronavirus.
FRIDAY, APRIL 3, 2020
The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has followed its drastic measures to curb the spread of COVID-19 with an all-out information campaign to present their response at home as visionary as their leadership abroad as magnanimous. Among the stories of Chinese engineers constructing makeshift hospitals in record time, and Chinese doctors sharing their accomplishments with afflicted nations around the world, a consistent theme in the CCP’s messaging has been the value of Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) in treating COVID-19.
Chinese state media began extolling the value of TCM almost as soon as the virus began attracting international attention, with four posts on Weibo in Chinese on January 28, discussing the efforts of the National Administration of Traditional Chinese Medicine, a branch of China’s National Health Commission.
The posts marked the beginning of a long lasting campaign to support the claim that TCM was key to fighting COVID-19. Over the ensuing three months, Chinese state media posted 201 times across 55 accounts on the subject. The posts appeared on Reddit, Facebook, YouTube, RSS, Instagram, Weibo, and Twitter. In line with China’s IO campaign “Chinese Scientific Prowess Coveted Around The World” (2019–11–18 to 2020–02–12 with 3,751 posts), the focus on TCM’s efficacy was international. Posts came in 11 languages, only a quarter of which were in Chinese. The reports have been overwhelmingly positive, with a sentiment score of +0.32, though audience response has been muted, with a resonance of -0.02 and average engagements per post of only 10.
In recent weeks, the focus has shifted to how China is evangelizing TCM to the rest of the world. China has posted about collaborations to train American and Italian doctors in TCM. On March 23rd, China began claiming that TCM treatment was effective in 90% of cases of COVID-19.
The CCP’s narrative of how the wonders of state engineering and healthcare have combined with traditional Chinese practices fits neatly into Xi’s Socialism with Chinese Characteristics for a New Era, the CCP’s organizing ideology. As far smaller Western societies far surpass China in total number of cases, the CCP has a uniquely captive audience to offer their blend of socialism and nationalism. Their propaganda machine is taking full advantage.
WEDNESDAY, APRIL 1, 2020
Today’s Covid-19 update will be focused on what the breakaway republics and secessionist movements are saying about the virus. We included in our analysis Ahwaz Separatist Movement, Balochistan Separatist Movement, Donetsk People’s Republic, Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic, Republic of Abkhazia, Republic of Somaliland, and Republic of South Ossetia.
In total, these seven actors are active across 43 brands with some actors posting more than 500 times per day. While Twitter is usually the leading platform, in this case, it is second to VK, followed by YouTube, ok.ru, Telegram, and Facebook. The spread of platforms is much more even than the majority of the actors–state, parastatal, and non-state–that we track.
In terms of narratives, all the breakaway republics are discussing Covid-19 but not in the same sense as Western actors, which tend to be more centered on the number of cases, the epidemiological nature of the virus, and its economic impact. All the narratives of breakaway republics are around the security restrictions of the republic and the border closings with the major country from which they are attempting to breakaway. For Donetsk, that means Ukraine, while the Ahwaz Separatists are disparaging what the Iranian government is doing to contain the pandemic. In short, the rebellion streak of these actors is still live and well.
MONDAY, MARCH 30, 2020
China’s IO strategies around Covid19 have evolved much more rapidly than in normal circumstances. In the past two years, China’s IO strategies have been steady with one or two new, distinct campaigns per month. But now, there are 2–3 new campaigns every week. For the past week, the top ones by engagement rates are below in the graphic:
China has also been taking a page out of the Russian playbook by using human stories to exemplify their campaigns rather than stale, neutral content that we are used to from government accounts. We saw a dramatic spike in active engagement rates on March 1st. Upon further exploration, we saw that it was due to an Instagram post of two frontline doctors from Shanghai having to have their wedding at the Wuhan hospital where they are fighting Covid-19. The Account is CCTV, the largest state-run TV station. It received more +82,000 likes.
FRIDAY, MARCH 27, 2020
The overall online information environment has had no clear winner in terms of engagement rates, though Russia continues to lead over France, followed by the UK, Germany, and then the US. A breakdown by brand is below:
Non-state actors, such as designated foreign terrorist organizations, are also catching up and posting about Covid19, though it is still only around 1–18% of the total content. Though Hezbollah puts out the most content, it only ranks 4th in terms of engagement. The organization with the most active engagement rate is Hamas.
FTOs by engagement rates:
- Hamas
- Popular Mobilisation Forces
- Al-Shabaab
- Hezbollah
- Houthis
- Taliban.
