And will they talk about China's interference machinery?

The Graphika collective has produced a detailed report on a practice that is both peculiar and unsettling. Dozens of websites have appeared that mimic reputable media outlets, but with slight changes to their names to mislead. This operation originated in China, and the pseudo-media sites in question are full of information favorable to the country's single-party state. Furthermore, the bots that also repost pro-regime propaganda are linked to these websites, most of which are blatantly created with artificial intelligence and whose articles are of extremely low quality. This organization has dubbed the operation Spamouflage. spam and camouflageAnd among the places where it has made its presence felt – albeit with a very limited reach – is Spain: as part of its destabilization agenda, they instigated protests against the Sánchez government for its handling of the Valencian Community's severe weather. Reading the report has made me think about how the Russian interference machinery has been given free rein by media outlets hostile to Catalonia, which have exploited alleged links to the independence movement that are more imagined than real, and yet I don't recall any sensationalist articles about this Chinese campaign.

The answer, of course, is that it wasn't about Russia or China, but about Catalonia. And that Putin was merely the bogeyman with which the independence movement wanted to associate itself, using sinister stories that included –Never forget– the Kremlin's deployment of 10,000 soldiers. Russian (which exists) and Chinese (which also exists) interference have so far had limited effectiveness, as far as we know: fake accounts end up interacting more with other bots than with real users. But they will surely refine their methods. And that's why we must demand that the media report accurately, and not engage in alarmist rhetoric.