In December 2008, Ratson was invited to attend Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs Diplomatic Academy, the principal mechanism through-which the Israeli Foreign Service recruits diplomats into service.[1] His diplomatic training included six months of theoretical and academic studies, followed by six months of on-the-job training in various departments of the ministry.[2]
Deputy Chief of Mission - Israeli Embassy, Côte d'Ivoire
In January 2010 Ratson was appointed Deputy Chief of Mission (DCM) of the Embassy of Israel in Côte d'Ivoire, a position that ended prematurely as the country plunged into a Civil War in March 2011. In an interview he gave to the Israeli daily Ynet on 14 January 2011, several weeks before the Civil War broke, Ratson recounted the reality in the country: "The embassy's economic activity has reached an almost complete standstill, and our focus now is on securing the small community of Israelis that is left in the country".[3] On 9 April 2011, two days before the arrest of Ivorian President Gbagbo, which marked the end of the civil war, Ratson and the remaining three Israeli diplomats were evacuated to Ghana by United Nations UNOCI forces[4] in an operation commanded by Jordanian UN forces.[5]
Director of Public Relations - Israeli Embassy, France
David Horovitz, in a Times of Israel article from 6 February 2019[8] sheds light on yet another significance, the August 2015 "Tel Aviv sur Seine" affair, that appears to have played a major role in shaping Ratson's diplomatic career in the years to follow. Horovitz quotes a senior diplomatic source within the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs describing the Tel Aviv sur Seine affair as "so potentially dramatic, and its faked origin so revelatory", that it drove the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs to "set up an R&D department for Algorithmic Diplomacy in the [foreign] ministry" in Jerusalem, with Ratson as its Head.[9]
Director of R&D - Foreign Affairs Ministry, Jerusalem
From September 2015 to July 2017 Ratson served as Director of Research and Development of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel in Jerusalem, charged with "developing innovative algorithms and software with the purpose of advancing and promoting diplomatic objectives".[13]
In what is described in the interview as a unique digital approach to diplomacy, Ratson is quoted explaining his work is to focus on "develop[ing] software which harnesses the massive influence which Digital Media has on the way people formulate their world view and use it to either advance the spread of positive narratives or inhibit the spread of violent narratives".[14]
Head of Data Diplomacy R&D - Foreign Affairs Ministry, London
Ratson is one of the first diplomats to introduce an algorithmic approach to the practice of diplomacy. An official Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs publication dated December 2017, described Ratson's diplomatic role the following:
Ratson is credited with pioneering a new subfield within digital diplomacy which experts refer to as Code-Based or Algorithmic Diplomacy - the harnessing of algorithms to influence the flow of country related narratives in the online matrix. Ratson is also one of the first traditional diplomats to be tasked with translating diplomatic objectives into code language
— Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2nd International Conference on Digital Diplomacy (5 December 2017)[16]
The Israeli daily Haaretz reported on 29 January 2019, that Twitter has suspended 343 accounts linked to foreign fake news manipulation campaigns aimed at the Israeli public, ahead of the April 9 election. The information in the report is attributed to Israel's Foreign Affairs Ministry Elad Ratson.[17]
We have identified five foreign attempts of disinformation in a level of sophistication indicating a state involvement, once it became apparent in November that Israel was heading for early elections.
The same article quotes the reputable Israeli white hat hackerNoam Rotem, speaking on his activities to identify and eliminate social media sockpuppet accounts saying: "If they [the social media companies] don't listen to us, we involve other professionals like Ratson from the Foreign Ministry".[19]
Confronting Online Hate & Radicalization
There are several journalistic and academic sources which provide information on the algorithmic nature of Ratson's work with respect to combating the spread of Terrorism on social media, most notably the development of a unique technology that is capable of removing social media posts and "bursting" social media echo chambers and filter bubbles. An article published by USA Today on 25 August 2016, reported:
Elad Ratson, a representative of the Israeli Foreign Ministry, said the government has developed online algorithms to identify and take down online posts that incite assaults. In addition, other ministries have worked on a system to find potential attackers based on their online comments in support of violence and a desire to avenge the death of a relative by Israeli forces.
