Over 90% of false posts on Okinawa gubernatorial election SNS spread outside the prefecture, analysis of source area

An analysis of the spread of one case of false posts on social media related to the Okinawa gubernatorial election related to defeated incumbent Denny Tamashiro revealed on the 16th that 98.8% of the reposts (reposts) for which the source area could be estimated by prefecture were from outside Okinawa. The number of reposts rapidly increased to over 9,000 in 24 hours.

30% of last time Mr. Tamaki went to Mr. Koja, Henoko retreats due to priority policies - Okinawa gubernatorial election exit poll

``The person who decided to relocate Henoko was Denny Tamashiro,'' and ``The opposition movement was his own work.'' At first glance, the post on X (formerly Twitter) posted just after 10 a.m. on July 26 seemed to indicate that Mr. Tamaki himself praised the decision to relocate the U.S. military's Futenma Air Base as a "wonderful decision."

According to the SNS analysis tool "Brand Watch," there were 54 reposts in the first hour, which rose to more than 1,300 in three hours, and more than 3,600 in six hours.

In 24 hours, there were 1,927 reposts whose locations could be estimated based on profiles, posted content, location information, etc. Tokyo accounted for over 60% of the cases, while Okinawa Prefecture had only 24 cases (1.2%).

However, there was no evidence that Mr. Tamaki had decided to move the facility to Henoko, and the content of the post was different from the truth. The remark that it was a ``great decision'' did not fully evaluate the relocation to Henoko.

Posts pointing out the errors appeared the next day, but even the most widespread one only received about 600 reposts in 24 hours. In August, the private organization Japan Fact Check Center judged the original post to be ``erroneous''.

In the gubernatorial election, a poster-like image of the newly elected candidate, Genta Furusa, with the words ``Building an Okinawa that serves the national interest'' was circulated on X objectId, and his campaign denied creating it.

During the election period from August 27th to September 13th, there were approximately 1.67 million posts of X containing the words ``Okinawa Prefectural Governor's Election'' and ``Okinawa Governor's Election.'' Of the approximately 360,000 cases for which the origin could be estimated by prefecture, approximately 95% were from outside Okinawa Prefecture.