Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (NSW, Liberal Party) Share this | Hansard source

Last year, a declassified and redacted US intelligence community report detailed Russia's multifaceted influence campaign in recent US elections, part of which involved its Internet Research Agency of professional internet trolls. This report assessed:

Moscow will apply lessons learned from its Putin-ordered campaign aimed at the US presidential election to future influence efforts worldwide, including against US allies and their election processes.

Recently, in a story that deserved much more attention than it received, The Australian reported:

Twitter accounts linked to an infamous Russian "troll factory" spread politically charged posts about Australian politics, including the 2016 federal election and last year’s marriage-equality survey.

A trove of almost three million tweets associated with the Internet Research Agency, compiled by American academics, has revealed hundreds of posts that related directly to Australian politics.

…   …   …

The tweets were targeted at progressives and conservatives, with right-wing posts lamenting the "Islamisation" of Australian society and expressing support for the nationalist Reclaim Australia movement.

…   …   …

On the political left, the trolls' tweets drew attention to issues of racial injustice and spread messages critical of the Coalition government and Pauline Hanson’s One Nation.

I note that Australian cybersecurity agencies have provided a classified briefing to political party leaders on the cyber threat to the electoral process, but we must also guard against a variety of domestic Twitter campaigns which are also not what they seem.

Tonight, I want to focus on the activities of an Australian offshoot of an American online activist group called Sleeping Giants Oz. Sleeping Giants Oz claims to be combatting bigotry, racism and sexism in the media and trying to 'stop hate speech in the media by stopping its ad dollars'. Followers are encouraged to identify 'hate speech' and to send a screenshot of the ad next to the supposedly offending content to the advertiser, copying in Sleeping Giants at the same time—the aim being to discourage advertisers from advertising with that media outlet, often with the threat of consumer boycott. Advertisers have been told to demand their ads not appear on the same or opposite page to any coverage of Pauline Hanson or One Nation—an action claimed to be aimed at stopping racism. The same confused thinking was behind one follower's boycott of liquor shop Dan Murphy's because their ad appeared on the opposite page to a The Daily Telegraph column by Miranda Devine. Such actions whip up online vigilantism, with all its potential excesses, in an effort to censor coverage or expression of opposing political views.

Sleeping Giants Oz was also active in the same-sex marriage plebiscite, demanding assurances from printing companies that they would not print the elusive 'stop the fags' poster supposedly spied in a Melbourne laneway but believed to be a social media prank by same-sex marriage proponents. But Sleeping Giants' main targets in Australia are Sky News and News Corp more generally, and also 2GB—specifically Alan Jones. Sleeping Giants Oz made clear its intentions in August 2017 when it accused Sky News and the Murdoch print media of whipping up 'hatred and division'. However, last month Sleeping Giants Oz began a concerted campaign against Sky News following an interview on Sky's Adam Giles Show with Australian United Patriots Front founder, Blair Cottrell. Despite Sky News apologising profusely for this interview and notwithstanding Cottrell's previous appearance on Channel 7 and interview by the ABC triple j Hack program, Sleeping Giants Oz unleashed a wave of confected fury.

But the anonymity of Sleeping Giants' campaigns destroys their credibility. Often, anonymous campaigns like Sleeping Giants have ulterior commercial motives. In the US and Australia, these campaigns appear at first glance to be propagated by advertising industry types with political motivations. In the US, Sleeping Giants began after the 2016 election by targeting the influential Breitbart News, operating entirely anonymously until July 2018, when advertising industry copywriter and registered Democrat Matt Rivitz was outed as the group's founder.

The reason such campaigns crave anonymity is they don't want to be exposed as being politically inspired and, more importantly, they rely on deceiving people—in this case, advertisers—about their real level of support. Here, it's been revealed that a key figure in Sleeping Giants Oz is advertising industry consultant Denise Shrivell, though she describes her involvement as advocacy while the group itself claims she is only 'a dearest friend'. Clearly Ms Shrivell, who regularly posts to Sleeping Giants Oz, is a prime mover in this group.

Ms Shrivell runs a consultancy called MediaScope, which is promoted as connecting advertising buyers and advertising sellers within niche, ambient, below-the-line, emerging mobile, digital and independent media platforms. MediaScope produces graphics called MediaScapes, one of which purports to plot Australian media by political complexion as being either progressive, centre or conservative, which is how she categorizes Sky News. She also regularly tweets a list of media of which she approves, including The Guardian, The Saturday Paper, New Matilda, The Monthly, The New Daily and Independent Australia.

In mid-2016, Denise Shrivell wrote of her recent political awakening, saying: 'Over the last 12 or so months, I've had a political awakening. My husband says it's like I've been born again, and in some ways he's right. I've found my political truth and can finally see the realities of our political and news media landscape. Overall, it's a compelling, sorry story and is something we should all be aware of.' Quite so! Ms Shrivell is active in the North Shore Labor politics. Her Facebook profile page has pictures of her doorknocking for Ms Keneally, now Senator Keneally, in Bennelong. She is obviously untroubled by Senator Keneally's previous association with Sky.

Although Sleeping Giants Oz claims to have no political allegiances, on Twitter Shrivell is fanatically pro-Labor and anti-coalition, repeatedly suggesting the country is sliding towards fascism and authoritarianism. It has now emerged that fewer than 200 individual Twitter accounts were responsible for 53 per cent of Sleeping Giants' campaign against Sky News following the Blair Cottrell interview; that as few as 10 of these 200 accounts generated a total of 4,500 tweets in 45 days aimed at advertisers; and that more than 70 per cent of the Twitter accounts are anonymous. Here we have a case study of how anonymous multiple Twitter accounts are used to massively amplify campaigns, in this case targeting advertisers on Sky News. It's simply online astroturfing.

Sleeping Giants' most prolific anti-Sky News tweeter is an anonymous account which goes by the interesting name What You See Is What You Get. Its blurb says the owner of this account is 'committed to driving all forms of hate speech, including racism and misogyny, out of Oz media'. This account also features a Bitmoji-type avatar of a woman with long blond hair and glasses who could be mistaken for Ms Shrivell herself and who coincidentally happens to share some of her interests and preoccupations. Many times daily, What You See Is What You Get tweets at different advertisers, accusing them of financing or supporting an alleged hideous agenda of racism, misogyny and homophobia in an effort to engage and dissuade them from advertising on Sky News, occasionally even threatening a personal boycott of their product. By comparison, Ms Shrivell's tweets, while supportive of Sleeping Giants, are more circumspect and by and large do not directly criticise individual advertisers. I note she is reported as denying she runs Sleeping Giants Oz or set up its anonymous Twitter accounts.

In conclusion, I would stress that the anonymity of Sleeping Giants' operators and their reliance on anonymous Twitter accounts completely destroys the credibility of their campaigns and, indeed, attracts suspicion about the group's motivation. Advertisers should be aware, particularly in the lead-up to election campaigns, not only that Sleeping Giants Oz engage in multiple anonymous and therefore suspect accounts to amplify its attacks but also that its attacks are politically motivated. Thankfully, most advertisers so far appear not to have been conned by this campaigning. I will have more to say on the deceptiveness— (Time expired)

Senate adjourned at 18:30