USAID Censorship Exposed: Governments And Media Firms Deployed Hostile AI Propaganda Tools
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On Thursday, America First Legal (AFL) released explosive new documents obtained through ongoing litigation against the U.S. Department of State’s Global Engagement Center (GEC), exposing a vast, government-backed censorship operation to silence Americans under the guise of “misinformation,” “disinformation,” and “malinformation.” The documents reveal a disturbing alliance between the GEC, the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the British Foreign, Commonwealth, Development Office (FCDO), and media censorship organizations, all working in lock-step to manipulate public discourse, control media narratives, and suppress free speech.
https://media.aflegal.org/wp-content/uploads/2025/03/19104054/FL-2023-00013-February-2025-Production.pdf
The GEC, which was forced to shut down in December 2024, was designed to “combat foreign disinformation abroad.” However, through Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, AFL uncovered that the GEC engaged in state-sponsored propaganda, repeatedly using willing participants from private media organizations. Further, AFL’s lawsuit against the GEC revealed that USAID had created an internal “Disinformation Primer” that explicitly praised private sector censorship strategies and recommended further censorship tactics.
The new documents released by AFL show:
The GEC and USAID coordinated efforts to censor “COVID-19 misinformation” and counter “COVID-19 propaganda.”
The GEC collaborated with officials in the British Foreign, Commonwealth, and Development Office on disinformation efforts.
The GEC coordinated with private media censorship firms, including Poynter and NewsGuard, which provided samples of its Misinformation Fingerprints artificial intelligence (AI) tool, designed to identify and rate websites based on their perceived “misinformation.”
In a widely distributed email to USAID, the GEC’s “Liaison Planner to USAID” stated that GEC would like to “sustain dialogue and connectivity during these unprecedented times” to help counter “misinformation” surrounding COVID-19 despite USAID’s self-described mission being “to extend assistance to countries recovering from disaster, trying to escape poverty, and engaging in democratic reforms.”
The documents show that GEC communicated with multiple branches of USAID, including “TF 2020-COVID 19,” “Digital Development,” “Asia Bureau ES Taskers,” “Asia Outreach,” “Conflict Prevention and Stabilization (CPS) Policy,” and “CPS Africa.”
Additionally, GEC and USAID worked together on “counter-propaganda” and “Disinformation and COVID-19 related products,” ranging from a “KHARON” (risk analysis program) demo to monitoring “disinformation” narratives surrounding the 2020 Presidential Elections in Moldova.
Two days after the 2020 US Presidential election, NewsGuard Technologies’ General Manager, Matt Skibinski, started an email chain to pitch NewsGuard services.
Park Advisors’ then-Director Christina Nemr is an Obama Administration State Department alum. According to her LinkedIn, Park Advisors “Designed and led multi-million public-private initiatives addressing security threats in the information environment, bridging gaps between emerging technologies and real-world operational needs. Built and managed a global platform that evaluated and connected tools with mission-critical challenges, supporting government adoption.”
Government employees from the Department of State, the National Security Agency (NSA), and Department of Defense components, including the National Security Innovation Network (NSIN), U.S. Cyber Command, and the U.S. Army European Command.
These documents further show the now-defunct GEC’s widespread efforts to suppress so-called “misinformation,” often through collaborating with government agencies, foreign governments, NGOs, and the media to silence dissenting voices. America First Legal will continue fighting to expose government censorship and will always defend the First Amendment.
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/usaid-censorship-scheme-exposed-global-engagement-center-worked-uk-government-and-media