France uncovers a vast Russian disinformation campaign in Europe
France uncovers a vast Russian disinformation campaign in Europe
“Portal Kombat” also targets Germany and Poland
France uncovers a vast Russian disinformation campaign in Europe::undefined
Disinformation or more accurately, lying, is Russian doctrine. Everything that they say seems to be a lie and designed to delay appropriate action.
I think every literate soul in Afghanistan would agree that this isn't really limited to Russia.
All sides are doing it in every war, be wary what you trust
Of course. That's been true since the dawn of humanity.
Russia has a certain flavor of lying that I don't see elsewhere. They make claims that are so utterly ridiculous that everyone knows it is complete bullshit. It's like some weird gaslighting / dominance thing. Lavrov and Putin are pros at this.
Purely by coincidence, you see a similar technique employed by one of the two major US presidential candidates. Only his approach is to repeat the ridiculous lie enough times that some people believe it.
Sure, but for Russia it's the actual doctrine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_military_deception
Uncovering these rings, publicizing them, and shutting them down needs to be a top priority. I think a lot, if not most, of the bad decisions made by voters stem from these kind of bad actors. We've let it go on for long enough.
Not only voters, also politicians. Everyone can be influenced, even those in power :)
You'd have thought publicising them would involve not only saying they exist, but also educating people about what the misinformation is. As far as I can tell from a quick scan, the article doesn't talk about the message the proganda is pushing. I'm just as clueless as before about what I should believe and what I shouldn't.
Are the public just meant to know when they're being lied to?
Yes this should have been done better. I remember when they did the same thing in the USA they at least listed all of them so you could to see what they were up to.
Wait?!! RUSSIA?!?!?
Misinformation campaign?!?!
Surely some mistake?!?!
That would be SO unlike them!!!
DISinformation. The difference is that misinformation might or might not be intentional, whereas disinformation is organised intentional misinformation with specific goals in mind.
Not that I blame you for getting it wrong, mind you, since most media outlets consistently do.
When you think about scammers that send fishing emails and stuff, it's similar. Should we be surprised when we click on sketchy links and get scammed? No. Should we stay on top of reporting the issue and ensuring that more people aren't scammed? Yes.
I'm expecting a really nasty autumn this year. A big chunk of Russia's campaign against Europe is held up by Ukraine and they badly need a stooge US president again.
Musk also opened Twitter's doors wide for state-sponsored manipulation and agitation campaigns. All protections are offline and the teams are gone, under the guise of free speech.
To add: Twitter under Musk also complies with all government censorship requests since Musk took over. News on Twitter has been hugely influential in the past in protests in authoritarian states, but that's clearly a thing of the past now.
Full compliance with government censorship was 83% in may last year, up from the 50% it was before Musk.
And partial + full compliance was at 98.8%, up from 92% before Musk. And the remaining 1.2% were not denied, just status unknown, so it's basically 100%.
I wonder what the current numbers are and how the full/partial takedowns are geographically distributed. It wouldn't surprise me one bit if partial compliance was limited to some western countries and it's full compliance everywhere else.
Elon Musk, the self declared "free speech absolutist", what a shithead.
stooge president
Don't worry, we'll deliver that with a bow on. Or orange spray.
Anyone else getting tired of Russia's bullshit?
Europe certainly is. I should note that while most of their campaigns happen over on Twitter & Facebook that if federated social media ever took off in a big way it would happen there too and it might actually be harder to control if it did.
It sure would be nice if NATO and the EU would just steamroll them back into place.
Wait until springtime though.
tired of Russia's BS
I think Ukraine is.
And most of western Europe.
And US.
And...
Well yes and obviously. Russia is a bad actor and obviously wants to sow division & doubt over the war in Ukraine, to sow division in general, and to slander political enemies. They have a special interest in interfering with US and European politics.
They're not the only bad actor of course. If you see memes & misinfo trend about immigration, Ukraine, drugs, vaccines, climate change, abortion, gas & oil, politics, NATO, EVs, MAGA, Palestine / Israel, dissidents etc. then invariably there is a bad actor driving that crap. They'll use their clusters of bots on Twitter to amplify the info until it gets picked up by useful idiots looking to retweet around.
If you see memes & misinfo trend about immigration, Ukraine, drugs, vaccines, climate change, abortion, gas & oil, politics, NATO, EVs, MAGA, Palestine / Israel, dissidents etc. then invariably there is a bad actor driving that crap.
The thing is, there's a lot of stuff in those topics you list that we need to have social discourse about and there are legitimate differences of opinion on. I don't think you can write everyone that is against what somebody/government deems as "approved fact" as a bad actor. I'm sure I would disagree with you on a number of those topics and would argue them in good faith. This is what makes it all so hard.
Yes you can have a social discourse. What I mean is somebody took time to turn some disinfo in meme form and amplify it. This is inauthentic actors poisoning discussions with lies and division.
The best lie is the one that contains grains of truth
Rightwing idiots are already drooling to swallow up everything they say.
Russian propaganda is big on the left, too.
Without paywall. (Initially posted the same link, but then I noticed their comment. Leaving mine up since theirs doesn't explicitly say what the link is)
Honestly Portal Kombat is a great name.
It's a great pun, but I hate how good an English pun it is, especially for the operation. It suggests that these guys aren't hacks, and have enough language and culture skills to blend in. The recent "warm water ports" gaffe comes to mind.
