TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — As Taiwan's election nears, China has released a propaganda piece on President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) that is being spread across multiple social media platforms in an apparent attempt to interfere in the election.

A National Security Bureau (NSB) official told Liberty Times that since the start of this month a video called "The Secret History of Tsai Ing-wen" has been uploaded to platforms like YouTube that smears the Tsai's administration and attacks her character. The videos have been created with generative AI technology, coupled with machine-generated virtual voices and hosts.

These videos are being quickly disseminated across the internet. For example, at least 400 such videos have appeared simultaneously on nearly 200 YouTube channels. The official said analysis points to a disinformation operation by the Chinese Ministry of State Security.

The NSB found that on Jan. 2, a 300-page e-book titled "Secret History of Tsai Ing-wen" was uploaded to the open repository Zenodo. The content includes false information about Tsai such as unsubstantiated claims of academic credential forgery, same-sex marriage, family problems, promiscuity, and failures in epidemic prevention.

Using AI-generated technology, the e-book content was converted into videos with machine-generated voiceovers read by fake anchors. These videos have appeared on social media platforms such as YouTube, Instagram, and X with identical content but different virtual anchors, including female hosts, Santa Claus, and Westerners. Every few minutes, hundreds of accounts repost this YouTube content.

Even after the platforms take down the videos or delete accounts, new accounts appear within a short period posting the same content. 

The official said this type of forgery technology makes extensive use of the video editing software Capcut developed by the Chinese company ByteDance, which is the parent company of TikTok. This software is then combined with virtual anchors to generate misleading content.

The official said this is not the first time China has launched cognitive warfare attacks against leaders of democratic countries, with Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau targeted in October. However, the official said this incident is even more significant in terms of the scale and the resources invested.

As for why they chose to target Tsai instead of attacking the Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) presidential candidate Lai Ching-te (賴清德), the NSB believes that China not only uses Taiwan's elections for "troop training" on newer online technologies for information warfare but also targeted Tsai as her popularity and support among the public can provide a boost for DPP candidates.

This is evident, for example, in the recently popular "On the Road" video. Therefore, China's efforts to denigrate Tsai personally and tarnish the image of the president, along with criticizing her governance, are meant to undermine the ruling party as part of its election interference scheme.

Austin H. Wang (王伟恩), an assistant professor at the Department of Political Science, University of Nevada Las Vegas, wrote on X that he had spotted more than 100 YouTube videos "attacking" Tsai recently. Wang said that they all have the same content and contain a similar machine-generated voice, but utilize different presenting styles and fake hosts.

Wang described the campaign as a "clear illustration of volume manipulation."

Ma Wenhao, a journalist at the Voice of America, described the book as muddling facts with rumor and depicting Tsai as a "morally corrupt and promiscuous race traitor." Ma reported seeing the book across a plethora of social media platforms including YouTube, Facebook, X, Reddit, Wikipedia, WeChat, and Baidu.

According to Ma, on WeChat, the e-book soared in popularity with over nine million views by Tuesday (Jan. 9) and 100,000 views on a prominent public account. Ma said some X users, such as Why You Tou Zheli?, have reported being spammed with copies of the e-book by bots.

A Chinese Wikipedia page for the e-book was uploaded on Jan. 6 but was quickly deleted by a site editor. The author of the page was found to be a bot, and the entry was reuploaded by an anonymous user on Wednesday (Jan. 10), according to Ma.

(X, Ma Wenhao image)

More than 100 YouTube videos attacking #Taiwan president @iingwen have been uploaded recently. They all have the same content and similar machine-generated voice, but with different presenting styles/fake anchors. A clear illustration of volume manipulation. pic.twitter.com /4CHl7LF69S

— Austin H. Wang (@wearytolove) January 8, 2024

An E-book titled "The Secret History of Tsai Ing-wen" (蔡英文 secret history) are being spread by bots in the Chinese language social media circle. The book, mixing facts with political rumors, portrays the Taiwan President as a morally corrupt and promiscuous race traitor. 1/ pic.twitter.com/frLkKJSS9f

— Wenhao (@ThisIsWenhao) January 10, 2024