Blind Sided: A Reconceptualization of the Role of Emerging Technologies in Shaping Information Operations in the Gray Zone

Ashley Mattheis, Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, Varsha Koduvayur, Cody Wilson

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Introduction

In June 2022, Facebook and Twitter accounts suddenly focused their wrath on Australian company Lynas. The previous year, Lynas—the largest rare earths mining and processing company outside China—had inked a deal with the U.S. Department of Defense to build a processing facility for rare earth elements in Texas. Over a year after the deal was signed, concerned Texas residents began taking to social media to loudly voice opposition to the deal. They claimed the facility would create pollution and toxic waste, endangering the local population. Residents disparaged Lynas’s environmental record, and called for protests against the construction of the processing facility and a boycott of the company.

Only these posts weren’t coming from Texas residents at all. The lead voices on the topic weren’t even real identities. The campaign was led by fake accounts set up and maintained by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) in an information operation (IO) aimed at smearing the image of China’s competitors in the field of rare earths—metals critical to producing advanced electronics, electric vehicles, batteries, and renewable energy systems. China is a behemoth in this field, controlling over 80% of global production of rare earths, and is eager to maintain its supply chain dominance.[i]

This PRC-led campaign against a rival in the rare earths field was discovered by cybersecurity firm Mandiant, which has also unearthed past PRC-led IOs aimed at promoting “narratives in support of the political interests of” Beijing.[ii] Nor was Lynas the only company that China targeted in its attempts to use the information space to ensure continued rare earths dominance. In June 2022, the same PRC-led campaign targeted both Appia Rare Earths & Uranium Corporation, a Canadian rare earths mining company, and the American rare earths manufacturer USA Rare Earth. Both companies were bombarded by “negative messaging in response to potential or planned rare earths production activities,” Mandiant noted.[iii]