Data Monitor: December 2024 - Robo Cops

The document details a campaign of coordinated inauthentic activity on social media platforms—primarily X, Facebook, and YouTube—attributed to Azerbaijan during the lead-up to and duration of COP29. It highlights the use of thousands of bot-like accounts to amplify pro-government and pro-fossil fuel messaging while drowning out criticism of the regime's human rights record and climate policies. The report criticizes Big Tech companies for failing to enforce policies against coordinated inauthentic behavior and calls for better guardrails in the COP Presidency process.

• Research identified thousands of bot-like accounts on X used to amplify official Azerbaijani accounts and pro-fossil fuel messaging. Marc Owen Jones from Northwestern University in Qatar found 1,800 such accounts in October, while further analysis of 2,800 accounts showed the majority were created in three quarters of 2024.
• The bot activity effectively suppressed criticism of Azerbaijan's role in the conflict in Armenia. Global Witness observed that in July, 7 of the top 10 posts using #COP29 and #COP29Azerbaijan were critical of the country, but by September, all top posts for those hashtags originated from the official COP29 Azerbaijan account.
• CAAD tracked 554 suspicious X accounts, finding that 464 of them posted the phrase “#COP29 #COP29AZERBAIJAN” 5,632 times in the two weeks before the summit. A significant portion of this activity (77.1%) consisted of quote tweets of the official @COP29_AZ account, with spikes in activity coinciding with negative news reports about gas production and the arrest of a climate activist.
• Inauthentic activity extended to Facebook and YouTube, including the use of identical banner images for 'welcome to COP29' posts and a 'brigade' of hostile comments targeting Abzas Media. These Facebook accounts often used AI-generated headshots or images stolen from Russian, Turkish, or Pinterest sites.

APA

Climate Action Against Disinformation (2024). Data Monitor: December 2024 - Robo Cops. https://caad.info/analysis/uncategorized/data-monitor-december-2024-robo-cops/

Chicago

Climate Action Against Disinformation. Data Monitor: December 2024 - Robo Cops. 2024. https://caad.info/analysis/uncategorized/data-monitor-december-2024-robo-cops/.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=Climate Action Against Disinformation |title=Data Monitor: December 2024 - Robo Cops |date=27 December 2024 |url=https://caad.info/analysis/uncategorized/data-monitor-december-2024-robo-cops/ |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{climateactionagainstdisinformation2024data, author = {{Climate Action Against Disinformation}}, title = {{Data Monitor: December 2024 - Robo Cops}}, institution = {Climate Action Against Disinformation}, year = {2024}, month = dec, url = {https://caad.info/analysis/uncategorized/data-monitor-december-2024-robo-cops/}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }