let's stop Russian fakes

Romanian intelligence has data on Russian interference in the presidential election

Documents on interference in the presidential election are released in Romania. Intelligence suggests that the kremlin is behind the crime, but local analysts point to the contrary.During the election campaign, identical messages were actively spread on social media and influencers were involved. The operation itself was carried out from ‘external locations’ to circumvent restrictions.

According to the BBC, this is stated in the investigation documents released by Romanian President Klaus Iohannis.
Intelligence officers also found that one TikTok account paid $381,000 to users who campaigned for a pro-russian candidate in just one month, starting on 24 October. In addition, data for accessing election websites were stolen from genuine users and published ‘on the platforms of cybercriminals originating from russia.

TikTok is suspected of criminally ignoring fake accounts before the Romanian elections

The social network's CEO is being summoned to the European Parliament to explain the role of the platform in the Romanian presidential election. A Politico article quoting the head of the liberal group Renew Europe, Valerie Haier, states that TikTok's management must prove the platform's transparency and compliance with the Digital Services Act.

According to Keita Kili, coordinator of the Bulgarian-Romanian Digital Media Observatory, the platform had a ‘significant impact’ during the first round of elections, as TikTok's rule banning paid political advertising was ‘largely ineffective’.
It is worth noting that the far-right and pro-russian candidate Kelin Georgescu won the first round of the election. He had no party support and was not among the favourites in opinion polls.

Russian cybercriminals target European and American users

The russian-controlled RomCom group, known as Storm-0978, Tropical Scorpius or UNC259, exploited vulnerabilities in Mozilla and Windows products to carry out the hacking attacks.According to cybersecurity researchers from ESET, the criminals' goal was to gain hidden remote access to computers to install malware on them.

ESET also found that the number of potential victims of the RomCom cybercrime campaign between 10 October and 4 November 2024 ranged from one victim to 250 per country.
In 2024, RomCom carried out cyberattacks on government agencies, the defence and energy sectors in Ukraine, the pharmaceutical and insurance sectors in the United States, the legal sector in Germany, and government organisations in Europe.

Russians are training new propagandists in Africa

Russian intelligence services in the Malian capital, Bamako, have organised so-called "journalism schools" for future fake newsmakers, and promised the best of them jobs. According to Le Monde, 60 Malian "journalists" are being trained by the "African Initiative" and "Agence de presse", both controlled by the kremlin's intelligence services.

The article notes that the selection of the ‘students’ was carried out by a Malian journalist and influencer with pro-russian views, Robert Dissa, who had previously visited moscow and the temporarily occupied Mariupol. In addition, the lecture involved the russian Mikhail Pozdnyakov, the head of the French editorial office of "Agence de Presse".

Russia regularly transfers weapons to third countries for acts of aggression

The Wall Street Journal recently reported that about 70 percent of the weapons found in the possession of the Hezbollah terrorist group during Israel's military operation in southern Lebanon were russian-made. According to the markings on some of the samples, the weapons came from Syria. One of the missiles had a label in russian stating that it had been transferred to the Syrian Ministry of Defence. 

As IDF experts found out, some of the russian weapons were manufactured in 2020 and sent to southern Lebanon. Other samples, according to the markings, were produced in the 1980s. putin, when providing weapons to Assad, knew full well that they could fall into the hands of Hezbollah. But this eloquently confirms the kremlin's strategy of increasing chaos in all regions of the world. Earlier, we wrote about an investigation that confirmed russian arms supplies to the Yemeni Houthis, as well as the kremlin's strategic cooperation agreement with North Korea.

Viktor Orbán continues to manipulate the issue of Russian energy carriers

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has called for a review of the European Union's sanctions against russia over energy prices. Similar calls from a number of European politicians at various levels are regularly published by the russian media.In this way, kremlin propaganda tries to convince European communities that refusal from russian energy carriers will primarily affect ordinary Europeans. They will "suffer", "freeze", and "pay more". 

But the truth is that no European country that has refused to cooperate with Gazprom has seen prices rise. The underground storage facilities are full and Europe will get through the next winter without any problems. Only those few countries that did not want to give up russian gas after the start of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine have problems and have additional difficulties with supplies and payments. That is why Orban's calls for a review of sanctions are not viable. 

