Bots are launching Twitter attacks on who they think should apparently be the next U.S. president.
‘Social bots’ are on the march on Twitter and a surprising number think Donald Trump should be the next US President.
A new study by UK and US academics discovered that these bots – computer Twitter accounts that post messages automatically – made up 39.1% of sampled tweets supporting his cause in the aftermath of the first presidential TV debate on 26 September.
Analysed by sifting 4.5 million political tweets for pro-Trump hashtags, this means that a staggering 1.76 million messages of support were posted in his favour by machines rather than people.
In case it sounds as if Hillary Clinton is being left out, she appears to have her own bot army, albeit a smaller one that tweeted 612,000 messages (13.6%) preferring her.