AI, voting machine conspiracies fill information vacuum around Venezuela operation

The surprise raid by U.S. armed forces and law enforcement agencies in Caracas, Venezuela had observers around the world scouring social media and news for updates on an operation that saw Venezuelan president Nicholas Maduro and his wife captured and flown to the United States to face criminal charges.

The Trump administration initially offered few details about the attack and reportedly declined to notify allies or the bipartisan Gang of Eight in Congress ahead of time. The information vacuum regarding the U.S. action and the motivations behind them was quickly filled by online accounts posting realistic looking but fake images and videos, right wing disinformation artists connecting the operation to debunked conspiracies of Venezuela remotely manipulating U.S. voting machines and widespread messaging in online Spanish-speaking groups depicting the U.S. as an aggressive, imperialist power seeking to control the resources of other countries.

In the early morning hours after the operation, fake imagery and media quickly flooded social media. A grainy image falsely depicted Maduro in a suit being escorted off an aircraft by camo-clad DEA agents, only for the White House to later stage and post its own (real) perp walk of Maduro online.

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