Марк Дайс - The True Story of Fake News - How Mainstream Media Manipulates Millions

In April 2017, Google rolled out a new “fact checking tool” which includes a tag next to some search results that declares whether they are ‘true’ or ‘false,’ using sources like Snopes.com, PolitiFact.org, FactCheck.org, The Washington Post , and The New York Times as the ‘fact checkers.’ 624Google’s blog explained, “Even though differing conclusions may be presented, we think it’s still helpful for people to understand the degree of consensus around a particular claim and have clear information on which sources agree.” 625

For example, a search for “Obama born in Kenya” brings up results including the “fact checking snippet” saying “Fact Check by Snopes: False.” Searching for “15 million undocumented immigrants” brings up the result “Three Pinochios” by The Washington Post , and “Pants on Fire” by PolitiFact, even though the number was said to be 11.4 million back in 2012 according to the government’s own statistics. 626

Researchers at the American Institute for Behavioral Research and Technology published a study showing that Google could influence how people thought about different candidates in an election by serving up mostly positive or negative articles about them when people searched for certain topics. “We estimate, based on win margins in national elections around the world, that Google could determine the outcome of upwards of 25 percent of all national elections,” said Robert Epstein, who helped conduct the study. 627

The amount of influence doesn’t even have to be all that great, because when you consider that most elections have fairly close margins, if Google can increase or decrease the positive or negative feelings about a particular candidate or issue by just a small percentage, it could be enough to change the outcome of a race.

During the 2016 election, a New York Times tech writer named Farhad Manjoo actually suggested that Google should filter out search results to videos and articles which raised questions about Hillary Clinton’s health problems. “Google should fix this,” he said in response to Rudy Giuliani encouraging people to look up “Hillary Clinton illness.” He added, “It shouldn’t give quarter to conspiracy theorists.” 628Just three weeks later Hillary would be caught on video collapsing as she was leaving the 9/11 memorial at Ground Zero where she had to be carried away by her staff, confirming what many had been suspecting◦— that she was not well. 629

Just a month after the election The Guardian actually claimed that search results were, “being manipulated and controlled by rightwing propagandists,” because a journalist didn’t like some of the results that came up when searching for ‘Muslims,’ ‘Jews,’ and ‘women.’ 630“[Google] simply can’t go on pretending that it has no editorial responsibilities when it is delivering these kinds of results,” the article says. “It [Google] is simply not defensible for it go on claiming ‘plausible deniability.’ It has clearly become a conduit for rightwing hate sites and it must urgently take action.” 631

Shortly after Donald Trump’s book Crippled America came out, a Google search for the title brought up pictures of Adolf Hitler’s book cover Mein Kampf. 632And for some period of time a search for “When Hitler was born” resulted in photos of Hitler, but also of Trump. After these and other strange search results began making headlines, Google quietly fixed the issue.

If you go to the Google News page you’ll find a series of articles they have aggregated from various sources, and of course their editors have chosen which ones to feature as the “Top Stories” and what news outlets they come from. The page consists simply of links to articles from news outlets like the Washington Post , the New York Times , and other mostly liberal papers. The stories chosen to be featured there are obviously going to reflect the political leanings of Google, and from my own experience the top stories are almost always anti-Trump and frame conservative issues in a negative light.

It’s not just the search results that are manipulated (or completely hidden), Google also manipulates search suggestions as well. As you have likely noticed when you begin typing something into Google it will give you a list of what it thinks you are searching for (or what it wants you to search for).

For example if you just type in “When is,” it will suggest four different options depending on what time of year it is, or what other users tend to put after those words. When I just typed “when is” into Google, it came up with “When is Mother’s Day” as one, “When is Mother’s Day This Year 2017” as the second, “When is Easter” as the third, and “When is the Kentucky Derby” as the fourth autosuggestion. Mother’s Day is just a week away as I’m writing this, and the Kentucky Derby was just yesterday.

But after a close look at this autocomplete or “suggested search” feature, it becomes clear that certain autosuggestions are regularly censored so they don’t show up. Google has admitted they filter out certain phrases from the autocomplete suggestions if they are “potentially inappropriate.” 633Currently, typing in “Islam is” brings up “a religion of peace” as the top autosuggestion. “Islam is Peace” is the second, and “Islam is not a race” is the third. Meanwhile one of the autosuggestions for Christianity is “Christianity is dying.”

Currently, when “Hillary Clinton cri” is typed in, Google suggests “Hillary Clinton credentials,” “Hillary Clinton creme brulee,” and “Hillary Clinton crazy laugh,” but the same search on Yahoo brings up “Hillary Clinton crying,” “Hillary Clinton crimes,” “Hillary Clinton criminal,” and “Hillary Clinton crimes list.” Microsoft’s Bing brings up “Hillary Clinton crying,” “Hillary Clinton criminal,” “Hillary Clinton crooked,” and “Hillary Clinton crazy.”

A search for “Hillary Clinton ind” on Google brings up “Hillary Clinton India,” “Hillary Clinton Indiana,” and “Hillary Clinton individual donors.” On Microsoft’s Bing the recommendations are: “Hillary Clinton indictment,” “Hillary Clinton indicted,” and “Hillary Clinton indictment update.”

On Yahoo they are: “Hillary Clinton indictment,” Hillary Clinton indictment coming,” and “Hillary Clinton indictment coming NY Times.”

Autosuggestions involving Hillary’s health were also censored when I tested this. Google’s autosuggestions for “Hillary Clinton’s health” are “Hillary’s Clinton’s health plan,” “Hillary Clinton’s healthcare plan,” and “Hillary Clinton’s healthcare plan 1993.”

On Bing, a search for “Hillary Clinton’s health” brings up “Hillary Clinton’s health issues,” “Hillary Clinton’s health problems,” and then third is “Hillary Clinton’s health care plan.”

These autosuggestions may have changed by the time you are reading this book, but others and myself have documented the clear protection of Hillary Clinton’s autosuggestions by Google during the time period surrounding the 2016 election. 634If Google manipulated the autosuggestions to protect Hillary Clinton during the election, which all evidence indicates they did, they are most likely doing it for other people, issues, and topics as well.

They don’t just manipulate the top search results for various topics for their own financial interest or political reasons◦— sometimes Google outright hides what would be results for certain topics so nothing shows up at all. Sometimes these censored pages are the result of DMCA takedown complaints; sometimes they’re the result of a court order which is fairly common in England with their “right to be forgotten laws” that mandate Google hide certain pages from their index; and sometimes it’s just because Google feels it’s the ‘right thing to do.’ These topics are considered to be “un-Googleable.”