Explainer: the Russian influence operations targeting the 2024 US elections

[Nevilledog]

https://dfrlab.org/2024/09/06/how-doppelganger-and-other-russia-linked-operations-target-us-elections/


On September 4, 2024, the US Treasury Department announced that it had sanctioned ten Russian citizens and two entities for participating in malign influence efforts targeting the November 2024 US presidential election. The sanctions featured high-ranking staff members of RT, including editor Margarita Simonyan, as well as a Russian organization called ANO Dialogue, which the department accused of participating in the Russian influencer operation known as Doppelganger. Simultaneously, the US Department of Justice seized more than thirty online domains operated by Social Design Agency, which has previously been linked to Doppelganger.

Operation Doppelganger

Creating forged versions of news articles, websites, and reports, among other things, is nothing new in the world of Russian influence operations. Individually, a single fake article or website may cause confusion among internet readers, but generally doesn’t infiltrate much deeper into public discourse. In contrast, persistent efforts to impersonate authoritative news websites and promote their content at scale in a coordinated manner can have tangible impact, casting propaganda narratives far and wide on a systematic basis. Doppelganger is such an operation; among the most documented Russian influence operations, it has continued to evolve since at least 2022. Also sometimes referred to by the Microsoft designation of Storm-1099, Doppelganger creates online clones of well-established media outlets and government websites, propagating them with anti-Western, anti-Ukrainian, and pro-Russian messaging intended to deceive Internet users into thinking they are legitimate online sources. When it comes to distribution, the techniques vary.

The primary method used by Doppelganger to infiltrate the US information space is through the reply sections of Twitter posts. The operation employs bot-like networks for engaging with audiences. These are referred to as originators and amplifiers, depending on their function. Originator networks concentrate on producing large quantities of similar but not identical posts that serve as fodder for dissemination, while amplifier networks exclusively repost the originator content to high-profile accounts in the form of replies. The targeted high-profile accounts could include politicians, celebrities, influencers, meme accounts, and the like; usually, their audiences range from hundreds of thousands to millions of subscribers. This approach indicates an attempt to engage with influential segments of society by consistently disseminating pro-Kremlin content.

The operation also utilizes single-use accounts (or “burner” accounts) that typically publish a single post, making no effort to establish an account’s online presence or authenticity. These posts are then promoted by amplifier networks, whose accounts are often more active and appear more authentic. Burner accounts are used on Facebook as well, as previously documented by Viginum, the French government agency tasked with fighting disinformation. Similarly, the DFRLab uncovered a network of thousands of burner accounts on TikTok in conjunction with the BBC in late 2023.

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[dalton99a]

1. Kick

[The Roux Comes First]

2. I Hate This Shit and How Relatively Powerless We Seem to be Against It!

On the other hand we have the Murdoch/Fox propaganda megaplex, against which we seem to be equally inept! Don't get me started on Qanon and yam/musk's networks! And, oh yes, the widespread repub efforts to distort the voting system in their favor, since having the Electoral College and the Supreme Court heavily canted in favor of a minority of voters is not enough!

But does anyone have insights on how these various attempts to cheat our democratic system differ and which pose the greatest threats?

[jacksonian]

3. Kick