Short-form insights and rapid-reaction analysis of breaking news and global events.
On February 4, 2022, Russia and China surprised many observers by releasing a joint statement promising a “no limits” friendship, which they described as “superior to political and military alliances of the Cold War era.” Just after the Beijing Olym [...]
Russia Kremlin-linked messengers last week pushed a series of false claims about Ukraine’s pursuit of biological, chemical, and nuclear weapons. On Sunday, Russia’s Defense Ministry said it had documents that show Kyiv ordered the “emergency destruc [...]
The Russian invasion of Ukraine has shocked the European Union and its member states into decisive action. With Germany upending decades of foreign policy choices and unprecedented economic sanctions imposed on key parts of the Russian economy and l [...]
Russia Russian state media celebrated Putin’s recognition on Monday of the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic, sharing images of fireworks and people waving Russian flags in the regions. Russian President Vladimir Putin just [...]
Russian disinformation on the Kremlin-instigated crisis in Ukraine reached a new level of intensity between February 14 and February 20, 2022. Months of Russian warnings about a Ukrainian provocation developed into baseless accusations that Ukrainia [...]
As Russia has menaced Ukraine with a buildup of troops in recent weeks—and even after those forces ultimately crossed the border—much media and expert commentary has focused on what the U.S. and EU sanctions response should be, analyzing its effects [...]
Russia Russian disinformation on the Kremlin-instigated crisis in Ukraine reached a new level of intensity last week. Months of Russian warnings about a Ukrainian provocation developed into baseless accusations that Ukrainian forces had launched an [...]
As France gears up for a presidential election in April, several foreign officials and state-sponsored media are promoting narratives in France’s public debate that are conducive to their foreign interests, sometimes to the detriment of French democ [...]
Russia Russian officials last week continued to insist that Moscow has no plans to invade Ukraine and made more calls for diplomatic solutions. Russia’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations claimed there is “not even a hint of common sense [...]
Overview Chinese diplomats and state media’s relentless promotion of the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympics between November 1, 2021 and February 1, 2022 highlights the crucial importance of the games for China. More than a sporting competition, Beijing s [...]
One hundred countries joined Biden’s Summit for Democracy in December 2021 to demonstrate their commitment to, and develop strategies to defend, democracy during a time of increased autocratic threats. While the event was largely aspirational and sp [...]
Russia Russian officials and state media last week pushed familiar narratives about Ukraine, claiming NATO is the aggressor and Russia is seeking a peaceful solution. On February 1, President Vladimir Putin spoke for the first time since December ab [...]
Last Thursday, AP reporter Matt Lee accused State Department spokesperson Ned Price of crossing into “Alex Jones territory.” Lee made the argument after Price refused to give evidence to support a U.S. claim that Russia was planning to release a fak [...]
The Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) is uniquely situated and driven by its core values to combat corruption in all its forms, yet it remains an underused resource in the fight against strategic corruption. The Biden admin [...]
Russia Russian diplomats and state-directed media last week continued to claim that Russia does not want to go to war in Ukraine, where the Kremlin has perpetuated a conflict since 2014. “If it depends on Russia, there will be no war,” Foreign Minis [...]
For months, Russian propagandists have been preparing for a potential war by framing Ukraine and the West as aggressors. We compiled data from our weekly Hamilton 2.0 reports to shine a light on how Russian officials and state media have messaged ar [...]
Russia Russian officials and state media last week framed the West as being solely responsible for increasing the chance of war in Ukraine. RT, Sputnik, and others closely followed shipments of Western military aid to the country. Foreign Ministry s [...]
Russia Russian officials and state media last week focused on three rounds of high-level diplomatic meetings between Russia and the West. Kremlin-linked accounts gave live updates of U.S.-Russia talks in Geneva on January 10. State media complained [...]
Towards the end of 2021—a year when ransomware attacks reached record highs—researchers at the Alliance for Securing Democracy investigated how local police are responding to the threat of ransomware. We sought to understand how cases are reported a [...]
The Kremlin and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), as constant critics of the United States, naturally converge in the information space. The themes and narratives they disseminate about the United States and Western democracies show remarkable cons [...]