Agents of the Russian special services were detained in Poland

Game agents were detained in Poland on suspicion of preparing terrorist attacks on international flights. Criminals were preparing to set fire to parcels on board cargo and passenger planes bound for the USA and Canada.

The Financial Times writes that the Polish prosecutor's office has issued international arrest warrants for two more people suspected of involvement in the preparation of sabotage. By the way, earlier the Lithuanian police arrested a suspect in sending four explosive devices, in particular through the DHL company in Vilnius. The detainee introduced himself as Igor Prudnikov, but the investigation found out that his real name is Alexander Suranovas, and he acted for the benefit of the special services of the kremlin.

A blogger from the USA spread pre-election fakes for Russian money

An American registered on the X social network under the nickname AlphaFox78 published a fake video where a Haitian immigrant claimed to have voted at least twice in Georgia for Vice President Kamala Harris. As stated in the CNN investigation, the propagandist-podcaster Simeon Boykov paid for this publication him 100 dollars.

In addition, it was established that a russian agent paid $100 each at least 10 times for the publication of memes and videos on the AlphaFox78 account.
In this way, another method of disinformation during the elections was revealed - the creation and distribution of fake videos by influential bloggers. russians target influencers, or rather their followers. Also, according to US intelligence, the stories that Boykov and AlphaFox shared on their pages originated from a russian disinformation campaign called Storm-1516.

The Kremlin's anti-Israel rhetoric is reinforced by the arming of Jerusalem's opponents

In parallel with the spread of anti-Israel "truth" in the world, moscow is actively helping Israel's enemies with military means. The Wall Street Journal published an investigation (https://www.wsj.com/world/russia-provided-targeting-data-for-houthi-assault-on-global-shipping-eabc2c2b?st=HtmFp4) that in early 2024, russia provided the Yemeni Houthis (a Shia-Zaydi terrorist paramilitary group operating in Yemen) with satellite data that they used to attack Western ships in the Red Sea.

At the end of September, Reuters reported that russia may hand over Yakhont anti-ship missiles to the Houthis, and Iran is mediating the negotiations. In turn, UN experts in their reports repeatedly talked about attempts to smuggle russian Kornet anti-tank guided missiles, AKS20U assault rifles, etc. to Yemen. 

Iran, which hates Israel, was involved in this scheme.It will be recalled that moscow never officially condemned the attack by Hamas against Israel on October 7, 2023. On the contrary, two weeks after the attack, russia vetoed a UN Security Council resolution condemning the militants. And this despite the fact that among the hostages of Hamas were citizens of the russian Federation.The kremlin claims leadership in that part of the Global South that denies Israel's right to exist. And it seems that the anti-Israel policy of the russians will only deepen. In September, putin ordered the signing of a strategic partnership agreement between russia and Iran.

Finland and the USA record large-scale operations of influence on the part of the Kremlin

According to the information of the Minister of the Interior of Finland, Lulu Ranne, cited by Reuters, it is about numerous cases of sabotage, cyberattacks and destabilization that create an atmosphere of uncertainty and doubt in society.
The law enforcement agencies of the country established that moscow is involved in:
• interference with GPS signals in sea and air transport in Finland;
• a cyber attack on the Fortum company, its facilities in Finland and Sweden, as well as the deployment of suspicious persons and drones to the company's facilities;
• DDoS attack on the largest bank in the Nordea region;
• numerous thefts at water supply facilities.

The United States announced that russia was involved in the creation of a fake video of the destruction of ballots for Donald Trump. In the video, a person is sorting through and tearing up the ballots cast for Trump. Such a fake received millions of views on the X (Twitter) platform and is part of a russian disinformation operation. This is stated in the article of The Guardian: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/oct/26/russia-disinformation-campaign-pennsylvania-ballots

The Bucks County (Pennsylvania) Board of Elections has officially called the video a fake, saying the envelope and other materials depicted in the footage are fake. The kremlin has long been destabilizing the US election process and attacking candidates with deepfakes. The Washington Post wrote that russia lied to Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz. In the fake materials, he is accused of inappropriate communication with students during his work as a teacher and coach many years ago. Millions of people watched a video on the X platform with Matthew Metro pretending to be a Walz student. The real Matthew Metro, who now lives in Hawaii, said another person was speaking on his behalf in the video. He did attend the high school where Walz worked, but he was never his teacher.
"These Russian activities are part of a broader effort by Moscow to raise baseless questions about the integrity of US elections and to inflame divisiveness among Americans," the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Security Agency said in a joint statement. infrastructure (CISA).

