I tweeted about Harper. Then the Twitter bots attacked

Benjamin Perrin, a professor at UBC’s Peter A. Allard School of Law, wrote about his first-hand experience with political bots, automated fake Twitter accounts set up to attack Twitter users with dissenting political views.

“I have a pretty thick skin, figured this online attack out and knew what to do to stop it. But imagine if someone had released this unethical and prohibited social media attack on a future Amanda Todd or Rehtaeh Parsons. The devastation caused by an automated cyberbullying attack that can be launched with the click of a button could be tragic,” wrote Perrin in an article for the Globe and Mail.