No Bahn on RT: How RT Deutsch Stays on Track Despite Content Bans

This is part two of a two-part series on how RT Deutsch content is evading domain bans and sanctions published in partnership with the Institute for Strategic Dialogue. Find part one here. 

Germans head to the polls on Sunday not only to decide who will lead the next German government but also how Germany, and by extension Europe, will navigate the war in Ukraine and its increasingly fractured relationship with the United States. This dynamic, coupled with the rise of the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party and a spate of recent violent attacks linked to asylum seekers in Germany, has created a combustible environment ripe for foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI). Indeed, there have already been several documented cases of Russian-linked actors allegedly engaged in both online and offline efforts to influence voters ahead of the election.

To identify potential vectors for information attacks before, or potentially after, the election, ASD has spent the past month tracking the ways in which RT Deutsch—Russian state media’s primary German-language affiliate—continues to reach audiences in Germany despite platform restrictions and an EU ban against the channel. Our investigation relied on two primary research methods: tracking the links shared by RT Deutsch’s official X account and the use of the Information Laundromat tool to detect duplicate or near-duplicate RT Deutsch articles published on unaffiliated channels or websites.

Although we employed different methods, our work overlapped significantly with the Institute for Strategic Dialogue’s (ISD) investigation, which uncovered 20 new RT Deutsch mirror domains and eleven subdomains¹, some of which we also independently identified in our research. Given that ISD’s report provides substantial analysis of RT’s mirror and alternative domains and their impact, this report focuses on other tactics and techniques, namely the use of content aggregator sites and the distribution of RT Deutsch content via podcasts, which, to date, has not received significant attention as a circumvention tool.

Methodology

To identify websites reposting or repurposing RT Deutsch content, we used the Information Laundromat, a tool developed by ASD, ISD, and the University of Amsterdam that detects content and metadata similarities between and among websites. Using the Laundromat’s content matching feature, which attempts to detect duplicate or near-duplicate content posted to other websites, we queried a random sample of 445 RT Deutsch articles published in 2024. That process generated hundreds of potential leads. To improve the accuracy of results, we then filtered out all results with a match score below 60%², leading to a list of 148 domains that likely reposted or cited at least one of the sampled RT Deutsch articles. We further filtered results to focus on domains that appeared multiple times in our results, limiting the possibility of spurious matches.

We paid particular attention to domains with more than ten observations in our dataset (Figure 1) or that were seemingly connected to previously identified Russian influence or laundering networks. For the latter approach, we relied upon publicly available lists of domains, including those published by France’s Viginum Agency in its Portal Kombat report and those identified in ISD and ASD’s Russian Propaganda Nesting Doll report, which documented RT’s English-language content laundering ecosystem. Analysts then matched those domains to the list of domains generated in this study to identify those with similar naming conventions.

In addition, we conducted an analysis of links shared on RT Deutsch’s X account, @de_rt_com, from January 30, 2024–January 8, 2025. The resulting dataset contained a total of 13,287 posts and 14,987 links. We then extracted and lengthened the links to reveal the full domain and aggregated domains by the number of occurrences in the data. To determine engagement with posts, we used Junkipedia, a social media analysis platform, to connect individual links with the metadata associated with those posts. We also checked the registration date for each of the RT Deutsch mirror sites we uncovered using ICANN’s lookup tool to determine possible connections between the identified mirror sites and patterns in terms of when they were registered.

RT Deutsch’s Content Laundering Ecosystem

As noted in the methodology section, we used the Information Laundromat tool to identify websites that potentially reposted one or more of the sampled RT Deutsch articles. After applying match score filters, we found 24 domains with ten or more observations in our study, which means that at least ten different sampled RT Deutsch articles were found to have been republished, cited, or repurposed, in whole or in part, on those sites. Those websites fell into one of five broad categories:

• news aggregator or content re-poster sites
• mirror sites or alternative domains
• social media, video sharing, or other user-generated platforms
• podcast discovery sites and aggregators
• sites affiliated with the Pravda network

The two most common categories of sites were news aggregator or reposter sites and social media/video sharing platforms, which accounted for more than half of the most observed domains in our study. The three most observed social media platforms were the Russia-based VKontakte (VK), X, and Telegram. Although VK.com was the most observed domain, if we combined all occurrences of both Twitter.com and X.com and all occurrences of Telegram-affiliated domains, including Telegram’s anonymous online publishing platform (Telegra.ph) and its analytical platform (telemeter.io), X and Telegram would have been the most and second most observed social media platforms in our study, respectively. It is worth noting, however, that this does not mean that more RT Deutsch content was posted to those platforms than other social media platforms, though that is possible. It simply means that those platforms surfaced most often in search results when we queried RT Deutsch articles.

