February 28, 2020

"A high school student created a fake 2020 candidate. Twitter verified it."

CNN reports.
After Twitter announced in December that it would give a blue checkmark to verify all 2020 congressional and gubernatorial candidates, the high school senior decided to test how the company was verifying that candidates really were who they said they were -- and if they existed in the first place.

"During Christmas break I was kind of bored and I learned a lot from history class [about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election]..." the high school student told CNN....

For the photograph of the fake candidate, he said he downloaded a picture from a website called This Person Does Not Exist....

47 comments:

Antiantifa said...

"I learned a lot from history class [about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election]..." Unbelievable. Our tax dollars hard at work, spreading Trump Derangement Syndrome Russian-collusion bullshit.

tim maguire said...

I learned a lot from history class [about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election]

Nate Silver: If you wrote out a list of the most important factors in the 2016 election, I'm not sure that Russian social media memes would be among the top 100. The scale was quite small and there's not much evidence that they were effective.

tim maguire said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Ken B said...

Both hilarious and sad. I hope this kid learns about Gell Mann Amnesia.

henry said...

Gee, that fact checking from the media is now on social media.

AlbertAnonymous said...

I bet this person learned all kinds of things from “history class” about Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Probably very little of it accurate and very little of it “history”. Unless it’s a super uber modern really f-ing recent history class ...

We used to call that current events not history.

Qwinn said...

US high schools and colleges have been pure transmission vectors for Democrat lies and propaganda for at least 80 years. If you think you or your kids have been immune to it, you're wrong. No matter how conservative you think you are, you have bought their bullshit on some level you're not even aware of yet. I have no doubt that I have, too. If you're a Democrat and don't even treat anything you were taught that backs up your biases critically, you are probably dumber, more ignorant and more incorrect than the average medieval serf.

Carol said...

rUsSiA hAcKeD mY cOuNtY's VoTiNg MaChInEs

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

update: 'I learned a lot in my public school about how Hillary was cheated by her benefactors in Russia. How odd that Hillary's benefactors in Russia helped Trump win!"

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Our public education system is built to hand our nation over to the communists - so they can turn a once thriving nation into Cuba.

Michael Moore movie in 5-B after mac and cheese in the cafeteria.


rhhardin said...

Purple Unicorn ✔️

ga6 said...

And Bloomberg sent him ten million before the hoax was revealed...

Nonapod said...

Adversarial machine learning is extremely powerful for certain specific tasks like the generation of images fake people. If it could be applied to something like generating protein structures, we could probably engineer treatments, cures, and vaccines for various diseases at highly accelerated rates.

We're entering a weird new era.

Char Char Binks, Esq. said...

I thought I voted for Trump because he promised to shoot someone on Fifth Avenue. Turns out the Russkies tricked me with their meme about Jesus armwrestling Satan. Dang!

Narr said...

Sound like the kid was so bored during the break that he learned something from history class.

Of course he's a little indoctrinaire and not a clear thinker, but imagine what would happen if every bored kid spent his time trying to learn something!

Narr
Utopian, I know

Equipment Maintenance said...

I think Trump should start a Literacy program. Then even Bernie would vote for him !

WK said...

The kid should be hauled in front of the FEC for not reporting in-kind contributions for the development of the candidate’s website.

Jupiter said...

I suppose when you have been as successful as the Democrats at selling absurd lies to American voters, it seems reasonable to worry that a few Russians with a FaceBook account could be influencing American elections. I wonder when the Democrats think the Russians first set out to undermine American democracy. They don't seem to realize that their entire platform is based upon Soviet propaganda from the last century.

MadisonMan said...

Well done, kid!

chuck said...

The interesting thing here is that he learned about Russian interference in the 2016 election in a history class. I'm starting to think schools may be the biggest practitioners of election interference, and all on the public dime.

Temujin said...

Twitter reminds me of government. They make a lot of statements that don't actually apply to reality. And they make a lot of rules that they don't follow, but use those rules to hold against people who hold views they don't approve of.

There are a huge number of blue checked Twitter users who you would not invite into your living room. Louis Farrakhan for one. Yes, I know they finally removed his blue checkmark. But only after being embarrassed about it enmasse. Again- like government.

rcocean said...

Why is twitter "verifying" everything? Its not their job.

rcocean said...

There was NO election interference by Russia in 2016. They didn't hack the election or change one vote. The whole thing is a hoax. And always was.

Its amazing how the Left NEVER get blowback. Hillary claims Bernie and Tulsi are "Russian Assets" and a few people, mostly right-wingers, call her on it. But the Left and MSM just 'Move on' like nothing happened and Hillary was making a valid point.

Fernandinande said...

CNN: "Russia interfered in the 2016 election."

