Since October 29, with the accusation by Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla at the United Nations, a campaign has been underway to reveal the true nature of the digital platform El Toque.
Far from being an independent media outlet, it is a privileged creation of the U.S. government, designed to attack the economy and stability of the Cuban people.
In the TV program Razones de Cuba, compelling evidence was presented about this subversive operation. Raúl Capote, a former State Security agent, explained that the essence of the multifaceted war against Cuba has two axes: the war against the national economy and the war against the consciousness of Cubans. "El Toque has been precisely that: an attack directed at the country's economy, but also at the stability of the people," he said.
Capote pointed out that this type of operation involving induced inflation and currency manipulation is not new. "It was tried against Chile, Nicaragua, and Venezuela. The difference lies in how it has developed since then."
He gave the example of Dollar Today in Venezuela, which managed to drive up the exchange rate through very similar operations.
The investigation by Cuban security agencies has identified 18 key executives and operators of El Toque, whose faces were published by the Razones de Cuba website. According to the former agent, this revelation caused a "stampede" among those involved —many of whom do not even have legal immigration status in the countries where they reside— for fear of criminal prosecution.
Among the names listed is Gretel Valladares Carbonell (alias "Filo"), who was responsible for managing funds from USAID and the NED, distributed by the US State Department. Katia Sánchez Martínez, current community manager at El Toque and, significantly, also an employee of the U.S. Embassy in Havana, was also mentioned, which is evidence of direct coordination.
The current management of El Toque is composed of four people: José Hassan, Eloy, Alejandro, and Ana Lidia. Capote revealed that Ana Lidia is "the brains" behind the operation, while José Hassan acts as the public face, and he publicly confessed to receiving funding from the U.S. government. This internal dynamic shows struggles for leadership, exacerbated after the allegations.
THE FARCE OF THE ALGORITHM: ELEMENTARY, SIMPLE, AND CRUDE
El Toque's supposed "technical sophistication" in calculating an informal exchange rate was dismantled on the same program by two academics from the University of Havana. Raúl Guinovart Díaz, PhD in Science, a prominent mathematician who led the COVID-19 prediction models, and Yubán Gutiérrez Quintanilla, PhD in Science, first vice president of the Association of Economists and Accountants of Cuba, analyzed the method.
Both specialists agreed that they felt "disappointed to discover" the procedure.
Guinovart Díaz said he thought the algorithm they used was sophisticated, "but in reality they use a very basic concept, fundamental in the teaching of statistics: the median."
He explained that the computational process is extremely simple, basically reduced to sorting a list of data, a first-year programming exercise.
He also highlighted the lack of rigor in their analyses, which do not correspond to what they claim is the basis of their algorithm, and validate its accuracy. What is presented as a technical indicator is nothing more than crude manipulation, lacking the complex econometric and statistical models that truly analyze macroeconomic variables.
A CLEAR PURPOSE: TO HARM CUBA
The publication of articles that, feigning concern, quote Cuban scientists —such as Guinovart himself— on sensitive issues such as dengue fever, is another facet of this hybrid war. They seek to create anxiety and destabilize, while on the other hand, they manipulate economic perceptions with a fraudulent algorithm.
"The statistical method used by El Toque to calculate and publish the dollar exchange rate on the Cuban informal market is 'elementary and crude,'" Guinovart Díaz said. This mechanism, he explained, consists of calculating a Representative Informal Market Rate (TMRI, in Spanish) by taking the median of the prices published in advertisements on social media and classified sites.
To obtain the median, all price data is sorted from lowest to highest, and the central value is taken. Analysis of a specific period, from November 13 to 22, revealed that four key Telegram groups contributed an average of 348 messages with prices daily, representing more than half of the total sample used by the platform.
"In statistics, whoever controls 50% plus one of the data in a sample determines the median value," said the mathematician.
The academic questioned the use of such small samples, given the platform's supposed processing capacity, and warned that this methodological choice makes the system "very susceptible to manipulation." "By concentrating efforts on flooding only those four groups with messages, the median could be shifted toward the desired value," he said.
The investigation presented evidence of non-compliance with El Toque's own stated filters: duplicate messages counted more than once, identical or very similar text structures suggesting automated generation, and equivalent posts in different groups at the same time.
Given that this TMRI has become the main reference for the informal exchange rate on the island, its manipulation has a direct impact on the economy. Gutiérrez Quintanilla listed the damages: "distortion of prices and state economic planning, promotion of inflation and erosion of purchasing power, encouragement of speculation, and discouragement of remittances entering through official channels."
In a context of economic blockade, these practices prevent foreign currency from entering the national banking system, affecting Cuba's ability to make essential imports. The experts' conclusion is clear: "The manipulation is not found in the algorithm's calculation, but in the selection of data. They have a number and go out looking for data so that the calculation gives them the number they already have."
This dynamic, according to the analysis, is linked to the economic phenomenon of overshooting, where prices in volatile markets react exaggeratedly to artificially created expectations.
The accusation is clear: El Toque is a media arm of the unconventional economic war against Cuba. It is financed by foreign powers, its operators are mercenaries in the service of foreign powers, and its main tool is the crudest deception, disguised as a technique.
As stated in the program, it is a creature that must, and will, die in the face of the truth and the resistance of the Cuban people. (Granma)
