Are bots a danger for political election campaigns?

(University of Erlangen-Nuremberg) Normally, autonomous computer programs known as bots are used to trawl the Internet. However, there are also programs known as social bots which interfere in social media, automatically generating replies or sharing content. They are currently suspected of being used to spread political propaganda. Scientists at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) have investigated the extent to which autonomous programs such as these were used on the platform Twitter during the general elections in Japan in 2014.

from EurekAlert! - Social and Behavioral Science http://ift.tt/2C8X2Vo