Russia has discovered another way to spread and amplify disinformation about its invasion of Ukraine by using digital tricks that allow its wartime propaganda videos to bypass restrictions imposed by governments and tech companies.

Accounts linked to the Russian state press have already used the new method promote dozens of videos in 18 languages. And no one leaves clear signs revealing their source, experts from Nisos, a US-based intelligence firm that monitors disinformation and other digital threats, said in a report released Wednesday.

Videos promote Russian conspiracy theories blaming Ukraine for civilian casualties, as well as stating that residents of areas forcibly annexed by Russia welcomed the occupation troops.

English versions of Russian videos are now making the rounds on Twitter and lesser-known platforms popular with American conservatives, including Gab and Truth Social, created by former President Donald Trump, giving Russia a direct access to millions of people.

overcome barriers

To demonstrate the Kremlin’s ambitions and the extent of its disinformation operations, versions of the same videos were also made in Spanish, Italian, German and more than a dozen other languages.

“The genius of this approach is that the videos can be downloaded directly from Telegram and that erases the trail that the experts are trying to follow,” said Patricia Bailey, senior intelligence analyst at Nisos, speaking with Associated Press. “They’re creative and adaptive. And they look to their audience,” she added.

The European Union banned RT and Sputnik, two of the main state media outlets in Russia, after the February 24 invasion of Ukraine.

Companies like Google’s YouTube and Meta’s Facebook and Instagram also announced that they would ban content from those outlets within the European Union, undermining Russia’s ability to spread its propaganda.

Russian efforts to circumvent these new rules began almost immediately. They created new websites to post videos which skewed information about the war. Russian diplomats took over some of the work.

The new campaign revealed by Nisos involved the practice of uploading propaganda videos to Telegram, an unmoderated platform that is hugely popular in Eastern Europe and used by many conservatives in the United States.

In some cases, digital watermarks that identified the video as coming from RT have been removed to hide its origin.

Once on Telegram, the videos were downloaded and posted on platforms such as Twitter, with no indication that the video was produced by the Russian state press.

Hundreds of accounts that posted or played the videos were linked by Nisos researchers to the Russian military, embassies or state media.

Some accounts appear to be using fake profile photos or posting content in a strange way, indicating that they were not genuine.

Source: AP

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