Expert: Bots Have Little Effect on Political Views, Outcome of Elections

Robotic responders on social media have little effect on political views held by those exposed to their activity, a social media expert says. The New York Times generated another political storm in Israel on Monday when it published a piece supposedly exposing Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's vast army of bots which are working on his behalf ahead of the elections. The report quotes a study by the Big Bots Project, which alleges that it has exposed a network of hundreds of social media accounts, many of them fake, used to smear Netanyahu's opponents. However, the watchdog group found no direct links between the network and Netanyahu or his Likud party. Netanyahu's political opponents immediately called for an investigation into the matter while accusing Netanyahu of "stealing the elections." Netanyahu dismissed the report and pointed to its author, left-wing activist Noam Rotem, who has called Arab terrorists imprisoned in Israel "freedom fighters" and "political prisoners" who should be released, and called on Israeli youth to refuse to serve in the IDF. Rotem has also stated that "Netanyahu is dangerous," and has accused him of setting up "concentration camps for refugees," while charging the IDF with being a "terrorist organization." Furthermore, several of those who have supposedly been exposed as bots were revealed to be real people who expressed their genuine support for Netanyahu. Professor Azi Lev-On, the head of the Institute for the Study of New Media, Society and Politics at the School of Communication at Ariel University, told TPS that in his opinion, the Times report is accurate, and that while everybody is involved in the use of bots, Netanyahu has been found to make greater use of them. He noted that there have been attempts to block or limit the use of bots in political campaigns in Israel, but that Netanyahu's Likud party opposed the legislation. However, when asked about the effect such bot campaigns could have on the political views of those exposed to them, Lev-On estimated that they have very little influence, as voters usually have a solidified political view, and one post or another will not change their minds. Bots deployed to change consumers' opinions on products do have an effect, he says. He explained that bots can be effective in political campaigns in two scenarios: if the targeted political party or entity are new, and therefore people have not formed an opinion of them, or in a situation when the elections are very close, and therefore any small change can make a difference.