Professor Wilson Comments on Facebook Campaigns Influencing U.S. Political Views

KNTV-CHANNEL 11 (SAN FRANCISCO) -- Facebook has identified a coordinated influence campaign on U.S. politics ahead of November’s midterm elections, banning more than two dozen pages and accounts as it attempts to learn more about the activity.

An expert on the impact of social media believes that these posts could be used to fire up the right as well as the left.

“It's that they look angry. It goes to that stereotype,” says Yumi Wilson, associate professor of Journalism at San Francisco State University.

And when the posts are amplified, passed around — in this case by nearly 300,000 followers — it adds power.

“It is really the power of the people saying that this could be true. And by that power, we then think it’s true,” Wilson adds.