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Secret Pakistani Program Directs Military Officers to Attack Social Media Critics and “Digital Terrorists”
In an unprecedented step, the army has ordered thousands of field officers to wage online war against supporters of deposed former prime minister Imran Khan and other opposition voices
Aug 02, 2024
If you live in a would-be authoritarian society, one way to find out whether something matters is how much attention the government is paying to it. It’s easy to tell ourselves that “Twitter isn’t real life” and that social media is mere triviality. But those in power know that it means so much more. The story we’re publishing today demonstrates that in a striking way. We’ve uncovered a massive, classified program being run by the Pakistani government that directs thousands of military figures to engage directly in rhetorical battles on social media. Much of this story is funny, and it’s fine to laugh at the foibles of our masters, but that also doesn’t take away from the serious threat it represents to the kind of dignified and democratic global civil society we’re trying to recreate.
Whether you care about Pakistan itself or not, this kind of story is key to understanding both our current world and where we’re headed. If you can help support this reporting, please do so by becoming a paying subscriber or by donating to our Pakistan-specific coverage here. If not, please share this with anybody you think would appreciate it.
Pakistan’s military leadership has secretly enlisted thousands of serving officers in an online campaign against judges, activists, and journalists it views as political enemies.
The program, known as the “Army Agahi Network,” or Army Awareness Network (AAN), directs groups of military field officers to create fake social media accounts to proliferate pro-military messages and level defamatory accusations and threats against critics of the army, members of Pakistan’s civil society and judiciary, and supporters of deposed former prime minister Imran Khan and his Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf party (PTI).
A source involved in the program leaked information to Drop Site that shed light on the vast, covert network. Drop Site is not publishing the data in order to protect the source. An expert in social media analysis reviewed a collection of posts made by officers involved in the AAN to help evaluate their authenticity.
While in the past the military has used journalists and social-media influencers for similar campaigns, the AAN directly commands Pakistani army officers to shape public opinion by posting anonymously online—an unprecedented development that has alarmed some members of the military. In Pakistan, those serving in the military must take an oath to avoid participating in political activities.
The military’s press office did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication. The military’s online manipulation program coincides with a government-led campaign to silence most major media outlets in Pakistan through suppression and intimidation, leaving social media outlets as one of the last remaining sources of information for citizens.
“We are being given instructions by our superiors to spread political posts despite knowing that this is a violation of our oath of office and the constitution,” the source said, explaining their motivations for disclosing the program. “People are being made to post against members of the judiciary and civil society. We are becoming involved in political fights that are harming the army’s image.”
Since an army-backed no-confidence vote in 2022 against Khan, Pakistan has been embroiled in an economic and political crisis that has triggered widespread unrest. In an attempt to silence dissent, the military has shut down domestic news outlets while imprisoning or driving into exile many of its political rivals, supporters of the PTI in particular.
But the military was seemingly unprepared for the response from millions of young, very online supporters of the party. On social media, they slammed the army for its alleged role in ousting Khan, even forcing its official Twitter account to go dormant in response to a barrage of scathing posts.
“Those who spread propaganda against state institutions and personalities on social media will be considered digital terrorists,” a source told Pakistani media.
In retaliation, early last year, the Inter-Services Public Relations department (ISPR), the military’s public affairs office, launched the AAN. In recent months, the Pakistani government has moved to ban the platform formerly known as Twitter, now rebranded as X. According to new directives given by ISPR earlier this year, military officers were told that the Twitter ban would remain in place permanently. As a result, the AAN program has lately focused more efforts on Facebook, where military officers have recently been ordered to create fake Facebook accounts.
A vocal critic of what he viewed as an exploitative bilateral relationship with the U.S., Khan had cultivated ties with Russia, partly to alleviate Pakistan’s chronic energy shortages. Last year, reports revealed that his removal was preceded by private threats from the U.S. State Department that Pakistan would face repercussions if he remained in power, along with a promise that “all will be forgiven” should he be deposed.
While Khan remains imprisoned on charges of inciting violent protests, a number of espionage and corruption-related charges against him have been dismissed in recent months.
Despite these setbacks, the military seems undeterred in its campaign to assert control, including on the internet. In late July, reports in the Pakistani press emerged that the federal cabinet is considering fresh measures aimed at further curtailing speech online, and labelling its critics on social media as terrorists.
“Those who spread propaganda against state institutions and personalities on social media will be considered digital terrorists,” a source told Pakistani media this month about the forthcoming legal measures. “Strict legal action will be taken against those elements spreading propaganda.”
The crackdown has included the detention and harassment of social media users critical of the government through threats, smears, and online doxing. Accounts linked to the AAN have played a central role.
“The army is standing up against terrorists and digital terrorists,” the head of ISPR said in a statement in July. “The time has come for the entire nation to stand up against them.”
The AAN’s operations are coordinated by the ISPR and resemble those of the “troll farms” used by state actors like Russia and India. According to the source working on the program, officers in the AAN receive approved messages from their superiors, then share those messages on social media under their aliases.
Many AAN accounts feature bios with descriptors like “freelance writer,” “social media blogger,” “investigative researcher,” or “foodie.” Other accounts claim to provide open-source military analysis. In addition to posting, officers involved are expected to amplify and engage with the messages of their peers and attack perceived adversaries online.