Russia is trying to bring Poles and Ukrainians into conflict against the backdrop of a natural disaster

A number of videos of dubious quality and false posts in which Poles allegedly blame Ukrainians for their troubles after the September flood spread online.Main topics:• Ukrainians are looting Polish shops (there were indeed cases of looting in Poland, but the participation of Ukrainians was not confirmed in any of them);

• Poles cannot stay in a hotel, fleeing from a natural disaster, because all the places are occupied by Ukrainians (there is no mention of Ukrainians in the original posts);• the money collected for the injured Poles will be given to the Ukrainians (in fact, Poland allocated significant financial aid to the affected citizens - only the first tranche is almost €5 million, and the EU allocated another €5 billion to Poland).The Polish Research Institute NASK, which monitors disinformation on the Internet, believes that russia may be behind these fakes. And the Polish military officially accused the kremlin of conducting the IPSO against the background of the flood.

The information war waged by the Russian Federation against the West reached Canada and Japan

Canadian Prime Minister Trudeau accused the russian media holding "rt" of funding bloggers and YouTube channel authors in North America who spread messages to "destabilize democracy".Trudeau said that "rt" sponsors, for example, Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson and other "right-wing bloggers". In addition, the prime minister mentioned the recent scandal with the Tenet Media channel. He also believes that it was russia in 2022 that intensified the chaos surrounding the "Freedom Convoy" in Canada. It will be recalled that this movement began as an anti-vaccination protest and turned into riots.

In a recent interview with Ukrinform, the Chairman of the Canadian House of Commons Standing Committee on Foreign Affairs and International Development, Ali Ehsassi, noted that despite the ban, russian media resources "remain active and now engage third-party media platforms to spread their disinformation." In addition, according to Ehsassi, the Canadian government understands that russia is not interested in the stability of the world order. 

"Another important aspect is the increasingly close interaction between the authoritarian regimes of russia, North Korea and Iran. Such a development encourages very close cooperation with our allies to oppose the intentions of these authoritarian states."Meanwhile, the website of Japan's ruling party was attacked by kremlin hackers. The responsibility for the cyberattack on the resource of the Liberal Democratic Party lies with the group NoName057(16) and the cyber army of russia. As noted by the Record, Japan became the victim of a cyberattack due to the upcoming large-scale joint military exercises with the United States.In addition, according to local media, russian DDoS attacks also targeted Japanese institutions, including shipbuilding companies, legal consulting agencies, as well as financial and government services.

Kremlin cybercriminals are attacking government websites and companies in Belgium

Hackers use DDoS attacks to overload servers with an excessive number of malicious requests, making websites inaccessible to real users.
In particular, the websites of the banking federation Febelfin, the Ministry of Economy, and the port of Antwerp-Zebrugge are not working. The website of the Belgian Cyber ​​Security Center is also unavailable.

According to VRT (https://www.vrt.be/vrtnws/nl/2024/10/10/hackerscollectief-opnieuw/), the pro-russian hacker group NoName057 is involved in cyberattacks. Hackers claim that their actions are a response to the statement of Defense Minister Lyudivin Dedonder about the intention to purchase three Caesar artillery installations for Ukraine.
Let's add that NoName057 has been carrying out attacks on allied sites since the beginning of the full-scale russian invasion of Ukraine.
At the same time, a fairly powerful cyber community is also working on the side of Ukraine, which neutralizes similar hacker groups, as well as institutions involved in the kremlin's armed and informational aggression. You can join here

"Reporters Without Borders" is launching a project to analyze the impact of propaganda and disinformation in the world

The key goal of the "Propaganda Monitor" project is to highlight the mechanisms and multifaceted nature of propaganda, increase public awareness of the problems it covers, and help better navigate the information space.As stated on the organization's website, the first season of the project will be devoted to Russian propaganda, with a special emphasis on the Kremlin-controlled media "rt".

