Counter disinformation unit

Covid disinformation unit 'hourly contact' with tech firms

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/politics/2023/06/09/david-davis-counter-disinformation-unit-shut-down-lockdown/

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/06/09/covid-disinformation-unit-hourly-tech-lockdown-dissent/

British civil service, secretive government unit

Flagged critics of lockdown and pandemic policy

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/counter-disinformation-unit-open-source-information-collection-and-analysis-privacy-notice/counter-disinformation-unit-open-source-information-collection-and-analysis-privacy-notice

A secretive government Covid unit (CDU),

(A cell within government)

accused of seeking to supress free speech

“hourly” contact with social media firms

The civil servant in charge, Sarah Connolly, pandemic and now

(previously job, anti-terror policies for the Home Office)

one of the Counter Disinformation Unit’s main functions “passing information over”

Facebook and Twitter

“encourage the swift takedown” of posts

CDU worked with social media, to curtail discussion of controversial lockdown policies

“almost all” social media platforms,

discussions were “daily, sometimes hourly”.

“If somebody from the cell says: ‘We are worried about this,’

that goes immediately to the top of the pile.

Whoever it is in whatever company.”

“big” function, “talking to social media platforms and passing information over.

It gets information back from them,

and encourages that swift takedown –

the swift dealing with the platforms.

The cell has daily interactions with almost all the platforms”.

David Davis

“Early on, during the early part of the Covid pandemic, I began to worry that we weren’t really making decisions on science,”

“A lot of the arguments at the time were not really between science and non-science.

They were between authority and non-authority.”

Whitehall is all about control of information.

Information is power.

They know that so they tend to hoard it for themselves.

Monitored and comments were logged by CDU

Now DD called for the CDU to be shut,

and for a parliamentary committee to investigate

“most paranoid wing of Government is interfering in the democratic process”

“There would be a limit to what they could do 25 years ago...

The trouble today is we don’t know what the algorithms do.

We have no idea what deal they’ve struck with Google or Twitter or whoever.

And that’s a really serious influence on debate, not just in Britain, but across the entire world.”

Parliamentary inquiry with the “biggest combination of power, access and speed” now needed

BBC, accused of acting as “the broadcast arm of the Government”

Now

Growing speculation CDU may have links to intelligence

The Government confirmed last night

Social media firms, taken action on more than 90% of referrals

Deleted or using algorithms to get low views

Seems to have been another group;

Counter-Disinformation Policy Forum

A group, which included a member of BBC staff, tech companies, academics, lobby groups.

‘Climate of fear’ over anti-Government reporting at BBC

Current and former BBC staff

In those who suggested BBC reporting lacked balance

branded “dissenters”.

CDU takes a broad view of what qualifies as disinformation.

Mrs Connolly, addressing MPs

the most concerning types of anti-vaccine material included discussions about side-effects and the speed of production

Connolly took control like a ‘puppeteer’

A revolving door of culture secretaries

Rapid succession of ministers

Lack of oversight from No 10

Government sources

“As a hard-working civil servant, she’s an impartial adviser – not a puppeteer,”

Social media posts, CDU and Rapid Response Unit

Dr. Alexandre de Figueiredo, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine,

argued against mass vaccination of children against

Questions about CDU

Budget
Number of workers
Use of external AI firms
List of people targeted

A Government spokesman

“When referrals were made during Covid, over 90% of them were ultimately found to be in breach of terms of service.”

Facebook owner Meta

Does not “allow false claims about the vaccines or vaccination programmes which public health experts have advised us could lead to Covid-19 vaccine rejection.

This includes false claims about the safety, efficacy, ingredients, development, existence or conspiracies related to the vaccine or vaccination programme”.