Video: Ben Nimmo on influence operations and the Breakout Scale

Ben Nimmo, the director of investigations at Graphika, joins Elias Groll, the managing editor of TechStream, to discuss the evolution of influence operations and a system developed by Nimmo to measure their impact, the “Breakout Scale.”

By considering how influence operations move between online platforms and are amplified by influential voices on those platforms, the Breakout Scale offers analysts a way of measuring the impact of an influence operation without having to measure changes in behavior of those targeted. The Breakout Scale divides influence operations into six categories, based on whether they remain on one platform or travel across multiple platforms (including traditional media and policy debates), and whether they remain in one community or spread through many communities.