A number of the accounts provide news updates on Pakistani security and military affairs. While the accounts post predominantly in Urdu, many share messages in English.
“The aim may be to win the war for public opinion domestically, or to force their preferred narrative of events onto the global agenda.”
In one recent instance, an account run by the network praised the idea of Pakistan launching a so-called national firewall, a policy government officials have promoted as a means of fighting “disinformation.”
Geoff Golberg, an expert on online network manipulation and founder of Social Forensics, a social media data analytics firm, reviewed a collection of posts attributed to the network and described the AAN as an example of the “professionalization of social media manipulation” through so-called “digital soldiers.”
“The aim may be to win the war for public opinion domestically, or to force their preferred narrative of events onto the global agenda,” he said. Golberg observed that many of the accounts amplified the same messages, while following and quote-posting each other. As such, they “do not pass the smell test in terms of authenticity.”
A major target of the social media campaign in recent months has been Babar Sattar, a judge who sits on the Islamabad High Court. Sattar was among the signatories on a recent letter accusing Pakistan’s military intelligence agencies of interfering in judicial cases involving Khan and of intimidating and coercing judges to influence ongoing legal proceedings against the former prime minister.
In April, @PakLawMovement, an account on Twitter affiliated with AAN, posted screenshots of Sattar’s U.S. green card and photos of properties allegedly owned by his family in the U.S., along with salacious rumors about his personal life and alleged ties to the Indian government.
The social-media campaign against the judiciary is currently the subject of a case before the Islamabad High Court as well as an investigation by Pakistan’s Federal Investigation Agency (FIA). The court has directed several agencies, including the powerful Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) and Pakistani Military Intelligence (MI), to investigate the campaign.
In early July, a court in Islamabad ordered several government telecommunications and regulatory agencies to investigate Twitter accounts involved in an online harassment campaign against yet another judge. At least one of the accounts named by the court, @DrSyeda_Sadaf, is an account affiliated with the AAN.
With the AAN campaign against so-called digital terrorists showing no signs of abating, it continues to narrow its focus on Khan and the PTI.
Some of the accounts have accused the party of harboring ties to India’s intelligence agencies. Others share antisemitic messages about Khan and the PTI, alleging that they receive covert political support from Jewish powerbrokers. Many of the AAN-linked profiles that denounce the PTI claim to belong to anonymous former officials of the party who are disgruntled with its leadership.
The AAN has targeted individuals involved in the legal standoff between the government and Khan, including his wife, Bushra Bibi. Bibi was recently acquitted of charges related to her marriage to Khan, which allegedly violated a religious law requiring a waiting period coinciding with her menstrual cycle. Following her acquittal, she was promptly arrested on separate corruption charges.
The network has also sought to blame for Pakistan’s ongoing economic problems onto the deposed former prime minister.
Recent Facebook posts from the network denounce enemies of the Pakistani military, accusing them of working on behalf of the “illuminati.”
@Lailatweets_, an account affiliated with the AAN, claims to belong to a young woman with no evident ties to the military. In June, the account shared a video on Twitter with the comment, “PTI is the reason why IMF doesn’t trust Pakistan. PTI violated IMF agreement & staked the economic & foreign policy of the country to save its government.”
The following month, as Pakistan reeled from record high annual inflation, the account continued to deflect blame onto the former PTI government, posting: “Ever thought why is government forced to accept IMF’s strict conditions today? The public must know the highest external borrowing of around $52 billion in 3.8 years was taken by PTI’s government, which has to be returned. Hence, the economic crisis!”
Recent Facebook posts from accounts in the network provided to Drop Site denounce enemies of the Pakistani military, accusing them of working on behalf of the “illuminati,” and sharing purported man-on-the-street video interviews with Pakistani citizens denouncing the PTI as well as members of the country’s judiciary.
After the recent arrest of a PTI official involved with running communications for the party, another AAN-affiliated Facebook account praised the government for its crackdown on “digital terrorists”—the same term used by the ISPR to describe its campaign to control speech online.
Last year, The Intercept published a series of reports on Pakistan’s crackdown on the PTI, including leaked Pakistani intelligence documents showing the involvement of U.S. officials in the campaign to oust Khan from office.
Months after the publication of the stories, an account called @PTI_Insider claiming to belong to a disaffected founder of the party posted a fabricated audio recording of a conversation claiming to show Murtaza Hussain, one of the reporters of The Intercept stories and the co-author of this story, requesting money from an Indian intelligence official in exchange for continuing to report on Pakistan’s military leaders.
The account is affiliated with the AAN network, according to information provided by the source to Drop Site. In recent months, the account has continued posting what it claims to be insider information about corruption inside Khan’s party.
Other Twitter accounts in the AAN network have gone after Pakistani journalists and news organizations. The targets include columnist Hamid Mir, described in one post as “loyal to every enemy of the country,” and DAWN, a widely read Pakistani newspaper the network has attacked for giving “senior positions to LGBTQ supporters.”
Despite widespread reports of fraud in the February elections and human rights abuses targeting opponents of the military, the U.S. government has continued to offer security support to Pakistan, including joint counterterrorism exercises and new promises of economic aid and investment.
“Internal political matters in Pakistan are something that we do not take a position on,” U.S. State Department spokesperson Matthew Miller said in a July 25 press briefing. “We urge respect for democracy, respect for human rights, and treatment of all political parties equally.”
