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Digital occupation: Pro-Russian bot networks target Ukraine’s occupied territories on Telegram

Yuliia Dukach, Iryna Adam, Meredith Furbish

Atlantic Council, July 16 (2025)

"This joint report from OpenMinds and the Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab) analyzes the activity of a network of 3,634 automated accounts that posted pro-Russian comments on Telegram channels between January 2024 and April 2025 targeting Ukrainian populations inside Russian-occupied territorie ... more

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In Eastern Europe, freeze on US aid leaves door open to Russian disinformation

Romain Chauvet

Washington, DC: International Center for Journalists, February 25 (2025)

"The Trump administration’s freeze on U.S. foreign aid will lead to a surge in Russian disinformation across Eastern Europe, experts warn, as independent media outlets across the region will be forced to shutter, leaving a vacuum of credible information in their wake. “Russian disinfo will have ... more

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“Voices from the Island”: Informational annexation of Crimea and transformations of journalistic practices

Ksenia Ermoshina

Journalism, volume 25, issue 3 (2024), pp. 528–546

"After the annexation of Crimea by Russia in March 2014, the peninsula experienced a progressive transition of telecommunication and broadcasting infrastructure under Russian influence, followed by a wave of repression of Ukrainian media. Between 2014 and 2015, dozens of Ukrainian media organization ... more

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Pop-up-Propaganda: Epikrise der russischen Selbstvergiftung. Mit einem illustrierten "Ratgeber für das Überleben"

Irina Rastorgueva

Thomas Martin (Nachwort)

Berlin: Matthes & Seitz (2024), 337 pp.

"Während innerhalb Russlands das Verbot kritischer Medien und die Gleichschaltung der verstaatlichten Sender eine beinahe karikaturhafte Erzählung über traditionelle Werte und die Notwendigkeit der "Militärischen Spezialoperation" hervorbringen, arbeiten sorgfältig geplante Propagandaaktionen i ... more

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“She Played All the Pregnant Women!”: Russian Disinformation, Symbolic Annihilation, and the Mariupol Hospital Attack

Valentyna Shapovalova

International Journal of Communication, volume 18 (2024), pp. 3730-3751

"On March 9, 2022, the maternity and children’s hospital number 3 in Mariupol, Ukraine, was bombed as part of Russia’s full-scale war efforts in Ukraine. However, Russian statealigned media promoted a different narrative: namely, that the bombing itself, as well as the victims on site, were fake ... more

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Russia, Disinformation, and the Liberal Order: RT as Populist Pariah

Stephen Hutchings, Precious Chatterje-Doody, Marie Gillespie, Vera Tolz

Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press (2024), 342 pp.

"Through the prism of the first comprehensive account of RT, the Kremlin's primary tool of foreign propaganda, Russia, Disinformation and the Liberal Order sheds new light on the provenance and nature of disinformation's threat to democracy. Interrogating the communications strategies pursued by aut ... more

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Russian Public-Diplomacy Efforts to Influence Neighbors: Media Messaging Supports Hard-Power Projection in Ukraine and Georgia

Maureen Taylor, Natalie M. Rice, Oleg Manaev, Catherine A. Luther, Suzie L. R. Allard, Alexander Bentley, Joshua Borycz, Benjamin D. Horne, Brandon C. Prins

International Journal of Communication, volume 18 (2024), pp. 2661-2684

"Nations use media to disseminate stories about their culture, history, and values. This study explored Russian public-diplomacy efforts by examining news content exported to its neighbors, Ukraine and Georgia, from February 2021 to July 2021, approximately one year before Russia’s invasion of Ukr ... more

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Digital Disinformation in Africa: Hashtag Politics, Power and Propaganda

Tony Roberts, George Hamandishe Karekwaivanane (ed.)

London: Zed Books (2024), xiv, 242 pp.

"In an era when hashtag campaigns like #MeToo and #BlackLivesMatter capture global attention for victims of injustice, politicians and corporations are now spending billions employing Cambridge Analytica-type consultancies to manufacture disinformation - employing trolls, cyborgs and bots to disrupt ... more

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Mapping a Surge of Disinformation in Africa

Washington, DC: Africa Center for Strategic Studies, March 13 (2024)

"Disinformation campaigns have targeted every region of the continent. At least 39 African countries have been the target of a specific disinformation campaign. Disinformation tends to be concentrated. Half of the countries subjected to disinformation (20 of the 39) have been targeted three or more ... times, up from just seven countries meeting that threshold in 2022. African countries experiencing conflict are subject to much greater levels of disinformation—facing a median of 5 campaigns– highlighting the connection between instability and disinformation. Countries confronting disinformation typically face multiple disinformation actors. At times, these actors amplify one another’s misleading narratives, while at others, they clash or stay in separate lanes. Nearly 60 percent of disinformation campaigns on the continent are foreign state-sponsored—with Russia, China, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia, and Qatar as the primary sponsors. Russia continues to be the primary purveyor of disinformation in Africa, sponsoring 80 documented campaigns, targeting more than 22 countries. This represents nearly 40 percent of all disinformation campaigns in Africa. These 80 campaigns have reached many millions of users through tens of thousands of coordinated fake pages and posts. Aggressively leveraging disinformation is a mainstay of Russia’s use of irregular channels to gain influence in Africa. Russia has promulgated disinformation to undermine democracy in at least 19 African countries, contributingto the continent’s backsliding on this front. African elections provide prime opportunities for disinformation. Some employ mercenary disinfo-ops teams. One private Israeli group, dubbed “Team Jorge,” has reportedly implemented disinformation campaigns to disrupt over 20 African elections since 2015. Domestic actors have also increasingly integrated disinformation into their political playbooks, notably during Kenya’s 2022 and Nigeria’s 2023 election. African countries that uphold presidential term limits (i.e., those with stronger checks and balances) are less exposed to foreign sponsored disinformation, with an average of 1.5 campaigns compared to an average of over 3 campaigns for countries without term limits. This underscores the common aim of foreign disinformation to prop up authoritarian actors." (Highlights) more

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Two Years On: An Analysis of Russian State and Pro-Kremlin Information Warfare in the Context of the Invasion of Ukraine

London: Institute for Strategic Dialogue (ISD) (2024), 25 pp.

"This report provides an overview of how Russian state and pro-Kremlin propaganda undermining international support for Ukraine has evolved over the two years since the beginning of the full-scale invasion on 24 February 2022. It outlines a range of semi-covert tactics through which Russian state an ... more

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Is Pro-Kremlin Disinformation Effective? Evidence from Ukraine

Aaron Erlich, Calvin Garner

International Journal of Press/Politics, volume 28, issue 1 (2023), pp. 5-28

"Can residents of Ukraine discern between pro-Kremlin disinformation and true statements? Moreover, which pro-Kremlin disinformation claims are more likely to be believed, and by which audiences? We present the results from two surveys carried out in 2019—one online and the other face-to-face—th ... more

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Ein Jahr russischer Angriffskrieg: Die Rolle von Desinformation in Deutschland

Pia Lamberty, Lea Frühwirth

Berlin: CeMAS Center für Monitoring, Analyse und Strategie (2023), 26 pp.

"Desinformation begleitet den russischen Angriffskrieg auf die Ukraine und erreicht auch ein deutsches Publikum. Sie dient der Stärkung russischer Propaganda und ist geeignet, die deutsche und europäische Entscheidungs- und Handlungsfähigkeit in Bezug auf den Krieg zu stören und negativ zu beein ... more

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The War of Narratives: Ukraine’s Image in the Media

Olena Davlikanova, Andriana Kostenko et al.

Kyiv: LLC «Vistka»;Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (FES) (2023), 146 pp.

"In order to spread Russian narratives about Ukraine that create a false impression of the country among external and internal audiences, the Russian Federation uses a whole complex of information and communication channels. Their main task is to replace the target audience's existing ideas about th ... more

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Russia’s Rising Military and Communication Power: From Chechnya to Crimea

James Rodgers, Alexander Lanoszka

Media, War & Conflict, volume 16, issue 2 (2023), pp. 135-152

"Most scholars working on Russia’s use of strategic narratives recognize the importance of the Russian state. Nevertheless, the authors argue that much of the attention on strategic narratives has given insufficient appreciation for how Russia has developed its military and media policies in a coo ... more

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The Malkevich Propaganda Machine: The Wagner-allied Network in Ukraine

Marianna Perebenesiuk, Jeanne Cavelier

Paris: Reporters Without Borders (2023), 16 pp.

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Kleptocratic Cooperation in Africa: How Russia and China Undermine Democracy

J. R. Mailey, Andrea Ngombet Malewa

Washington, DC: National Endowment for Democracy (NED) (2023), 17 pp.

"The two essays in this report highlight ways in which two global authoritarian powers, Russia and China, provide surge capacity to kleptocratic networks in Africa. In his essay J.R. Mailey dissects the Wagner Group’s illicit activities in key parts of Africa. The Wagner Group’s activities are c ... more

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Soft power, sharp power? Exploring RT’s dual role in Russia’s diplomatic toolkit

Sofya Glazunova, Axel Bruns, Edward Hurcombe, Silvia Ximena Montaña-Niño, Souleymane Coulibaly, Abdul Karim Obeid

Information, Communication & Society, volume 26, issue 16 (2023), pp. 3292-3317

"This article examines the multilingual audiences of Russian outlet RT on Facebook. RT is a state media outlet known for spreading strategic Kremlin narratives and disinformation in support of Russia’s domestic and foreign policy objectives to large and multilingual global audiences. RT serves as ... more

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Humour as a Strategic Tool Against Disinformation: Ukraine’s Response to Russia

Olga Tokariuk

Oxford: Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (2023), 35 pp.

"Ukraine has been building its capacity to use humour as a strategic communications tool since Russian first invasion in 2014. After Russia launched the full-scale war in February 2022, this often grassroots effort was multiplied by many new actors joining it. Foreign supporters of Ukraine stepped i ... more

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Exploring Disinformation in Fragile States: Iraq as a Case Study of Influence of International Political Actors

Rawand Faeq

Tokyo: Toda Peace Institute (2023), 18 pp.

"This paper examines the influence of international political actors in perpetuating disinformation in fragile states, using Iraq as a case study. The advent of modern technology and social media has transformed the global information landscape, providing new avenues for the dissemination of disinfo ... more

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Shielding Democracy: Civil Society Adaptations to Kremlin Disinformation About Ukraine

Adam Fivensen, Galyna Petrenko, Veronika Víchová, Andrej Polešcuk

Washington, DC: National Endowment for Democracy (NED) (2023), 30 pp.

"This report highlights adaptations and innovations by Ukrainians in their struggle against Moscow’s disinformation machine. As part of the project, the International Forum on Democratic Studies conducted more than fifty expert interviews and hosted a series of convenings with experts from Ukraine ... more