Also, intelligence agencies don't use cute code names for things like this since it makes it easier to work out the operation scope or intent. To me, this also says that the operation is "at arm's length" and the name was coined by non-government folks. Think: information age mercenaries.
intelligence agencies don’t use cute code names for things like this since it makes it easier to work out the operation scope or intent
It's kind of amusing that during WWII Germany had a penchant for choosing meaningful code names for some of their secret programs, names that actually gave important information to the Allies. Knickebein and Wotan were noteworthy examples, names given to German electronic bomber navigation systems.
I was gonna say "I love the name they gave it"
FIGHT!
Reason number %large_number% + 1 why support for Ukraine cannot falter. Russia cannot win its offensive there and continue to spread its poison across the world.
I too also uncovered this, but it was quite some time ago now
The thing is that their uncovered the method, whisch should help a bit in mitigating the damage
No shit .
Why even fund uncovering these. Just build your systems with this as a consideration. If it's not Russia it will be someone else.
To prove that they're real. Without proof it can be seen as a conspiracy
'Just'
Just make sure all information is correct. How hard can it be?
Yeah I hear you
How do you defend against something without first uncovering it and seeing how it works?
finally?!
These dudes look like we've just walked in on them kissing
Shocked Pikachu is Shocked
I really prefer the Israeli and the USA disinformation campaigns /s
Fucking neoliberals... decades of neoliberal economic policy, imperialism and media conglomeration allowed this fertile ground in the first place.
Add to that, that every news is owned by someone, makes a minimum of 50% of its revenue from ads, and gets the rest of its revenue from paying customers from a class with expandable income who don't want their worldview challenged or destroyed.... It is really scary, how easy it is to manipulate public opinion by simple strategically choosing how facts are reported (pictures of humans vs. reporting numbers, wording, etc.), which facts are reported in the first way and where to position the information (top of page vs. footer). It is fun to call out Russia, instead calling out the ruling class, companies, the western governments etc. They all lie and they all try to control/direct public discourse.
Out of curiosity can anyone point out to me some of this russian disinformation? There's so much western propaganda around that i really can't find any
Right now, France is gripped by a large labor revolt in the agricultural sector being driven by the state's effort to increase agricultural imports from North Africa and Eastern Europe while reducing state price-supports for down-year crops. This threatens to lead to large scale real estate consolidation and foreign real estate purchase. Nationalists, agricultural owner-operators, and farmers exposed to rising interest rates (basically all of them) don't like this very much.
However, claiming the heartland farmers of rural France are angry at Macron for selling out the agg sector to financial interests in Brussels and Zurich isn't going to be too popular as we approach the 2024 EU Parliamentary elections. So we're getting an earful about how all these local yokels are hoodwinked by anti-EU Russian Propaganda.
If you're not in favor of truckloads of exported Ukranian agricultural salvage ending up competing with fresh French produce on store shelves, then you're a secret spy for Putin and a traitor.
A perfect demonstration of how Russian indoctrination works right here.
Original reporting: A major disinfo attack against Europe being prepared by Russia is uncovered through diligent investigation and published and reported on.
The response:
-
- divert to farmer's dissatisfaction with several policies
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- cast disinfo reports as underhanded attempts (by politician Russia wants gone) to arrogantly brush off farmer's concerns (which the report never even related to)
-
- claim Macron is selling out to EU (here, have a serving of anti-EU sentiment, too)
-
- vaccinate reader against the disinfo being countered ("everyone who tells you otherwise belittles you and hates you, join us in our righteous anger")
Emotional framing:
Nationalists, agricultural owner-operators, and farmers exposed to rising interest rates
"truckloads of exported Ukranian agricultural salvage" vs. "fresh French produce"
we’re getting an earful about how all these local yokels are hoodwinked by anti-EU Russian Propaganda
Macron for selling out the agg sector to financial interests in Brussels
"If you’re not in favor of (insert supposed evil acts described in lurid way), then you’re a secret spy for Putin and a traitor."
Result: The reader comes out the other end an angry person, outraged about the plight of farmers, outraged again at disinfo reports supposedly serving to silence them, outraged once more at a France politician selling them out to the EU, EU painted as high-and-mighty villain, automatic anger against anyone who tells them a different viewpoint ready to trigger.
-
Russia Today comes to mind
Here's a great book on the subject: https://www.amazon.com/Putins-Trolls-Frontlines-Russias-Information/dp/1632461293
Ya I gotchu, fam. https://www.washingtonblade.com/content/files/2017/11/Bernie_Sanders_in_speedo_460x470_courtesy_House_Intelligence_Committee.jpg
They moved mountains with this one.
So we are doing the Russian thing again? An easy scapegoat to blame for everything. Western propaganda like this is more dangerous to society than fictional the Boogeyman
JFC, choose to be better.
Here you are, presented with facts and you just ignore them and start spouting more right wing garbage, truly worthless
Russia Russia Russia
Yes, we're doing this Russia thing again, because, like last time (though it's never truly stopped) we are confronted with evidence of a wide-reaching disinformation campaign. Yes, it's an easy scapegoat because Russia is actually the one at fault here. Crazy, right?
Try to make sure not to make yourself look like a complete idiot the next time you sit down to write a comment.
I was about to tag you, but your username is rather apt
