Ukraine war
Meta: Russian influence campaigns are getting bigger and clumsier
Meta warns of a large number of often short-lived Russian fake accounts whose aim is to weaken support for Ukraine in the West. photo
© Nicolas Armer/dpa
Russia continues to try to influence perceptions of its war of aggression in Ukraine through online campaigns. Apparently the focus is primarily on mass. Experts warn.
According to findings from the Facebook company Meta, Russia is now focusing more on quantity than quality in its online influence campaigns. Since the Russian attack on the In Ukraine, around two years ago, instead of building credible-looking complex profiles, we increasingly observed the use of a large number of barely concealed and often short-lived fake accounts, the company said in a report. The central goal is to weaken support for Ukraine in the West.
With the European elections and the race for the White House this year, one must assume that Russia will try to influence the discussion about the Ukraine war in the election campaign, warned meta expert Ben Nimmo. At the same time, the action against attempts to exert Russian influence was successful in that the fake profiles only got a few followers. At the same time, there is a risk that politicians, journalists or online influencers will give the influence campaigns more of a voice by disseminating information from such profiles.
Meta is raising the alarm about the activity of European surveillance companies, including those from Italy, who are offering their services to spy on journalists, activists and dissidents in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Mongolia, among others. The companies set up fake accounts on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn, among others, with profile pictures generated by artificial intelligence in order to contact the target people. Such companies are active in Europe but ignore European data protection regulations, emphasized Meta manager David Agranovich. EU data protection authorities would have the opportunity to put them in their place by applying the strict European rules.