Russian disinformation
[7] Often Russian campaigns aim to disrupt domestic politics within Europe and the United States in an attempt to weaken the West due to its long-standing commitment to fight back against "Western imperialism" and shift the balance of world power to Russia and her allies.
According to the Voice of America, Russia seeks to promote American isolationism, border security concerns and racial tensions within the United States through its disinformation campaigns.
Additional sanctions on Belarus were also proposed, targeting individuals linked to human rights abuses or benefiting from ties to President Alexander Lukashenko’s government.
[17][18] When explaining the 2016 annual report of the Swedish Security Service on disinformation, spokesman Wilhelm Unge stated: "We mean everything from Internet trolls to propaganda and misinformation spread by media companies like RT and Sputnik.
However, inoculation was shown to improve participants' ability to recognize and perceive disinformation as less credible, heighten perceptions of Russia's responsibility for the war, and strengthen solidarity with Ukraine.
Russian web brigades and bots, typically operated by Russia's Internet Research Agency (IRA), were commonly used to disseminate disinformation throughout these social media channels.
[26] Cameron Hudson, a senior fellow of the Africa Center at the Atlantic Council at the time, said Russia's aim is to make its presence felt in the same way it did during the Cold War, but with a much smaller investment using disinformation campaigns.
These sites include the Strategic Culture Foundation, New Eastern Outlook, Crimea-based news agency NewsFront and SouthFront, a website targeted at "military enthusiasts, veterans, and conspiracy theorists.
[30] Twelve of the thirteen Russian nationals indicted by Robert Mueller for conspiracy meddling in the 2016 United States presidential election were employees of the Internet Research Agency, based in St. Petersburg, Russia.
Probably to evade the detection mechanisms of social media platforms, the IRA co-opted activists working for a human-rights focused Ghanaian NGO to target black communities in the U.S.[41] Russian campaigns have also evolved to become more cross-platform, with content spreading, not only on Facebook and Twitter, but also on Tumblr, Wordpress, and Medium.
[46][47][48] Kammenos formed the Athens-based Institute of Geopolitical Studies which in November 2014 signed a "memorandum of understanding" with the former SVR officer Reshetnikov who headed RISI.
[49] In 2009, RISI, which had been an SVR operation, was placed under control of the Russian president with Reshetnikov regularly meeting with Putin and participated in Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections by developing plans of action: for example, with Russian intelligence assets and using a large disinformation campaign, Putin would support Republicans and the Trump campaign and disrupt Democrats and the Clinton campaign, and, if Trump were likely to lose the 2016 election, then Russia would shift its efforts to focus upon voter fraud in the United States in order to undermine the legitimacy of the United States electoral system and the elections.
Martin Kragh [sv] of the Center for East European Studies in Stockholm described this as following the pattern of political commissars, stating, "Everything we see in these documents is completely Soviet".
[58] Lev Parnas, Igor Fruman, Yuriy Lutsenko, John Solomon, Dmytro Firtash and his allies, Victoria Toensing and Joe diGenova were noted in a Fox News internal report Ukraine, Disinformation, & the Trump Administration: a Full Timeline of Events, which was written by Fox News senior political affairs specialist Bryan S. Murphy and made public by Marcus DiPaola,[d] as indispensable "in the collection and domestic publication of elements of this disinformation campaign" and numerous falsehoods.
[73] During the Russo-Ukrainian War, Russian state TV channel Russia-1 has used Tucker Carlson interviews on Fox News to support the Kremlin's objectives in Ukraine.
[10] Voice of America reported that Russian disinformation campaigns have focused on promoting American isolationism, tensions between various races as well as border security concerns.
[8] The Telegraph reported that Russia and China were promoting pro-Palestinian influencers in order to manipulate British public opinion in favor of Russian and Chinese interests.
[90][91][92][93][94][95][96] In September 2024, the United States Justice Department asserted that Sergey Kiriyenko had created some 30 internet domains to spread Russian disinformation, including on Elon Musk’s X which was formerly known as Twitter.
