新闻周刊:俄罗斯对美国的冷战战略(3)

The precautions the campaigns are taking now tend to address yesterday's problems, such as the DNC hack¹ that was ultimately so damaging to the Clinton campaign in 2016. The worry of intelligence and security experts is what the Russians are likely to do in 2020 that somehow was either overlooked in the aftermath of the last two elections or comes out of the blue. "We recognize that our adversaries² are going to keep adapting and upping their game," the FBI's Wray said to the Council on Foreign Relations in April.

竞选团队目前采取的防范措施，往往是为了解决昨日的问题，比如民主党全国委员会遭到黑客攻击，最终对希拉里2016年的竞选造成了如此严重的损害。情报和安全专家担心的是，俄罗斯人在2020年可能会采取的行动，这在上两次选举之后被忽视了，或者是出乎意料。“我们认识到，我们的对手将不断调整和提高他们的策略，”美国联邦调查局的雷今年4月对美国外交关系委员会表示。

To understand how Russia plans to undermine Americans' faith in the U.S. democratic system, cyber-security experts and campaign officials are digging through the aftermath of the elections of 2016 and 2018 for clues. There's a lot to worry about.

为了了解俄罗斯计划如何破坏美国人对美国民主制度的信心，网络安全专家和竞选官员正在梳理2016年和2018年大选的余局，寻找线索。有很多事要担心。

The Propaganda War

宣传战争

Shortly before the 2016 election, University of Washington researcher Kate Starbird began studying the online conversations of the #BlackLivesMatter movement. She and her team followed some of the most active Twitter accounts and tracked the influence of their tweets.

2016年大选前不久，华盛顿大学研究员凯特·斯塔伯德开始研究“黑人生活很重要”运动的在线对话。她和她的团队跟踪了一些最活跃的Twitter账户，并跟踪了他们的推文的影响力。

Starbird, who studies human-computer interaction, was primarily struck by how toxic³ much of the content was—and how vitriolic⁴ and polarized the debate had become, with some advocating violence and others using racist⁵ language. Then, just a few weeks after the team published its first paper on the topic in October 2017, representatives of Facebook admitted to congressional investigators⁶ that they had traced ad sales totaling more than $100,000 to a shadowy Russian company known as Russia's Internet Research Agency (IRA), with a history of pushing pro-Kremlin propaganda. The US Intelligence community had already concluded that Russia paid social media trolls to spread fake news and influence public opinion. The ads had focused on politically divisive issues such as gun rights, immigration, and racial discrimination.

斯塔伯德研究人机交互，主要被这些内容的毒性所震惊，以及辩论变得如此尖刻和两极分化，一些人提倡暴力，另一些人使用种族主义语言。然后,几周后团队对主题的第一篇论文发表在2017年10月，Facebook的代表向国会调查人员承认,他们追踪广告销售总额超过100000美元到一个神秘的俄罗斯公司，名为俄罗斯互联网研究机构，曾推动亲克里姆林宫的宣传。美国情报部门已经得出结论，俄罗斯付钱给社交媒体喷子，传播假新闻，影响公众舆论。这些广告集中在枪支权利、移民和种族歧视等政治分歧问题上。

The news got Starbird and her team wondering if any of the trolls engaged in any of the conversations she had studied. In November, when the House Intelligence Committee released a list of accounts given them by Twitter associated with IRA, Starbird and her team decided⁷ to take a look and see if they recognized anyone. They were stunned⁸ by what they discovered. Dozens of the accounts in the list appeared in their data—some among the most retweeted. IRA accounts were also masquerading as genuine #BlackLivesMatter and #BlueLivesMatter activists⁹.

这个消息让斯塔伯德和她的团队怀疑是否有网络喷子参与了她研究过的任何对话。去年11月，当众议院情报委员会公布了一份由Twitter提供的与IRA有关的账户清单时，斯塔伯德和她的团队决定查看一下，看看他们是不是认出了什么人。他们被发现惊呆了。名单上的许多账户都出现在他们的数据中，其中一些属于转发最多的账户。IRA账户也伪装成真实的“黑人生活很重要”和“蓝色生命很重要”活动人士。

1 hack   

n.劈，砍，出租马车；v.劈，砍，干咳

参考例句：

• He made a hack at the log.他朝圆木上砍了一下。
• Early settlers had to hack out a clearing in the forest where they could grow crops.早期移民不得不在森林里劈出空地种庄稼。

2 adversaries   

n.对手，敌手( adversary的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• That would cause potential adversaries to recoil from a challenge. 这会迫使潜在的敌人在挑战面前退缩。 来自辞典例句
• Every adversaries are more comfortable with a predictable, coherent America. 就连敌人也会因有可以预料的，始终一致的美国而感到舒服得多。 来自辞典例句

3 toxic   

adj.有毒的，因中毒引起的

参考例句：

• The factory had accidentally released a quantity of toxic waste into the sea.这家工厂意外泄漏大量有毒废物到海中。
• There is a risk that toxic chemicals might be blasted into the atmosphere.爆炸后有毒化学物质可能会进入大气层。

4 vitriolic   

adj.硫酸的，尖刻的

参考例句：

• The newspaper launched a vitriolic attack on the president.这家报纸对总统发起了一场恶意的攻击。
• Vitriolic impurity is contained normally in the sewage that vitriolic factory discharges.硫酸厂排放的污水中通常含有硫酸杂质。

5 racist   

n.种族主义者，种族主义分子

参考例句：

• a series of racist attacks 一连串的种族袭击行为
• His speech presented racist ideas under the guise of nationalism. 他的讲话以民族主义为幌子宣扬种族主义思想。

6 investigators   

n.调查者，审查者( investigator的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• This memo could be the smoking gun that investigators have been looking for. 这份备忘录可能是调查人员一直在寻找的证据。
• The team consisted of six investigators and two secretaries. 这个团队由六个调查人员和两个秘书组成。 来自《简明英汉词典》

7 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

8 stunned   

adj. 震惊的，惊讶的 动词stun的过去式和过去分词

参考例句：

• The fall stunned me for a moment. 那一下摔得我昏迷了片刻。
• The leaders of the Kopper Company were then stunned speechless. 科伯公司的领导们当时被惊得目瞪口呆。

9 activists   

n.（政治活动的）积极分子，活动家( activist的名词复数 )

参考例句：

• His research work was attacked by animal rights activists . 他的研究受到了动物权益维护者的抨击。
• Party activists with lower middle class pedigrees are numerous. 党的激进分子中有很多出身于中产阶级下层。 来自《简明英汉词典》