Channel 4 News has released an undercover, secretly recorded, video with some of the folks of Cambridge Analytica, a data firm that was used by the Trump campaign team.
And it’s pretty insane! Here are some excerpts from the video as well as the video itself:
“The two fundamental human drivers when it comes to taking information onboard effectively are hopes and fears and many of those are unspoken and even unconscious,” he said. “You didn’t know that was a fear until you saw something that just evoked that reaction from you.”
“And our job is to get, it to drop the bucket further down the well than anybody else,” he added, “to understand, what are those really deep-seated underlying fears, concerns.
“It’s no good fighting an election campaign on the facts, because actually it’s all about emotion,” he concluded
[…]
Here they discuss how they won’t use shady tactics…
“So we’re not in the business of fake news, we’re not in the business of lying, making stuff up, and we’re not in the business of entrapment,” he said. “So we wouldn’t, we wouldn’t send a pretty girl out to seduce a politician and then film them in their bedroom and then release the film.”
“There are companies that do this, but to me that crosses a line,” he claimed.
Though he later conducted this exact statement.
[…]
“And the operative you will use for this is who?” the agent asked.
“Well someone known to us,” Nix said.
“OK, so it is somebody, you won’t use a Sri Lankan person?” the agent asked.
“No, no, we’ll have a wealthy developer come in,” Nix explained, “somebody posing as a wealthy developer. They will offer a large amount of money to the candidate, to finance his campaign in exchange for land, for instance. We’ll have the whole thing recorded on cameras. We’ll blank out the face of our guy, and then post it on the internet.”
[…]
Except, it seems like they will.
“For example you’re saying when you’re using the girls to introduce to the local fellow,” the agent asked, “and you’re using the girls for this, like the seduction, they’re not local girls, not Sri Lankan girls?”
“I wouldn’t have thought so no, we’ll bring some,” Nix responded, “I mean, that was just an idea. Just saying we could bring some Ukrainians in on holiday with us, you know. You know what I’m saying.”
“They are very beautiful,” said the agent, “Ukrainian girls.”
“They are very beautiful,” Nix agreed, “I find that works very well.”
[…]
Despite this, the firm has released a statement… denying this sort of thing actually takes place.
“We entirely refute any allegation that Cambridge Analytica or any of its affiliates use entrapment, bribes, or so-called “honey-traps” for any purpose whatsoever,” a statement read from the company.
“We routinely undertake conversations with prospective clients to try to tease out any unethical or illegal intentions,” the statement continued. “Cambridge Analytica does not untrue material for any purpose.”