An online storm in a Philippine rainforest - BBC Trending podcast, BBC World Service

BBC Trending

2024-11-07

17 分钟
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A nature reserve in the Philippines has become the unlikely target on a smear campaign on social media. Who is behind it?
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  • The American Movie star Leonardo DiCaprio has more than 61 million followers on Instagram.

  • So when in July he posted calling for the protection of a nature reserve in the Philippines, it made headline news.

  • Hollywood actor Nasi Leonardo DiCaprio.

  • The Philippine media, like state owned PTV eagerly covered the story.

  • It wasn't just that Leo was mentioning the Philippines on his socials.

  • It was also the fact that he was accusing the government's Environment Department of putting this nature reserve at risk, which they denied, thanking him for his concern.

  • Meanwhile, on Facebook, news outlets boasted about the story too.

  • And readers made their feelings known in the comments area.

  • Some of them didn't seem quite happy with the actor's intervention.

  • Don't be a loser, Leonardo.

  • Does Leo know what's the real story behind the issue?

  • But there was something unusual about these comments.

  • They were posted by accounts with very few friends.

  • Accounts that seemed to have very little interest in anything that wasn't well related to the Environment Department.

  • Which made me wonder, could there be more to them than met the eye?

  • All of these are very consistent with what I've seen before previously while monitoring troll farm activity.

  • Internet trolls, really.

  • But working for whom and to do what exactly?

  • Getting those answers was not going to be easy.

  • This is BBC trending, where we take an investigative look at the world of social media.