"If the promotion of credible journalism is the antidote to disinformation and propaganda, then understanding their mechanisms and identifying their subjects is a necessary condition for blocking them," RSF believes. In addition, the Propaganda Monitor section of the site brings together RSF's previous research and analysis on the topic, portraits, interviews and other content produced by international teams.

Russia bribed more than 130,000 citizens of Moldova to prevent its accession to the EU

In Moldova, a large-scale operation by russia with the aim of influencing the results of the referendum on the country's accession to the European Union and the results of the presidential elections was revealed. The head of the General Inspectorate of the Police of Moldova, Viorel Chornuetsanu, said that only in September, 15 million dollars were transferred from russia to the accounts of Moldovan citizens. They were supposed to spread disinformation, carry out provocations and attack state institutions.

"russia seeks not only to corrupt voters, but also to provoke protests and destabilization on the territory of Moldova," Chernuetsanu said.
As a reminder, a referendum will be held in Moldova on October 20, during which voters will answer the question: "Do you support the introduction of European integration into the constitution of Moldova." Based on its results, countries can make changes to the basic law related to European integration. At the same time as the referendum, the presidential election of Moldova will be held.

Russian special services are recruiting Europeans with pro-Russian views to Telegram

The messenger, originating from russia, has become a tool for illegal networks recruiting young men in EU countries for the purpose of murder and sabotage. According to Western security services, the kremlin's special services are involved in these illegal actions.As indicated in the investigation by OCCRP (an international non-governmental investigative journalism organization that covers topics related to organized crime, corruption, etc.), one of these cases was an appeal to the fictional character Valery Ivanov, who was offered money for sabotage through the "Hello Bot" account - attacks on NATO military facilities or assassinations.

Similar Telegram channels are actively advertised in pro-russian media, including the "grey zone" channel (mercenary media of the Wagner group, russia). This method of recruitment has a low success rate, but is cheap for russia and can create chaos in Western societies, which is one of the main goals of the kremlin. Read the full text of the investigation here: https://www.occrp.org/en/investigation/make-a-molotov-cocktail-how-europeans-are-recruited-through-telegram-to-commit-sabotage-arson-and- murder

Russia uses AI to spread fakes about Western companies in Ukraine

To carry out disinformation attacks, moscow's special services created fake news sites londoninsider.co.uk and talk-finance.co.uk with registration in Great Britain. These fake media copy British media resources. As established (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/sep/22/fake-uk-news-sites-spreading-false-stories-about-western-firms-in-ukraine) The Guardian investigators, under the russian propaganda operation was caught by the American firm Sarn, which works in Ukraine in the field of energy and military equipment.

In the fake materials under the title "Guns, money and Sarn: How a Czech-American group looted Ukraine", the company is accused of alleged "arms trading", "judicial fraud" and "embezzlement of funds".

It is noted that the defamatory content on the sites has all the signs of using artificial intelligence, and the involved linguist came to the conclusion that the original text was created by a russian-speaking person. It was also found that under the materials on londoninsider.co.uk is the name of a real British journalist, but he denies any involvement with this resource.According to the researchers, the increase in the number of fake British news sites is happening against the background of the intensification of disinformation campaigns on the Internet by russia. Please check the sources of information.

Russian fake factory attacks US presidential candidate Kamala Harris

This is stated in a new Microsoft report. The company's experts determined that russian web trolls were circulating a fake video purporting to show Harris causing a hit-and-run accident that paralyzed a 13-year-old girl in San Francisco in 2011.The researchers discovered that during this influence operation, a video was created in which the actors were paid to shoot. 

Microsoft says this video was created by Storm-1516, a group linked to russian special services: https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2024/09/17/russian-election-interference-efforts -focus-on-the-harris-walz-campaign/

In another fake video, the actress pretended to be Harris in order to fabricate false claims about Harris' involvement in the accident. According to Microsoft, each of these videos received millions of views, and one was released via a fake news outlet in San Francisco to make it seem more credible.Another kremlin group, Storm-1679, which spread fake news about the Paris Olympics, is now also spreading false content about Harris. One of the fake videos featured a fake billboard in New York City with false claims about her politics.From the editors: if russia attacks only one of the US presidential candidates in the information space, certain conclusions can be drawn about the relationship of the other candidate with the head of the kremlin.

