Detecting Disinformation Agents

by Anthony Forwood

There are several types of disinformation agents, from high-profile ones who gain a lot of publicity and promote well-crafted stories, to low-level ones who serve to flood the Internet with less reputable claims. This document deals primarily with the former.

A disinformation agent will sometimes be someone who works directly for a larger entity (usually the government or major corporation) and uses a cover identity, but more often than not they will be someone who receives false information from someone who purports to be ‘in the know’, such as a government whistleblower. In other instances, they might just be someone who makes certain claims that tend to benefit those who keep dark secrets because it creates a sense of doubtfulness about those secrets, and confuses any chance of learning the truth. Whatever the case, they will be used because they’re willing to believe the information they’re given, and they’ll usually have or be provided with the right avenues and receive a greater than usual amount of promotion to ‘get the word out’. Often, they’ll be able to provide physical documents or other evidence that reveal certain truths to their story, but even these will not reveal the veracity of their entire story (nor are they necessarily legitimate). Other times, they’ll be able to provide verbal information that on later investigation by others will pan out, thus offering some legitimacy to what they claim. However, there will ALWAYS be unverifiable information that will be part of the foundation of their claims, and this information will more often than not be extraordinary in nature (e.g. beyond known science).

A disinformation agent will usually be given a scripted story to disseminate. This story will weave many truths with many falsehoods, so that these truths might be disregarded due to the inclusion of the falsehoods. Very often, these truths will simply be disregarded because they’re so far outside of our common understanding that they sound too outrageous to easily accept, and are hard – if not impossible – to prove. In such a case, the added falsehoods are meant to add to the seeming illegitimacy of the truths. This helps to turn away all but the most gullible people, who will be used to further increase the seeming absurdity of these planted falsehoods by the unscientific mindset these people generally have and the propensity to be carried away by imaginative ideas rather than to stay grounded in just those known truths that are provable.

A disinformation agent, particularly one who knows that they are disseminating false information, will rarely expand on their original information, and will be more interested in disseminating just the information they’ve been provided with. An unwitting disinformation agent, on the other hand, will usually be interested in investigating their own information further, and not be as compelled to stick to their original story over time as new revelations crop up.

It’s common for there to be a number of disinformation agents working simultaneously, either in secret collaboration or alone and unaware of each other’s true identity. One of their tactics is to engage in creating controversy between themselves, which only serves to disrupt the situation further and increase the uncertainty, while keeping their followers hoping something revealing might come of it.

Disinformation agents, whether witting or unwitting, will usually believe the story they tell, and this is a standard procedure in keeping secrets. These are cover stories that are fed to them with the purpose of compartmentalizing the knowledge and activities of the secret programs that they might actually be privy to. Virtually no one but those few people at the very top will ever know the full truth about the secret program.

The ultimate purpose of a disinformation agent is three-fold:

a) to create a sense of ridicule about anything that they include in their story so that even what is true will be not be believed by intelligent people,

b) to mislead those who are gullible enough to believe their story, and

c) to divert the efforts of those who seek to know the truth through further investigation.

Although disinformation agents are used to cover up the truth, their claims should not be written off completely, since they can still teach us something about the underlying truth that they’re meant to cover up.

To measure the level of truth within each of these individual stories, the unverifiable claims must be sorted out and then weighed against the verifiable claims. These two aspects of any person’s claims must be clearly understood before considering any further what they’re claiming.

To measure the claims that are being made by someone, it’s necessary to always pay attention to what they say and how they present it. For instance:

1) What percentage of their claims can be checked out, compared to what can’t?

2) What seems to be their motive for making their claims?

3) Do they act fairly and honestly during a discussion?

4) Do they act like they are beyond questioning?

5) Are they willing to provide further evidence of their claims when it’s asked for?

6) Do they claim to have special inside sources that gives them an edge on the facts?

7) Do they claim early on to only be interested in exposing what is going on at whatever cost, but then later blatantly withhold information?

8) Do they ever offer valid sources of information that would support some of what they say?