— USA Today, Palestinian stabs Israeli amid a recent drop in attacks (25 August 2016)[20]
Another article by Israeli online news website Ynetnews from 27 December 2016, sheds more light on the capabilities of the technology that was developed:
Only after the development of a unique technological system allowing the Foreign Ministry to monitor the way Facebook responds to users' reports, it managed—through technological means—to bring about the removal of 7,133 posts (53 percent of the reported posts).
— Ynetnews, Foreign Ministry accuses Facebook of failing to remove thousands of inciting posts (27 December 2016)[21]
Oxford University researcher Ilan Manor, who studies the effects of digitization on the practice of diplomacy, dedicated a chapter in his book The Digitization of Public Diplomacy, to the analysis of Israel's Algorithmic Diplomacy model, following an "interview with the Director of Israeli Algorithmic Diplomacy".[22] His conclusions shed light on the technical aspects of Ratson's work:
The Israeli MFA has determined that the best way to counter the echo chamber effect is to manipulate social media algorithms and burst filter bubbles through digital assets, or individuals who can transmit positive information about Jews into gated communities that hold negative opinions of Jews or Israelis. The activities of the Israeli MFA are less dependent on traditional public diplomacy assets and are more focused on developing new digital skillsets.
— Ilan Manor, The Digitization of Public Diplomacy (2019)[23]
References
^"Training in the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Cadet Course". mfa.gov.il. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel. 2 August 2013. Retrieved 21 March 2019. The State Public Service Commission Tender for diplomatic posts in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the principal mechanism for recruiting diplomats into the Foreign Service
^"Training in the Israel Ministry of Foreign Affairs: Cadet Course". mfa.gov.il. Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Israel. 2 August 2013. Retrieved 21 March 2019. intensive theoretical and academic part lasting six months [...] the second part involves on-the-job training in various departments of the ministry
^Miller, Elhanan (30 May 2013). "French and Israeli Muslims partner in the name of religious tolerance". The Times of Israel. Tel Aviv, Israel: timesofisrael.com. Retrieved 8 April 2019. Dialogue with France's Muslim leadership was unfamiliar territory for the Israeli embassy in Paris [...] Ratson called [it] 'the most ambitious project undertaken by the Israeli embassy in a decade'
^Horovitz, David (6 February 2019). "Liberman's a spy, Yair Netanyahu's a Christian, and fake news aims to play havoc". The Times of Israel. Tel Aviv, Israel: timesofisrael.com. Retrieved 8 April 2019. The "Tel Aviv on the Seine" astroturfing crisis, which diplomats say has affected cultural relations between the two cities to this day, was so potentially dramatic, and its faked origin so revelatory, that it prompted Yuval Rotem, the director-general of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, to take the radical and fairly prescient step that summer of setting up an R&D department for "Algorithmic Diplomacy" in the ministry, headed by diplomat Elad Ratson
^Ratson, Elad (19 August 2015). "Comment une poignée de musulmans haineux a mis à genoux la presse française". CoolIsrael (in French). coolisrael.fr. Archived from the original on 18 May 2019. Retrieved 8 April 2019. Selon les experts des réseaux sociaux, la méthode qu'ils ont utilisé a pour nom l'Astroturfing. Il s'agit en fait d'une technique de propagande ayant pour but de donner l'impression d'un comportement spontané ou d'une opinion populaire, alors qu'il n'en est rien
^Guy Levy, Yaron Druckman (27 December 2016). "Israel seeks to beat election cyber bots". Ynet News. Yedioth Ahronoth. Retrieved 8 April 2019. Only after the development of a unique technological system allowing the Foreign Ministry to monitor the way Facebook responds to users' reports, it managed—through technological means—to bring about the removal of 7,133 posts (53 percent of the reported posts).
^Manor, Ilan (2019). The Digitization of Public Diplomacy. Basingstoke, United Kingdom: Palgrave Macmillan. p. 169. ISBN978-3-030-04405-3. The Israeli MFA has determined that the best way to counter the echo chamber effect is to manipulate social media algorithms and burst filter bubbles through digital assets, or individuals who can transmit positive information about Jews into gated communities that hold negative opinions of Jews or Israelis. The activities of the Israeli MFA are less dependent on traditional public diplomacy assets and are more focused on developing new digital skillsets.
