How China's TikTok and Facebook influencers push propaganda
To her 1.4 million followers on social
media, Vica Li says she is a life blogger and food lover who wants to teach her
fans about China so
they can travel the country with ease.
Through my lens, I will take you around China, take you into
Vica's life! she says in a January video posted on YouTube and Facebook.
But that lens may be controlled by CGTN, the Chinese-state run TV
network where she has regularly appeared in broadcasts and is listed as a
digital reporter on the company's website.
While Vica Li tells followers she created all of these channels on
her own, her Facebook account shows at least nine people manage her page.
That portfolio of accounts is just one tentacle of China's growing
influence on US-owned social media platforms, an Associated Press examination
has found.
As China continues
to assert its economic might, it is using the global social media ecosystem to
expand its already formidable influence.
The country has built a network of social media personalities who
parrot the government's perspective in posts, operating in virtual lockstep as
they promote China, deflect criticism of its human rights abuses and advance
Beijing's talking points on world affairs like Russia's war against Ukraine.
Some of China's state-affiliated reporters have posited themselves
as trendy Instagram influencers or bloggers. The country has also hired firms
to recruit influencers to deliver carefully crafted messages that boost its
image to social media users.
And it is benefitting from a cadre of Westerners who have devoted
YouTube channels and Twitter feeds to echoing pro-China narratives on
everything from Beijing's treatment of Uyghur Muslims to Olympian Eileen Gu, an
American who competed for China in the most recent Winter Games.
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