That said, the prevalence of RT Deutsch content on VK is not surprising, given that VK is based in Russia and therefore has not implemented any restrictions on RT. Both X and Telegram have blocked RT and other Russian state media channels within the EU, but RT Deutsch’s content remains popular on both platforms and widely accessible outside the EU. Because search services treat mainstream social media platforms as trusted sources, RT content posted to those platforms can gain visibility in the EU through links in search results—though users in the EU who click on those links would likely not be able to view those posts on either X or Telegram.

The two most observed video sharing platforms in our study—Odysee and Rumble—both position themselves as “free speech” alternatives to YouTube and have not enacted any restrictions on Russian state media. RT has actively promoted both as alternatives to YouTube, after YouTube decided to remove RT’s channels in response to Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine. As of this writing, RT Deutsch’s Odysee channel has approximately 18,000 followers and its Rumble channel has just under 4,000 followers, far less than the sizeable audience it once enjoyed on YouTube.

RT Deutsch has clearly attempted to shift its audience to Odysee and Rumble, but it maintains a presence on alternative channels on YouTube, though it is not clear whether RT Deutsch has authorized or is even aware of those efforts. In our study, we found several examples of RT Deutsch’s podcasts—which are audio recordings of published RT Deutsch articles, perhaps narrated by an artificial intelligence (AI) text-to-speech program—on a YouTube channel called Maraqlı TV, whose site description is written in Azerbaijani but whose location is set to Germany. The channel boasts 133,000 subscribers and posts content in a variety of languages from multiple sources, though a sizeable amount of the content appears to focus on Russia. In our study, a few of the RT Deutsch podcasts posted to the Maraqlı TV channel received substantial engagement, including one video—translated as “Norway’s digital transition: A return to cash and the analogue world”—that received more than 135,000 views and, as of this writing, 795 comments and more than 6,000 likes.

RT Deutsch’s Podcast Distribution Network

As noted, RT Deutsch produces audio versions of its written content, which it publishes on a dedicated page on its website. These podcasts, however, are also distributed to a wide network of podcast aggregators and discovery sites, but again, it is not known whether those sites republish RT Deutsch’s content with the consent or knowledge of RT. Interestingly, RT Deutsch seemingly stands alone among RT affiliates in its effort to attract audiences through audio content. Though we did not conduct an exhaustive search, we found no evidence of other RT affiliates, like RT France or RT en Español, on the podcast sites we identified that host RT Deutsch content—though RT France and RT International had channels on some of the identified podcast aggregators prior to Russia’s full-scale invasion.

Among the 24 domains in our study that had ten or more occurrences of RT content, seven were podcast sites. If we expanded our dataset to include all domains with at least one observation in our study with a match score greater than 60%, there were at least 17 websites dedicated to podcasts. From that list, we were able to find dozens of other interconnected podcast aggregators or discovery sites. Almost all those sites hosted or linked to thousands of episodes of RT Deutsch’s podcast, updated multiple times per day, with episodes, in some cases, dating back to 2018.

In terms of impact, the roughly 50 podcast aggregator sites we uncovered that host RT Deutsch content see an estimated 23 million visits per month based on internet traffic estimates provided by Similarweb. However, the podcast platforms that surfaced in our study host thousands and in some cases millions of unrelated podcasts, some with massive followings, which means that traffic to those sites is not a particularly useful metric to determine the listenership of RT Deutsch’s podcast. To gain a more fulsome understanding of RT Deutsch’s reach, we therefore collected whatever information was available on RT’s Deutsch’s channels on identified podcast sites, including subscribers, listen scores, or plays, though this information was limited or nonexistent on some sites.