Maybe he'll figure out a way to make CNN verify that what they say is not nonsense. Oh, wait, lying about everything is freedom of speech, you idiots.

after learning in history class about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election

I hope that poor child gets over his misplaced trust in authority figures.

Fernandinande said...

Turns out the Russkies tricked me with their meme about Jesus armwrestling Satan.

I voted for both of them but neither one got elected. Sigh.

Rick said...

I learned a lot from history class [about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election]..." the high school student told CNN....

Wrong. Instead he learned left wing hysteria.

The US intelligence community says America's adversaries, including Russia, are seeking to interfere in the 2020 election. They are sophisticated and well-resourced actors.

And yet the extent of their interference was idiotic facebook memes which could not possibly have influenced anyone. Keep up the fearmongering Dems!

Levi Starks said...

So, does this experience cause him to question his sources about “Russian interference”?

Greg the class traitor said...

"During Christmas break I was kind of bored and I learned a lot from history class [about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election]..." the high school student told CNN....


And today we learned his "history teacher" should be fired

hstad said...


"...I learned a lot from history class [about Russia's interference in the 2016 US presidential election]..."

Part of compulsory taxpayer-funded, government-provided education - 'Propoganda' from the Liberal Left!

gilbar said...

Char Char Binks said...
I thought I voted for Trump because he promised to shoot someone on Fifth Avenue. Turns out the Russkies tricked me


Wait a MINUTE!
You mean, he's NOT going to shoot someone on Fifth Avenue?

narciso said...

but enough about tom steyer or Andrew yang, comandante Krugman, who has been legendarily wrong about everything from three years, has ventured forth into more category error,

yes a outfit that does public relations for Russian oligarchs put forth this dubious report, and a fisa warrant and intel assessments was based on that, another outfit, crowdstrike put out dubious attributions, something that is being litigated in court, recently,

wendybar said...

I'd vote for the fake candidate, before I would vote for ANY of the crazy Democrats.

stlcdr said...

Giving the benefit of the doubt [regarding the education system] maybe he learned that it's the media, social media platforms and politicians that were taken in by the whole Russia collusion thing, and not the voters themselves?

purplepenquin said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
purplepenquin said...

Why is twitter "verifying" everything?

So folks can't show up pretending to be someone else?
To help prevent one person from having multiple accounts?
To help prevent organizations from conducting astro-turf campaigns?


The comments section of this blog (and others) would greatly benefit if every person was limited to using just one blogger account

MikeD said...

CNN won't name him, minor & all, but happily publishes his picture.

Greg the class traitor said...

purplepenquin said...
Why is twitter "verifying" everything?

So folks can't show up pretending to be someone else?


Because Twitter users are still emotionally stuck in high school, and getting a "blue Checkmark" means you're one of the "cool kids"

purplepenquin said...

getting a "blue Checkmark" means you're one of the "cool kids"

Ain't on Twitter so ain't up to speed on the whole concept of the blue check-mark. I thought it was to show "this person actually is who they say they are".

Does it mean something other/more than that? Is there some sort of drama/status attached to it as well? Ain't tryin' to fight with anyone about it, but don't understand why it is such an issue with some people and wanna know more.

JaimeRoberto said...

I'd be impressed if he got the fake candidate on the ballot.

Given that there are probably all kinds of candidates for Congress in the primaries, I don't really expect Twitter to be able verify all the identities efficiently. This is the equivalent of my friends putting up posters for Lu Phol during high school elections.

JaimeRoberto said...

Now that I look back on it, one of my friends who was responsible for the Lu Phol posters had a grandfather who escaped the Russian Revolution. So that was Russian interference too.

MadTownGuy said...

If a fake candidate does win an election, will there still be fake news coverage of that election?

rehajm said...

Looks like he's a Republican. Did Titania McGrath out him as a non-person?

Greg the class traitor said...

Blogger purplepenquin said...
getting a "blue Checkmark" means you're one of the "cool kids"

Ain't on Twitter so ain't up to speed on the whole concept of the blue check-mark. I thought it was to show "this person actually is who they say they are".

Does it mean something other/more than that? Is there some sort of drama/status attached to it as well? Ain't tryin' to fight with anyone about it, but don't understand why it is such an issue with some people and wanna know more.


Nope. A blue checkmark says you're "special". Plenty of people on Twitter who can prove who they are, who've been "denied" a blue checkmark.

it's mostly "cool kids" wanking among people who have no real life.

daskol said...

And this is the firm that shits all over Facebook because they refuse to police political speech on their platform.

daskol said...

thank God for twitter and all that, but fuck twitter.

DeepRunner said...

Now this story is FUNNY. This kid has a future in engineering. SOCIAL engineering.

Bunkypotatohead said...

The rest of the Dem candidates are just as phoney.