By Aayushi Rana, Senior Fact Checker, DFRAC
Bangladesh’s social media is being manipulated by shadowy forces amid violent protests. A surge of bot accounts, all created in May 2024 with no real connection to Bangladesh, is amplifying anti-government hashtags and spreading inflammatory narratives to exploit & worsen the situation.
Copy-Paste Chaos:
First, we observed that bot accounts were created to amplify violent protests. These accounts post identical text across all their posts, mainly sharing screenshots from the violence in Bangladesh. All their post reads: “Dictator Hasina hired terrorists from outlying districts to the capital Dhaka to carry out massacres on students today. Mobile internet has been stopped in Bangladesh since last protests night.” They also repeatedly use hateful hashtags.
These bot accounts not only spam the same text but also recycle identical media, including screenshots of the violence. They even post adult content. Their repetitive nature serves a single purpose: to amplify hateful narratives & hashtags with double the force, manipulating public perception through sheer volume.
Let’s understand with Data :
We identified these accounts as bots by analyzing over 1,040 tweets. Their frequent, repetitive posting of similar content within short intervals revealed their automated nature. As seen in the timeline graph: @ 1:04 PM – 10 Tweets @ 1:05 PM – 11 Tweets @ 1:06 PM – 14 Tweets @ 1:07 PM – 7 Tweets Moreover, It can be seen that with time, the number of tweets/minute increased gradually.
While analyzing the content of the bot accounts. It was seen that the account with the username BlakGilson87557 has done nearly 108 tweets within a very short time, followed by hardman_jo17063 with 104 tweets. HardmanJos67379 posted 81 tweets, followed by BradberryG35137 posted 77 tweets. The bar graph showcases the top 15 bot accounts that all posted most of the copy-paste content.
Upon closer inspection, we found a website link attached to every post from these bot accounts. Investigating the link revealed malicious behavior, redirecting to PADSIMS.COM, a domain identified for scams, phishing, malware, and business email compromise (BEC), confirming the accounts’ involvement in abusive activities.
We scrutinized an account named Antonio Alessandro (ItalyambBD), supposedly the ambassador to Bangladesh since August 2023, yet the account was created in May 2024, coinciding with the bot accounts’ timeline. This account has posted hateful, copy-pasted content against the Bangladesh government and shared a graffiti image of Bangladesh’s PM from known fake news peddler Steve Hanke. Notably, the official Italy in Dhaka account doesn’t follow this account, raising further suspicion.
Our investigation has just unearthed a curious case of digital hatchlings. A bunch of freshly minted accounts (hatched in May 2024, moving among their circuits) through hate-filled rants about the Bangladeshi Protests. But it’s just a single thread in a much larger tapestry of dubious activity.
(Digital Forensics, Research and Analytics Center (DFRAC) is a daily based independent Fact-Checker media organisation)