A comprehensive, weekly recap of the news and events that define ASD’s work and mission.
Announcements Pennsylvania friends: Join us in Pittsburgh on July 26 and in Westmoreland County on July 27 for in-person events with ASD’s Deputy Director David Salvo and Head of External Affairs Rachael Dean Wilson on disinformation and potential [...]
Our Take State and local entities must leverage their community resources, funding, and experienced leaders to retain election officials and protect them from bad faith actors seeking to undermine trust in democracy, Elections Integrity Fellow Davi [...]
Our Take Russian and Chinese propagandists diverged in their messaging around the decision to overturn Roe v. Wade, with Russia playing into culture war narratives and China seeking to undermine US leadership on human rights, Program Assistant Krys [...]
Announcements Tomorrow is the last day of the German Marshall Fund’s Brussels Forum. Tune into Brussels Forum here starting at 9:00am CET/3:00am ET and watch past panels here. The Brussels Forum ASD-led panel “Rebuilding Trust in our Elections” fe [...]
Our Take China leverages the digital stack—network infrastructure, devices, applications, content, and governance—to influence five countries in the Global South, ASD’s Bryce Barros, Nathan Kohlenberg, and Etienne Soula explain in a new report with [...]
Announcement We recently launched the Yandex Dashboard, a tool that catalogs the information and sources Russian speakers in Russia, Ukraine, the United States, Poland, and Estonia encounter as part of their news consumption on Yandex. Try it out h [...]
Announcement We’ve just launched the Yandex Dashboard, a tool that catalogs the information and sources Russian speakers in Russia, Ukraine, the United States, Poland, and Estonia encounter as part of their news consumption on Yandex. Try it out he [...]
Our Take China has been exploiting search results on Google, Bing, and YouTube to spread state narratives and disinformation about Xinjiang and COVID-19, ASD’s Bret Schafer and Elen Aghekyan find in a new report with the Brookings Institution. The [...]
Our Take Finland and Sweden joining NATO will make the Baltic Sea region and all of Europe safer with new capabilities, closer coordination, and faster decision-making, Senior Fellow Kristine Berzina writes for GMF. While presidential elections are [...]
Our Take As Finland and Sweden apply for NATO membership, Russia is likely to retaliate with cyber operations and disinformation to try to destabilize government institutions and societal cohesion, Deputy Director David Salvo writes on ASD’s Interf [...]
Our Take Opting out of debates is a trait of autocracies, not healthy, advanced democracies that promote a contest of ideas, Director Laura Thornton argues in The Hill. The rubber stamp election of Hong Kong’s Chief Executive-designate John Lee hig [...]
Our Take Introducing Ballots and Bagels: Conversations with Trusted Election Sources, a new series from ASD where Elections Integrity Fellow David Levine discusses the successes and lessons learned from the 2022 U.S. primaries with the people who p [...]
Our Take Despite their free access to information, some Americans have fallen susceptible to the same Kremlin lies about the war in Ukraine that have traction in Russia, Director Laura Thornton writes in The Hill. As the world unites around Ukrain [...]
Our Take The EU should extend harsh sanctions to most or all of the largest Russian banks, including the one that plays a central role in Russia's financial system, Sberbank, Non-Resident Fellow Josh Kirschenbaum and Nicolas Veron argue for the Pet [...]
Our Take The struggle between democracy and autocracy is based not on geographic delineations but on values and ideas held by people everywhere, Director Laura Thornton writes in The Atlantic. Even after the EU banned Russian state media outlets RT [...]
Announcements We’re recruiting for our summer 2022 internships! Research interns will assist our fellows with research on autocratic actors’ attempts to undermine democracies, and the communications intern will work with the external affairs team t [...]
Announcements Tune in on Tuesday, April 5 at 9:00 a.m. EDT/3:00 p.m. CEST as Director Laura Thornton moderates a Global Democracy Coalition discussion on the written commitments countries have made since the Summit for Democracy. Learn more here. [...]
Our Take Russia has lost the information war in Ukraine, but the Kremlin will likely continue to carry out information manipulation campaigns to try to break the West’s unified response, Senior Fellow Bret Schafer said on the Chicago Council on Glo [...]
Announcement GMF has established the GMF Hope Fund to provide urgent assistance, including funds for emergency evacuation and relocation support, to our civil society grantees, fellows, and alumni who have become victims of the conflict and who req [...]
Announcement How can Ukraine win the disinformation war against Russia? Join ASD and GMF on Wednesday, March 9 for a discussion with Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Oleg Nikolenko, Head of the East Stratcom Task Force Martyna Bil [...]