9) Do they admit when they’re only assuming something or speculating, or do they pass off everything they say as hard fact?

10) Do they often leave it for you to fill in what they aren’t saying, relying on you to use your imagination to make the connections between certain things?

11) How much trust do they expect you to put into what they say?

12) Do they attempt use emotional appeals to gain support for their claims, or do they stick to straight, unemotionally imbued information?

13) Do they convey a lot of fear by the way they describe things?

14) Do they spend an excessive amount of time going over less significant or more widely known information than they do going over the more significant aspects of their claims, or in discussing any new information they might claim to have?

14) Can they explain what they claim in a logical and scientific way that might offer the ability to test, or do they avoid those important aspects and rely instead on emotional appeal for persuasion?

15) Is the way they present themselves that of an honest, fair, and respectful person that can admit being wrong, or are there telltale quarks in their personality that might indicate otherwise?

16) Do they include terminology or phrases that are unusual, and can’t be found anywhere else where the same meaning applies? (I see this with almost every person I’ve come across that I’ve suspected of being a high-profile disinformation agent, and I have a suspicion that this terminology is purposely planted in order to track the spread of the disinformation from its original source, and to indicate what pieces of disinformation are being bought into and what aren’t. You can usually determine whether the phrases are legitimate or just made up by doing an Internet search for them, to see who else uses them.)

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Here are some further pointers I found online (from ‘Disinformation Tactics of Shills & Online Trolls/Zombies’). These are common traits of low-level disinformation agents, although they usually fit high-profile ones as well:

1) Avoidance - They never actually discuss issues head-on or provide constructive input, generally avoiding citation of references or credentials. Rather, they merely imply this, that, and the other. Virtually everything about their presentation implies their authority and expert knowledge in the matter without any further justification for credibility.

2) Selectivity – They tend to pick and choose opponents carefully, either applying the hit-and-run approach against mere commentators supportive of opponents, or focusing heavier attacks on key opponents who are known to directly address issues. Should a commentator become argumentative with any success, the focus will shift to include the commentator as well.

3) Coincidental Participation – They tend to surface suddenly and somewhat coincidentally with a new controversial topic with no clear prior record of participation in general discussions in the particular public arena involved. They likewise tend to vanish once the topic is no longer of general concern. They were likely directed or elected to be there for a reason, and vanish with no reason.

4) Teamwork – They tend to operate in self-congratulatory and complementary packs or teams. Of course, this can happen naturally in any public forum, but there will likely be an ongoing pattern of frequent exchanges of this sort where professionals are involved. Sometimes one of the players will infiltrate the opponent camp to become a source for straw man or other tactics designed to dilute opponent presentation strength.

5) Anti-conspiratorial – They almost always have disdain for 'conspiracy theorists' and, usually, for those who in any way believe JFK was not killed by LHO. Ask yourself why, if they hold such disdain for conspiracy theorists, do they focus on defending a single topic discussed in a newsgroup focusing on conspiracies? One might think they would either be trying to make fools of everyone on every topic, or simply ignore the group they hold in such disdain. Or, one might more rightly conclude they have an ulterior motive for their actions in going out of their way to focus as they do.

6) Artificial Emotions – An odd kind of 'artificial' emotionalism and an unusually thick skin -- an ability to persevere and persist even in the face of overwhelming criticism and unacceptance. This likely stems from intelligence community training that, no matter how condemning the evidence, deny everything, and never become emotionally involved or reactive. The net result for a disinfo artist is that emotions can seem artificial. Most people, if responding in anger, for instance, will express their animosity throughout their rebuttal. But disinfo types usually have trouble maintaining the 'image' and are hot and cold with respect to pretended emotions and their usually more calm or unemotional communications style. It's just a job, and they often seem unable to 'act their role in character' as well in a communications medium as they might be able in a real face-to-face conversation/confrontation. You might have outright rage and indignation one moment, ho-hum the next, and more anger later -- an emotional yo-yo. With respect to being thick-skinned, no amount of criticism will deter them from doing their job, and they will generally continue their old disinfo patterns without any adjustments to criticisms of how obvious it is that they play that game -- where a more rational individual who truly cares what others think might seek to improve their communications style, substance, and so forth, or simply give up.

