芝加哥——远在民主党总统候选人之前乔·拜登宣布她为他的竞选伙伴，卡马拉·哈里斯是网上广泛误传的目标。
社交媒体上的帖子包括种族主义者声称她没有资格在白宫任职，或者她在自己的黑人和印度血统上撒谎。她的母亲来自印度，她的父亲来自牙买加。
根据媒体情报公司齐格纳尔实验室(Zignal Labs)与美联社(Associated Press)独家分享的一份报告，自被提名为总统候选人以来，哈里斯一直是在线错误信息活动的中心，次数是竞选同一职位的白人的四倍。
“与卡玛拉·哈里斯相关的叙述更多地集中在她的个人身份上，尤其是作为一名有色人种女性，”齐格纳尔实验室的洞察主管詹妮弗·格兰斯顿说。
自6月份以来，该公司在推特上发现了超过100万次提及哈里斯的信息，这些信息带有标签或与她有关的错误信息。这些提及包括拒绝谎言的事实检查，但这些只是谈话的一小部分。
根据齐格纳尔的发现，其中近30万次提及是关于哈里斯担任总统的资格。美联社发现了2019年1月哈里斯宣布她竞选总统时在网上流传的虚假说法。
然而，当唐纳德·特朗普总统在8月份将这一不真实的说法从总统讲台上提出时，它再次得到了巨大的推动。
哈里斯的出生证明显示，她于1964年10月20日出生在加利福尼亚州奥克兰，这使她有资格担任副总统或总统。格兰斯顿补充说，社交媒体上关于哈里斯资格的讨论在被揭露真相的新闻机构的事实调查“掩盖”后有所下降。
与2016年的竞选相比，今年围绕副总统候选人的社交媒体对话大幅增加。从7月到10月，哈里斯和共和党副总统迈克·彭斯在推特上被提及近4800万次，相比之下，四年前民主党副总统候选人彭斯或弗吉尼亚州参议员蒂姆·凯恩的总被提及次数仅为1200万次。
2016年彭斯和凯恩竞选时，错误信息在推特上的比例不到1%。彭斯今年也是如此，围绕他的大多数误导性言论都集中在他支持同性恋转化疗法的想法上，彭斯一再否认这一点。
但齐格纳尔实验室发现，围绕哈里斯的错误信息更为普遍，占推特对话的4%以上。
无党派威尔逊中心(Wilson Center)的假情报研究员尼娜·扬科维茨(Nina Jankowicz)说，这在很大程度上是由围绕哈里斯(Harris)的性别歧视或种族主义言论推动的，哈里斯是第一位竞选副总统的黑人和印度女性。
其中一些社交媒体帖子宣扬了这样一种观点，即加州参议员哈里斯(Harris)利用自己的浪漫关系推进了自己的职业生涯。这种说法在#HeelsUpHarris这样的标签中广受欢迎，这种标签经常被拥有数百万追随者的保守派影响者使用。Zignal实验室在Twitter上发现了近35万个与该叙述相关的标签或术语。
Jankowicz已经确定了在Facebook、Twitter和Instagram上流传的几十个模因，这些模因将哈里斯的照片叠加在性工作者的图像上，或者使用性别歧视的诽谤来描述她。她的初步研究显示，在10月7日的副总统辩论中，哈里斯使用性或暴力术语的标签在Parler等边缘社交媒体平台上飙升了631%，4chan增长了1078%。
“当我们一次又一次地看到这些叙事在公共生活中被用来反对女性时，这意味着要把那些强大和受尊重的女性打倒在地，”Jankowicz说。
Harris target of more misinformation than Pence, data shows
CHICAGO -- Long before Democratic presidential nominee Joe Bidenannounced her as his running mate, Kamala Harris was the target of widespread online misinformation.
Social media posts included racist claims that she was ineligible to serve in the White House or that she was lying about her Black and Indian heritage. Her mother is from India and her father from Jamaica.
Since being named to the presidential ticket, Harris has been at the center of online misinformation campaigns far more often — four times as much — than the white men who campaigned for the same job, according to a report from media intelligence firm Zignal Labs shared exclusively with The Associated Press.
“The narratives related to Kamala Harris zeroed in much more on her personal identity, especially as a woman of color,” said Jennifer Granston, head of insights at Zignal Labs.
The firm identified more than 1 million mentions since June on Twitter of Harris with hashtags or terms associated with misinformation about her. The mentions include fact checks that rebuffed the falsehoods, but those made up only a small portion of that conversation.
Nearly 300,000 of those mentions were about Harris' eligibility to serve as president, according to Zignal’s findings. The AP identified that false claim circulating online in January 2019, when Harris announced she was running for president.
The untrue assertion got a huge boost again, however, in August when President Donald Trump elevated it from his presidential podium.
Harris’ birth certificate shows she was born on Oct. 20, 1964, in Oakland, California, making her eligible to serve as either vice president or president. Social media chatter around Harris’ eligibility declined after being “eclipsed” by fact checks from news organizations that debunked it, Granston added.
There's been a huge uptick in social media conversation around the vice presidential candidates this year, compared to the 2016 campaign. From July to October, Harris and Republican Vice President Mike Pence have been mentioned almost 48 million times combined on Twitter, compared to only 12 million total mentions of Pence or Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, who was the Democratic vice presidential nominee four years ago.
Misinformation accounted for less than 1% of Twitter talk when Pence and Kaine were running in 2016. The same goes for Pence this year, with most of the misleading claims around him centered on the idea that he supports gay conversion therapy, which Pence has repeatedly denied.
But misinformation around Harris has been more prevalent, making up more than 4% of the conversation on Twitter, Zignal Labs found.
That’s largely been driven by sexist or racist narratives that have swirled online around Harris, who is the first Black and Indian woman running for vice president, said Nina Jankowicz, a disinformation fellow at the nonpartisan Wilson Center.
Some of those social media posts push the idea that Harris, a California senator, used her romantic relationships to advance her career. That narrative gained popularity with hashtags like #HeelsUpHarris, which is used regularly by conservative influencers who have millions of followers. Zignal Labs found nearly 350,000 mentions on Twitter of hashtags or terms related to that narrative.
And Jankowicz has identified dozens of memes circulating on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram that superimpose photos of Harris onto images of sex workers or use sexist slurs to describe her. Her preliminary research shows that during the Oct. 7 vice presidential debate, hashtags using sexual or violent terms for Harris skyrocketed on fringe social media platforms like Parler by 631% and 4chan by 1,078%.
“Time and time again when we see these narratives being used against women in public life, it’s meant to take women who are powerful and respected and knock them down a few pegs," Jankowicz said.
