Thai army accused of causing 'rifts and hatred among Thais'
Twitter have taken down almost 1000 Twitter accounts linked to the Royal Thai Army, that they said were used by political and state-backed groups to deceive users.
"Our investigation consequently uncovered a network of accounts partaking in information operations that we can reliably link to the Royal Thai Army (RTA)," Twitter said in a blog post.
"These accounts were engaging in amplifying pro-RTA and pro-government content. They were also engaging in behavior targeting prominent political opposition figures."
Twitter also said the network involved 926 accounts. "[We will] continue to enforce against small-scale activity associated with this network, as we identify it."
The origins and extent of the army's efforts to paint critics in a negative light and influence public opinion online are detailed in a paper titled "Cheerleading Without Fans."
It was released on Thursday by the Stanford Internet Observatory.
"To the best of our knowledge, this is the first time a social media company has suspended a network of accounts linked to the Thai Army," the paper said.
Twitter accounts targeted Thai government opposition parties
A former politician whose party was the apparent target of a disguised online propaganda campaign by the Thai army earlier this year said Friday she and her colleagues plan legal action in response.
Pannika Wanich, former spokeswoman for the now-dissolved Future Forward Party, said they had already been gathering information about the army's information operations — or "IO" — when Twitter announced Thursday that it had identified and removed 926 accounts that had unacknowledged or concealed links to the Thai military.
She described the worst aspect of the army's alleged action to be "using tax money to cause rifts and hatred among Thais," and said the former party will file a lawsuit when its fact-finding is completed.
She did not say what charges against the army it would seek.
Thai media have speculated about the general nature of the army's IO activities, but Pannika said Twitter's action proved the allegations were real because the social media company is a neutral party not involved with Thai politics.
Thai army refutes Twitters claims
Col Sirichan Ngathong, a deputy army spokesperson, said the unidentified Twitter accounts were unfairly linked to the Thai army without any in-depth analysis.
"Unidentified user accounts had nothing to do with any official account of the army. [The Twitter report] focused on quantities, frequencies and hashtags that anyone could do at will," she said.
The Thai army constructively used Twitter accounts for communications with people and its personnel and shared true information via them, she added. Above all referring to @armypr_news and other official accounts of army units.
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