In most cases, the subscriber numbers we uncovered were relatively modest, if not negligible. On castbox[.]fm and player[.]fm, two podcast sites identified in our study that, according to Similarweb, have more than one million monthly visitors, RT Deutsch’s channels have 614 and 142 subscribers, respectively. On podchaser[.]com, a lesser-known podcast aggregator site, RT Deutsch has just three subscribers, despite posting more than 5,000 episodes. Perhaps the most impressive metric for any of RT Deutsch’s podcast channels is on listennotes[.]com, where RT’s podcast ranks among the top 1% of global podcasts. But even that number seems misleading. Relatively obscure and long-defunct podcasts, including the German Marshall Fund’s “Out of Order” podcast, which has not been produced since August 2023, remain in the top 5% of global podcasts, suggesting numbers are likely inflated by a glut of podcasts with effectively zero listens.

It therefore does not appear that RT Deutsch has been particularly successful in promoting its content through alternative podcast platforms, though it is possible that its podcasts have found more traction on other forums—including, as previously noted, on unaffiliated YouTube channels. It is also worth noting that the podcast aggregators and discovery sites uncovered in our study host millions of podcasts, including hugely popular mainstream podcasts and podcasts affiliated with US government-sponsored outlets. It therefore is unlikely that these sites are engaged in a coordinated or intentional effort to help RT bypass EU restrictions or bans. At the same time, there is no indication that these sites, some of which appear to be registered in EU member states, are taking measures to moderate content produced by a sanctioned entity.

News Aggregators and Content Reposter Sites

There were five websites with ten or more observations in our study that we labeled as news aggregators or content reposters, including the most observed domain—pandoria.better-than[.]tv—which looks like a user-generated message board but appears to use RSS feeds to automatically post links to various pieces of online content, including RT Deutsch articles. According to the website’s own metrics, it has an incredibly modest 260 users. All content seems to be posted by a single “user”, though, again, that user appears to be an automated feed.

Among the other most observed domains were several content aggregators catering to German-speaking audiences that feature an array of alternative, conspiratorial, or anti-establishment media sources, including RT Deutsch and Sputnik News. Attribution is mixed on those sites: some clearly label content as originating from RT Deutsch, while others do not clearly label RT as their source. These sites are all available in Germany and URLs linking to RT Deutsch content surfaced in search results within Germany, but few of these sites seem to be generating substantial traffic, and most have a limited or nonexistent presence on social media platforms.

Figure 4: A screenshot of friedliche-loesungen[.]org, an alternative news aggregator featuring clearly labelled RT Deutsch content. 

Though most of the reposter sites identified in this study were not identified in our earlier report, there was one site, deutschland.shafaqna[.]com, which is part of a global content aggregator network that was featured in our Russian Propaganda Nesting Doll report³ as one of the most prominent global reposters of RT’s English-language content. As we wrote at the time, the Shafaqna network claims to “represent the interests of Shia Muslims across the world”, but its content often deviates from that stated mission. Like its English-language counterparts, Shafaqna’s German-language affiliate appears to repost all articles from RT Deutsch via RSS feeds. Though snippets of those articles are visible in the EU, Shafaqna links out to RT Deutsch’s official domain, meaning that visitors to the site in Germany would be unlikely to access the full articles.

The Pravda Network

In February 2024, France’s Viginum, an agency tasked with exposing foreign digital interference, published a report identifying a network of Russian-linked websites targeting global audiences, several of which used the Russian word “pravda” in their domain names. According to the report, these websites were all registered on the same date, used the same HTML architecture, and had a common IP address hosted on a Russian server. Beyond the similar visual style, domain names, and technical characteristics, the pravda sites were linked by their promotion of pro-Kremlin narratives and their reliance on Russian state media sources. Viginum’s report identified five websites in the pravda ecosystem, including one (pravda-de[.]com) that targets German-speaking audiences.

Since that initial publication, several other research organizations have identified additional websites that appear to be part of a growing number of branches connected to the pravda family tree. This includes a report from the European Digital Media Observatory’s fact-checking network that uncovered dozens of new pravda offshoots, many of which were created shortly before last year’s European Parliamentary elections. In our study, we found four websites, all of which were previously identified by Viginum in a December update to their pravda account list, that appear, in both visual appearance and naming conventions, to be affiliated with the pravda network:

• news-pravda[.]com
• news-pravda[.]com
• news-pravda[.]com
• news-pravda[.]com

The most observed pravda site in our study was deutsch.news-pravda[.]com, which appeared in 65 search results, making it the second most observed site overall. As with other previously identified pravda sites, the content on this site was reliably pro-Kremlin and featured content from numerous Russian state media sources, including RT Deutsch. Although internet traffic to these sites was difficult to obtain, previous reports have noted that the pravda network has struggled to build a sizeable audience.

