Barcelona unrest: how to fabricate a protest in the age of TikTok

On October 24, TikTok accounts linked to the anonymous Blocus platform promoted gatherings in Barcelona ostensibly about education, but private chats redirected participants to looting, resulting in 130 arrests and 14 injured police officers. Similar fabricated protests using AI-generated posters and the Blocus label have since appeared across nine European countries, though it remains unclear whether they stem from a single orchestrator or coordinated digital mimicry. The real violence from Barcelona has been weaponized by Spanish politicians as political ammunition in the pre-electoral environment.