Kremlin bots attacked Macron and France's agreement with the UAE

russian propaganda is actively spreading the lie that the United Arab Emirates, after the arrest of the owner of the Telegram social network Pavel Durov in Paris, allegedly froze an agreement with France to purchase a batch of fighter jets from it. Al Jazeera's fake story on this topic became the most viral video of the "matryoshka" and "doppelganger" disinformation network. He was picked up by the media of russia, Iran and India.

On the X network, it collected 7.7 million views, and the "Al Jazeera video" published by bots was actively distributed on X and Telegram. The promotion of the video was facilitated by the founder of the Mega file exchange and blogger Kim Dotcom, who published the video after the russian channels, - the analysis of the fact-checking journalist David Puente shows.For some reason, russia is very worried about the fate of a supposedly "independent businessman" who apparently secretly cooperates with the kremlin's special services (a recent meeting with putin's representatives confirms this). And the arrest of Durov was definitely not part of their plans.

Russia has created a network of influence on events in several countries in Meta

According to the August 2024 Meta study, this network originated in russia and focused on fake news websites that spread fake news about politics.In Georgia, the influence network criticized protesters against the "foreign agent law" and supported the ruling Georgian Dream party. In Azerbaijan, she spread negative messages about the West and local events. In Armenia, she supported russia, criticized the prime minister and promoted pro-russian narratives.The network used fake accounts to redirect people to its websites. In particular, she has collaborated with people in Armenia to create videos on TikTok, YouTube and Meta apps.

The network was discovered thanks to the notification of the non-profit organization ISFED from Georgia. The investigation also revealed ties to individuals associated with the moscow-based marketing firm IMA Digital.
In August of this year, Meta also exposed a fake network spreading russian propaganda to a European audience. Meta has removed 20 Facebook accounts, 14 pages and 9 Instagram accounts for violating its policy against coordinated inauthentic behavior.

This network, created in russia, was aimed at English-speaking and French-speaking audiences. Fake news websites such as Euro Top News used fictitious journalistic pseudonyms and fake addresses to appear legitimate. Content on websites and social networks was probably created with the help of artificial intelligence.UPD: Meta has closed access to all its platforms to the russian propaganda media group RT (Russia Today).“After careful consideration, we have expanded our current measures against Russian state media. Russia Today, RT and other related organizations are now banned from our apps worldwide due to foreign interference," the company said in a statement.

Pro-Kremlin media spread fakes about "Democratic plans to kill Trump"

These sites masquerade as American news channels and are linked to John Mark Dugan, an ex-US military man who fled to russia and plays a key role in the kremlin's global disinformation network.According to disinformation researchers, hundreds of fake media outlets have recently appeared, which, thanks to available AI tools, are fueling a surge of false narratives ahead of the US presidential election, writes AFP. 

The articles about the "Democratic attempt on Trump" spread false claims and cited an audio recording of an allegedly private conversation between former President Barack Obama and a Democratic Party strategist.As reported by the NewsGuard organization, the audio recording was created with the help of AI for an article on the little-known website DeepStateLeaks.org. The audio was distributed through a network of 171 fake news sites, including the Atlanta Beacon and the Arizona Observer, which in turn cited DeepStateLeaks as its source.NewsGuard added that the articles appeared to be AI-rewritten versions of the same story.

Russia intensified its information war against Moldova

Russian fake factory attacks US presidential candidate Kamala Harris

Pro-Kremlin media spread fakes about "Democratic plans to kill Trump"

Kremlin bots attacked Macron and France's agreement with the UAE

Polish special services neutralized a group of cyberspies controlled by Moscow, and Norway is preparing for sabotage

Journalists of the Washington Post refuted yet another Russian fake

Russia's ally has stepped up phishing cyberattacks against high-ranking US and Israeli officials

Hungary plans to make it easier for Russian agents to enter Europe

Western investors in big Russian business

The Kremlin and its allies intend to interfere in the USA elections

The Czech Republic has detected a number of hybrid attacks from Russia

The Russian Orthodox Church is expanding its sphere of influence

Manipulation of the statement of a high official of the European Union

In the Baltic countries and Poland, 8 sabotage attempts by Russia were recorded

TikTok found 41 fake accounts with political disinformation