Research: Election Manipulation as a Business Model

Executive Summary

Nisos identified a predictive analytics firm, Predictvia, which advertises itself as manipulating public discourse and targeting voters in elections. Chief executive officer Ernesto Olivo Valverde heads the company, which is linked to Ing3nia, another predictive analytics firm registered in Florida and Venezuela.

Predictvia claims to use fake social media accounts and other digital assets, including its artificial intelligence (AI) platform, Seenatra (formerly Tucomoyo) to manipulate public discourse, particularly pertaining to:

• The Fast Food Market
• Elections
• Publishing
• Retail
• TV
• Banking

Predictvia operates a survey site called Befrankonline that feeds the AI platform. We evaluated the site’s infrastructure to identify possible survey campaigns.

Nisos found evidence from the Befrankonline platform’s survey infrastructure that Predictvia has possibly deployed surveys related to elections in Honduras and Guatemala, the latter of which included surveys about uprisings prior to and during elections.

The reporting contained herein from the Nisos research organization consists of analysis reflecting assessments of probability and levels of confidence and should not necessarily be construed as fact. All content is provided on an as-is basis and does not constitute professional advice, and its accuracy reflects the reliability, timeliness, authority, and relevancy of the sourcing underlying those analytic assessments.

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