Announcements The German Marshall Fund of the United States condemns in the strongest possible terms Russia’s illegal and unprovoked invasion of Ukraine. Read the full statement from GMF President Heather Conley here. We’ve launched a Ukraine-focu [...]
Announcements Last week we launched the French Elections Dashboard, an interactive, open-source tool that will provide summary analysis of narratives promoted by influential foreign and domestic actors during this year’s presidential election in Fr [...]
Our Take Rather than question the legitimacy of future elections, pro-democracy supporters should focus on how to ensure the successful counting of ballots and certification of elections going forward, Elections Integrity Fellow David Levine argues [...]
Our Take The recent U.S. warning that Russia was planning to use a fake video to frame Ukraine for starting a war was credible and effective–despite the U.S. government’s poor job explaining the accusation, Research Assistant Joseph Bodnar writes o [...]
Our Take For months, Russian propagandists have been preparing for a potential war by framing Ukraine and the West as aggressors. We compiled Hamilton 2.0 data to shine a light on how Russian officials and state media have messaged around the crisi [...]
Our Take The West will not, and cannot, meet Putin’s demands to de-escalate the situation in Ukraine, Senior Fellow Kristine Berzina said on BBC News. Until Mesa County, Colorado Clerk Tina Peters demonstrates a commitment to free and fair electio [...]
Our Take The United States should enlist domestic and international nonpartisan election monitors to help restore public trust in the election process, Director Laura Thornton argues in The Fulcrum. Early this month, Russian diplomats and state me [...]
Our Take Democracies need to reckon with the fact that their internal systems can hinder real progress in curbing strategic corruption, Malign Finance Fellow Josh Rudolph writes in Foreign Policy. Whether the United States can adequately administer [...]
Announcement This is the last Securing Democracy Dispatch of 2021. We will be back in your inbox in the new year. Happy holidays! Our Take Domestic conspiracy theories about foreign interference in the 2020 election have been more damaging than a [...]
Our Take Last week, President Biden hosted a virtual Summit for Democracy with 110 governments, during which he called on leaders to make commitments to bolster democracy before an in-person summit in 2022. ASD experts weigh in and explain whether [...]
Our Take Sen. Ron Johnson and Republican state lawmakers’ push to take over Wisconsin’s election system indicates that the United States is failing to uphold the election integrity standards that it promotes around the world, ASD Director Laura Tho [...]
Announcement In the lead up to the Summit for Democracy, join the Alliance for Securing Democracy for two exciting events as part of the Global Democracy Coalition Forum on December 7. First, we’ll look at how democracies can regulate enablers of m [...]
Announcements In the lead up to the Summit for Democracy, join the Alliance for Securing Democracy for two exciting discussions as part of the Global Democracy Coalition Forum: The first will focus on how democracies can respond to digital authorit [...]
Announcement We’re recruiting for our spring 2022 research internship! Interns will assist our fellows with research on autocratic actors’ attempts to undermine democracies. Apply here. Our Take President Biden should anchor dialogue at the Summi [...]
Our Take Since the Biden administration invited leaders from some less-than-democratic countries to the Summit for Democracy, it must also ensure that opposition leaders, civil society activists, and journalists have a seat at the table, Director L [...]
Announcements We are pleased to join the German Marshall Fund of the United States in announcing that Heather A. Conley, currently senior vice president for Europe, Eurasia, and the Arctic at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, will [...]
Announcements Tune in on Thursday, October 28 at 10:00 a.m. EDT/ 4:00 p.m. CEST for a Facebook live Q&A with Cybersecurity Fellow Maurice Turner on recent attacks on critical infrastructure, the allied takedown of REvil, and international effor [...]
Our Take ICYMI, we hosted an event on tackling information manipulation in Europe with Hybrid Centre of Excellence Director Teija Tiilikainen, ASD Director Laura Thornton, and ASD Senior Fellow Bret Schafer. One big takeaway: Building resilience to [...]
Announcement Join ASD and the European Centre of Excellence on Hybrid Threats (CoE) for a virtual discussion on how to address the information threats facing Europe with CoE Director Teija Tiilikainen, ASD Director Laura Thornton, and ASD Senior Fe [...]
Announcements The Kremlin employs disinformation operations to weaken its competitors overseas, to maintain influence in its own neighborhood, and to keep President Putin in power. ASD teamed up with the Bertelsmann Foundation to shine a spotlight [...]