Russia Last week, Russian diplomats and state media launched a high-volume propaganda campaign around protests in Kazakhstan, which were started by anger over fuel prices and suppressed with the help of Russian troops. Kremlin-backed messengers refe [...]
Introduction States have wielded energy access as a strategic tool since at least the industrial revolution, when the adoption of coal power made energy a resource to be extracted and exported (or not), just like other strategic resources, including [...]
Russia For the past two weeks, Russian diplomats and state media continued to focus most of their attention on the conflict in Ukraine. On December 30, U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin exchanged warnings over the Ukraini [...]
Russia Last week, Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs published two draft treaties—one for NATO and the other for the United States—that listed a series of demands that would limit the alliance’s presence in Eastern Europe. The recommended agreemen [...]
Earlier this month, the Congressional committee investigating the Capitol insurrection said former President Donald Trump’s chief of staff Mark Meadows turned over a PowerPoint titled, “Election Fraud, Foreign Interference & Options for 6 JAN.” [...]
The name of a website is the key indicator users, operators, and algorithms use to evaluate the authenticity of the owner of that website. So much so that there are frequent, sophisticated attempts to trick users into going to fake websites to steal [...]
Russia Russian diplomats and state media last week continued to focus much of their attention on developments around the conflict in Ukraine. On December 7, U.S. President Joe Biden and Russian President Vladimir Putin held a virtual meeting to disc [...]
Last week, U.S. President Joseph R. Biden hosted a virtual Summit for Democracy with 110 countries and governments, in which he called on leaders to make commitments to bolster democracy before an in-person summit is hosted later in 2022—but did the [...]
Russia Kremlin-backed accounts last week continued to focus heavily on the tension between Russia and the West caused by Russia’s military buildup along the Ukrainian border. RT warned that “the risk of an all-out armed conflict in south-eastern Ukr [...]
On December 9 and 10, U.S. President Joseph R. Biden will bring together leaders from 110 countries and governments for a virtual Summit for Democracy based around three key themes: defending against authoritarianism; addressing and fighting corrupt [...]
Cybersecurity experts have watched closely as two trends in cyber interference have steadily grown in popularity: ransomware and hacktivism. Up to this point, they have remained relatively separate. That is, hacktivists have used technology for encr [...]
Russia Last week, Kremlin-affiliated messengers pushed combative messaging around the conflict in Ukraine. Russian officials and state media continued to blame the “'collective West’ under the leadership of the USA” for tensions along the Ukrainian [...]
Russia Last week, Russian diplomats and state-funded outlets continued their media push around the Belarusian-manufactured migrant crisis playing out on the Polish border, resulting in both “border” and “migrant” appearing among the top five most fr [...]
Belarusian dictator Alexander Lukashenko has used state resources to traffic migrants from the Middle East and North Africa to the Polish border—manufacturing a humanitarian crisis on the European Union’s eastern edge. It’s a move designed to retali [...]
Russia Last week, Russian diplomats and state media put forward a massive amount of commentary on the migrant crisis taking place on the Belarusian-Polish border. Six of the top ten most frequently used phrases by Russian accounts tracked on Hamilto [...]
Democracy is under threat across the globe, and President Biden’s Summit for Democracy could serve as a needed wake up call, banding democrats together to brainstorm solutions by drawing upon global successes. This is arguably best accomplished by c [...]
Key Point Consolidating the international consensus that the professional enablers of corruption should be required to watch out for dirty money would require landmark reform initiatives—split roughly evenly between enacting new rules and enforcing [...]
The alignment of interests between the German right-wing party, Alternative for Deutschland (AfD), and Russia’s flagship German-language media outlet, RT Deutsch, is both well-documented and unsurprising, given the Kremlin’s penchant for supporting [...]
Gulf states engaged in cyber-espionage, hacking, and harassment must not be given carte blanche to poison the cyber-realm simply because they are U.S. security partners. The Justice Department recently announced that three former U.S. intelligence [...]
President Biden’s Summit for Democracy aims to reenergize global commitment to democracy during a dangerous period of backsliding and rising authoritarianism. It is imperative that we work together—learn from one another—to defend democracy. But rec [...]