Russia is using “real U.S. voices” on major social media sites to “launder” propaganda and controversial stories that it wants to influence American audiences during the election campaign, the Washington Post reported.
Russia’s efforts to influence US election have become more sophisticated – Intelligence
Officials from the United States’ intelligence agencies stated that Russia’s secret efforts to change the outcome of the 2024 presidential election are smarter than in previous years and pose the most serious foreign threat during the current election cycle.
A top official from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence told the media that Russia’s actions “are more sophisticated than in previous election cycles.”
Using “real U.S. voices” to “launder” Russian government propaganda and spread stories that divide Americans on major social media sites was a new feature, according to the report. The Kremlin propaganda is also using fake websites that look like real American news outlets, he said.
Use of AI to generate fake content and target US swing states
The official stated that Moscow is focusing on US swing states and using AI to make fake content faster and more convincingly in order to change the election result in favor of former President Donald Trump.
The ODNI source, who like others spoke with WP and other outlets on the condition of anonymity, said that this was “in line with Moscow’s broader foreign policy goals of weakening the United States and undermining Washington’s support for Ukraine.”
Officials from the ODNI finally admitted that the Iranian government was behind both the hacking of the Trump campaign that came to light last month and the leak of internal campaign papers. Someone with the name “Robert” and an AOL email address sent the files to American news sites.
Last week, the U.S. government revealed a wide range of steps it would take to counter Russian propaganda campaigns. These included charging two Russian employees at the state-owned news website RT with paying an American media company to spread English-language videos on social video-hosting networks.
U.S. prosecutors also shut down 32 Russian-owned website domains used in a government-led campaign known as “Doppelganger” to undermine global support for Ukraine. The Treasury and State Departments also said they would put sanctions on Russian people and groups they say are spreading misinformation.
ODNI report on Russian propaganda dissemination in the US
In a September 6 report on election security, ODNI stated that RT has built networks to spread stories that fit Moscow’s agenda while trying to pass them off as real American free voices.
The ODNI official said that “Russia is at the top of the list” of foreign countries that want to influence the outcome of the election.
“Americans are more likely to believe other Americans’ views compared to content with clear signs of foreign propaganda,” the official stated. “So what we see them doing is relying on witting and unwitting Americans to seed, promote, and add credibility to narratives that serve these foreign actors’ interests.”
Brandon Van Grack, a former federal prosecutor who looked into Russia’s efforts to interfere with the 2016 election, said that these new strategies and technologies are better than what Russia did in 2016, when its efforts to meddle in the election shocked the public and caught U.S. intelligence off guard.
It was legal for Russia’s RT to broadcast its news content in the US in 2016. After a year, Russia’s RT was required to register as a foreign agent. However, following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022, sanctions for war propaganda led to its closure in the West.
How does Russia’s Doppelganger campaign work?
A Kremlin-linked network called Doppelganger uses fake versions of real news sites to promote disinformation in the United States.
Doppelganger is well known for using a network of fake bot accounts to spread links to fake versions of real trusted news websites. In the past, the network has cloned sites as diverse as WP, NBC, CNN, and Fox News in the United States.
In these campaigns, the fake Russian website appears identical to the real Washington Post website and has the same design, except that it uses a slight variation of the real URL.
The researchers recognized the bots as members of the Doppelganger network based on the shared URLs, which Meta had previously identified as the network’s frequent usage.
The Doppelganger campaign employed various strategies to evade detection, one of which involved hiding the genuine content in X posts with a redirected URL. When users click on a link, the Doppelganger campaign redirects them to content, such as a fake CNN or Fox News site.
Who runs Russia’s Doppelganger campaign?
Gavin Wilde, a former U.S. intelligence officer who worked on Russia, said that Sergei Kiriyenko, who is the deputy chief of staff at the Kremlin, was named by the FBI as the leader of the Doppelganger operation.
In April 2023, the Washington Post reported that internal Kremlin papers showed that Kiriyenko led a group of political strategists to run propaganda campaigns in Europe that helped Russia and hurt support for Ukraine.
In April 2024, American media reported that Kiriyenko’s political advisors worked hard to attack U.S. support for Ukraine while a bill for additional assistance was still being considered in Congress. They also aimed to instill fear about the security of the U.S. border and incite anger about issues related to race and the economy.
