Russian state media amplified commentary from a pro-Kremlin influence campaign that targeted the comments sections of Western news outlets, according to researchers at Cardiff University. The researchers identified unusual and coordinated pro-Russia comment activity on the websites of 32 major news outlets, including the BBC, Washington Post, and Fox News. These comments often originated from inauthentic or suspicious accounts. Russian state news routinely selected those comments and used them to make generalizations about public opinion in Western countries. Comments were used as the basis for headlines such as, “The British have compared the rise of Taliban to power with the end of Western civilization.” Cardiff University’s researchers discovered 242 incidents of such comments being fed into Russian media outlets. This tactic has been in use and escalating since 2018.