7) Inconsistent – There is also a tendency to make mistakes which betray their true self/motives. This may stem from not really knowing their topic, or it may be somewhat 'Freudian', so to speak, in that perhaps they really root for the side of truth deep within.

Often, they will simply cite contradictory information which neutralizes itself and the author. For instance, one such player claimed to be a Navy pilot, but blamed his poor communicating skills (spelling, grammar, incoherent style) on having only a grade-school education. I'm not aware of too many Navy pilots who don't have a college degree. Another claimed no knowledge of a particular topic/situation but later claimed first-hand knowledge of it.

8 ) Time Constant – There are three ways this can be seen to work, especially when the government or other empowered player is involved in a cover up operation:

a) ANY newsgroup posting by a targeted proponent for truth can result in an IMMEDIATE response. The government and other empowered players can afford to pay people to sit there and watch for an opportunity to do some damage. SINCE DISINFO IN A NEWSGROUP ONLY WORKS IF THE READER SEES IT - FAST RESPONSE IS CALLED FOR, or the visitor may be swayed towards truth.

b) When dealing in more direct ways with a disinformationalist, such as email, DELAY IS CALLED FOR - there will usually be a minimum of a 48-72 hour delay. This allows a sit-down team discussion on response strategy for best effect, and even enough time to 'get permission' or instruction from a formal chain of command.

c) In the newsgroup example a) above, it will often ALSO be seen that bigger guns are drawn and fired after the same 48-72 hours delay - the team approach in play. This is especially true when the targeted truth seeker or their comments are considered more important with respect to potential to reveal truth. Thus, a serious truth sayer will be attacked twice for the same sin.

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Further Notes

The purpose of disinformation is to confuse the facts about an issue as much as possible and leave so many false leads and possibilities that discovery of the truth becomes next to impossible to surmise. By the time any significant facts that would point to the truth can ever be ascertained, the greater part of what remains to be known will still be much greater, so that uncovering a few facts will make little difference. The best that this might lead to is that some people might realize what is true and what is false, but trying to convince anyone who’s willing to believe the disinformation is futile, because the disinformation is designed to draw in the type of person who negates logical reasoning and allows their emotions and imaginations to lead them in making decisions instead. On the other hand, anyone else you might try to convince will want either irrefutable objective proof, or at the very least, the acknowledgement of a trusted authority whom the greater public will believe in.

Disinformation campaigns build on or borrow from each other to keep the most successful falsehoods alive and use these in whatever way they can be to create new disinformation campaigns. Therefore, we see that the UFO/ET issue, which started one of the biggest disinformation campaigns that continues today, has been built on and borrowed from to incorporate other controversial issues, including psychism, time-travel, ancient astronaut theories, spirituality, metaphysics, demonology, mind-control, the NWO, and secret government technologies. If they want to cover up something, they create a disinformation campaign that relies on the more popularly accepted falsehoods of previous campaigns, and the more outrageous they happen to be, the better.

The underlying purpose of disinformation is to create confusion and distraction and thereby bury the light of truth deep beneath a pile of falsehoods, so it only helps the disinformers to put out as many claims as possible by as many people as possible. But in order to keep the truth hidden over a long time, the disinformation campaigns must also continue in one form or other, and this usually means finding new people with new stories to act as disseminators as old ones are ‘put out to pasture’ and dissolve into obscurity. These new recruits will lead the older campaign to new focal points of misdirection, such as we’ve seen happen with the initial UFO/ET issue leading to all sorts of rather extraordinary claims about certain aspects of witness contacts, sightings, and abductions. The underlying reason for building on this earlier disinformation campaign is because it worked so well, and continues to work well, in covering up a far more plausible but equally sinister truth.