FTOs by the number of posts:
- Hezbollah
- Hamas
- PMF
- Houthis
It is also interesting to note the huge percentage of their content on Telegram, second only after Twitter.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 25, 2020
For the first time since the Covid19 crisis began, Venezuela surpassed all the other major official media/propaganda producers on March 20th. It had 845 posts on Coronavirus in one day, which is 82 more than the 2nd actor, Russia, which posted 763 times in the same day.
The top four narratives coming out of Venezuela that day are the following in descending order of engagement rate:
- Rodriguez: The Coronavirus Virus is Killed by Solidarity
- Venezuela Confirms Two Cases of Coronavirus
- Efforts Are Articulated to Guarantee Supply to the Social and Collective Quarantine
- Chinese Embassy in Venezuela Rejects Accusations about the Origin of Coronavirus
We also took a look at the Arabic-language content on Coronavirus. Qatar and its Al-Jazeera affiliates leads in the amount of content with 41 posts on it yesterday. However, France24 Arabic leads in engagement rates, despite the fact that it only had 7 posts during the same time period.
Hamas came in at no. 2 in terms of content produced: 188 posts from March 11–24, 2020. Its primary narrative is the closing of the Gaza Crossing due to Coronavirus. It also reposted content from Israeli health department in publicizing the number of Coronavirus cases in Israel and the number of cases in the Occupied Terroritories (1656 new cases; 31 in serious condition). Sadly, Arabic content about Coronavirus continues to substantially lag behind other languges, especially given the large population of the +1B Arabic speakers in the world.
MONDAY, MARCH 23, 2020
Over the weekend, the top narrative by engagement rate changed from the health implications of Covid-19 to the economic impact of the virus. In the past three days alone, the top actor, Russia, posted 751 times on the economic slowdown from its top two brands alone.
The second narrative overall on Covid-19 is the Coronavirus Vaccine Trials Start in US. 172 brands participated in this narrative on Twitter, RSS feeds, Telegram, Reddit, YouTube, and VK in the order of decreasing post counts. The variety of brands is surprising:
The next level up from narratives (which are comprised of posts) is campaigns. For the first time since we began tracking campaigns over a year ago, a campaign created by the US came up as number 1 in terms of the number of posts: The US Implements Serious Measures to Address the Spread of Coronavirus.
The US posted 1,051 times across 257 brands in 21 languages between March 18–22 though they only got 1,622 active engagements. In comparison, the number 1 campaign by active engagement rate, “The Restructured Government Will Enhance Russian Strength and Prosperity”, by Russia only has 261 posts but 95,325 engagements from March 16–22.
FRIDAY, MARCH 20, 2020
While Western media continues to be primarily focused on Coronavirus, Iranian official propaganda has been emphasizing US violation of Iraqi sovereignty by targeting an Iranian backed militia as well as the release of an Iranian political prison by the US and UK.
In the meantime, the Taliban has bought into the Chinese conspiracy theory that Covid-19 originated in the US as a bio weapon against the rest of the world. It has retweeted the conspiracy multiple times on its official account with smiley or smirk emojis.
In terms of social media platforms, we’ve seen a dramatic uptick in government propaganda on Aparat, or Iranian Youtube. It rose by 47% since Wednesday. Surprisingly, the amount of Chinese propaganda on Weibo has vacillating wildly in the past two days: +28% from Wednesday to Thursday before plummeting -32% from Thursday to Friday.
WEDNESDAY, MARCH 18, 2020
Interesting drastic change in audience resonance in 24 hours. All countries’ content pertaining to Coronavirus (the international term for Covid-19) were negative at -.13, which is a sharp decrease from the previous day’s average of -0.09. The audience’s induced sentiments were also negative, dropping from -0.02 to -0.05.
Top Three Campaigns by Engagement Rates. The surprise is that the top campaign with 19,000 engagement views is a far cry from Russia’s top overall campaign (The Restructured Government Will Enhance Russian Strength and Prosperity) with 38,522 engagements across 42 participating brands in 4 languages.
- Iran Takes All Necessary Measures to Fight the Coronavirus and Protect Its People by Iran
- The CCP’s Favorable Policies Against the Coronavirus Allow the Resumption of Business by PRC
- CCP Gambles Chinese Lives by Suppressing Public Expression on Coronavirus by USA
MONDAY, MARCH 16, 2020
Top three IO campaigns on Covid internationally based on engagement rates:
- The State Brings Order and Prosperity to Common Russians: first detected on March 9th. with 10,013 engagements across 18 participating brands in 2 languages
- CCP Successfully Marshals Every Resource to Combat the Novel Coronavirus: first detected on March 9 with 607 posts, 7,282 engagements across 98 participating brands in 21 languages
- Iran Takes All Necessary Measures to Fight the Coronavirus and Protect Its People: first detected on March 10 with 74 posts and 5,989 engagements across 16 participating brands in 3 languages
