What they are calling "memetic engineering" is one of four areas addressed in their 44 page note.
From RAND, July 23, the one page overview:
Technological and Economic Threats to the U.S. Financial System
An Initial Assessment of Growing Risks
The resilience and stability of the U.S. financial system is critical to economic prosperity. However, the rapid pace of technological and geopolitical change introduces new potential threats that must be monitored and assessed. The authors of this report explore emerging and understudied threats to the financial system, focusing on risks from social media, advances in artificial intelligence, and from the changing role of economic statecraft in geopolitics.
Drawing on historical examples, the economic literature, and discussions with subject-matter experts, the authors assess the potential costs and likelihood of four threats: attacks on financial trading models, bond dumping by foreign holders of U.S. debt, using deepfakes to spread misinformation, and memetic engineering to manipulate beliefs and behaviors. Their analysis suggests these threats pose a limited near-term risk of significant economic damage because of the interconnectivity of global finance and existing safeguards. However, the gradual erosion of financial resilience and institutional trust over time could make attacks more impactful.
Key Findings
- Emerging threats to U.S. financial markets — such as attacks on AI-enabled financial models, bond dumping, deepfakes, and memetic engineering — pose a limited risk of significant economic damage because of the high costs of such attacks to adversaries and existing market safeguards.
- Risks may increase because of geopolitical tensions and advancing technological capabilities that alter adversaries' cost–benefit calculations.
- The most significant threat is not an abrupt event, akin to a "financial 9/11," but rather a slow and steady process, akin to "financial climate change." This phenomenon could occur when disinformation or misinformation diminishes public trust in markets, consequently complicating the distinction between reality and fabrication and thereby escalating market volatility.
- Data privacy regulations could limit the threat posed by AI-augmented disinformation campaigns. Regulations would make it harder for malicious actors to collect detailed data that could be used to create and disseminate highly customized messages to influence individual behavior....
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And from the report:
An Initial Assessment of Growing Risks .............................................................................................................1
Methods Used to Identify Threats ...................................................................................................................1
Threat 1: Attacks on Models .........................................................................................................................4
Threat 2: Bond Dumping ..............................................................................................................................8
Threat 3: Deepfakes ..................................................................................................................................12
Threat 4: Memetic Engineering .....................................................................................................................16*****....MEMETIC ENGINEERING INVOLVES DESIGNING VIRAL IDEAS OR CULTURE (MEMES) TO ACHIEVE A SPECIFIC PSYCHOLOGICAL OR MATERIAL OUTCOME.
The term is derivative of genetic engineering, with memes being the cultural equivalent of a biological gene. More specifically, memes are multifaceted units of culture, such as images, videos, phrases, or concepts, that spread rapidly online through imitation and sharing. When weaponized, memes can tap into human tribalism, emotions, cognitive biases, and identity and potentially manipulate behavior or beliefs.71
Potent memes can shape what issues people focus on, who they see as part of their in-group, and how they direct their energy and anger.
Historically, Russia has been the primary actor in using covert memetic engineering.72However, China has begun shifting its focus from social media memetic engineering operations that rely on volume to those that target specific individuals. The 2023 Microsoft Threat Intelligence report notes that Chinese influence operations have begun using generative AI tools to create visual content that has drawn higher levels of engagement in social networks than their prior efforts.73The Microsoft report also notes that Chinese operations have expanded across multiple social media platforms, including Reddit, in which many financial discussion boards are hosted.
Although foreign actors have shown increased interest in memetic engineering, there are no reported cases of memetic engineering by foreign adversaries to manipulate financial markets. Additionally, to our knowledge, there have been no analyses of the feasibility of a memetic attack on markets, how an attack might play out, nor the potential economic costs of such an attack. However, in our discussions, subject-matter experts were concerned about the potential for a memetic attack on financial markets because they perceived such an attack to be feasible and potentially impactful.
There are likely two potential use cases of memetic engineering in a financial setting....
....MUCH MORE (44 page PDF)