Discovering Mirror Websites Shared by RT Deutsch’s X Accounts

As noted in the methodology section, we used Junkipedia to collect all posts from RT Deutsch’s X account, @de_rt_com, from January 30, 2024–January 8, 2025. The resulting dataset contained a total of 13,287 posts and 14,987 links. After extracting and lengthening the links, we aggregated domains by the number of occurrences in the data. This process uncovered 14 mirror domains that were shared by RT Deutsch’s X account more than 8,800 times during the studied period.

The most linked-to mirror domain shared by RT Deutsch’s X account was freedert[.]online. RT Deutsch’s X account linked to this site more than 3,000 times in 2024, representing roughly one third of all links shared by RT Deutsch’s X account in 2024. This domain was registered in July 2023 and was most actively shared by RT Deutsch’s X account from February to July of 2024. Rtnewsde[.]pro, another RT Deutsch mirror, was the third most linked-to domain (1,778 links) across all RT Deutsch X posts last year. This domain, along with three others, was registered in April 2024 and was shared most often in August and September 2024. Rtde[.]org, the fifth-most linked-to domain, was registered in late September 2024 along with five other domains and was predominantly shared by RT Deutsch’s X account in October and December 2024. Two additional domains registered in 2022, freeassange.rtde[.]life and freeassange.rtde[.]live, were linked to sparingly, and were mostly shared in the beginning of 2024.

Interestingly, RT Deutsch’s official domain, de.rt[.]com, was only the ninth-most shared domain, suggesting that RT recognizes that its core German-speaking audience would not be able to access those links with EU-based IP addresses. To evade restrictions, RT Deutsch’s X account strategically linked to different mirror domains throughout the year, possibly introducing new domains as established ones were blocked, and alternating between domains to familiarize its audience with various mirror websites.

To better understand the use of and engagement with linked-to mirror domains, we plotted the number of views associated with posts linking to each domain throughout 2024. For better visibility, we combined mirror domains that were registered on the same day to show the ebbs and flows of RT Deutsch’s linking strategy on X.

As evidenced by the chart, RT Deutsch’s X account rotated mirror sites to continue to reach audiences who might otherwise be unable to access its content. In every month in 2024, posts linking to those mirror sites enjoyed substantially more views than RT’s primary domain (visualized in dark green).

Conclusion

Prior to the German Federal election in 2021, RT Deutsch enjoyed an enormous online following in Germany. Our research at that time showed that its Facebook page outperformed all other German-language media outlets in the lead-up to the election and that its YouTube channel had generated a sizeable following, primarily by exploiting anger over Germany’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The evidence uncovered in this, and ISD’s, report suggests that RT Deutsch has struggled to maintain its pre-invasion audience in the face of bans and restrictions despite clear efforts to bypass them. RT Deutsch, however, is still reaching German audiences, and often in ways that are far less transparent than when it relied on its legacy website and affiliated channels. For the most part, the methods used to launder RT’s German-language content are not new and have been well-documented in our and other researchers’ prior investigations. This again suggests that regulators and moderators are failing to adapt to even well-known circumvention strategies. But our research also uncovered an under-researched avenue for spreading Russian narratives: podcast recordings distributed to podcast discovery and aggregator sites. Because of the focus on text and video-based content, and the relative lack of investigations into and understanding of the podcast ecosystem, this is a strategy worth watching, should other RT outlets adopt a similar approach.

¹ Mirror websites are websites that are identical copies of RT Deutsch’s website but are hosted on different domains.

² See page 9 of the Russian Propaganda Nesting Doll report for more details on the match score and how the information laundromat tool works. 

³ See page 35 of Laundromat-Paper.pdf.

APPENDIX A: Podcast Discovery and Aggregator Sites Hosting RT Deutsch’s Podcast

The views expressed in GMF publications and commentary are the views of the author alone.