Russia has long been waging operations against democracies using all of the asymmetric tools ASD tracks—information manipulation, cyberattacks, malign finance, civil society subversion, and state economic coercion. The Kremlin’s geographic scope in conducting operations to undermine democracy continues to expand and its tactics continue to evolve. Find ASD’s work on Russia’s attempts to interfere in democracies on this page.
Interference Matters
Catch Me If EU Can: How RT and Sputnik Evade EU Content Bans
Hamilton Toplines: September 20–26, 2021
Russia Last week, Russian officials and state media focused heavily on the UN General Assembly (UNGA), making it the most frequently used phrase on the Moscow-linked Twitter dashboard. Much of the coverage attempted to highlight Russia’s diplomatic [...]
Russia’s Parliamentary Elections: Building Autocratic Resilience to “Foreign Interference”
Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party maintained its parliamentary majority in elections marked by apparent Kremlin-directed ballot tampering. Ahead of the elections, Russian government officials and state media used unfo [...]
Russia’s Media Reach and Coverage of Candidates in Advance of the German Federal Election
Foreign actors have demonstrated an interest in Germany’s federal election this year. Of particular concern is the fact that Russian state-backed media have developed a wide reach within Germany and are actively engaging in election discourse. Since [...]
The Elections, Covid, and Afghanistan: August on the German Elections Dashboard
On September 26, around 60 million voters in Germany will be able to cast their ballots in the 2021 parliamentary elections. After 16 years in power, incumbent chancellor Angela Merkel is not running for office, and a change in government leadership [...]
Regulating The Enablers
Executive Summary When kleptocrats, foreign intelligence services, homegrown autocrats, and other malign actors weaponize corruption to undermine U.S. democracy, their financial secrecy relies upon the services of ten sectors of U.S. professionals [...]
Lithuania on the Frontlines: A Conversation with Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis
The German Marshall Fund of the United States invites you to a timely virtual conversation with Lithuania's Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis. The foreign minister is in Washington on September 15 for high-level meetings with senior U.S. offic [...]
Hamilton Toplines: September 6–12, 2021
Russia Continuing a weeks-long trend, Afghanistan dominated the outputs of Russian state media last week, with the country registering as the second or third most-mentioned country in videos, tweets, and articles posted by state media accounts and o [...]
Hamilton Toplines: August 30–September 5, 2021
Russia Last week, Russian state media and diplomats continued to focus on the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Taliban’s takeover of the country; although, the amount of coverage declined slightly from previous weeks. Kremlin-linked Twitter [...]
Russia Sows Distrust on Social Media Ahead of German Election
RT Deutsch, the Kremlin-backed media outlet, has become a major player on social media just weeks before the polls open. A video on YouTube alleging anti-vaccine conspiracy theories in Germany was viewed more than a million times. A Facebook post p [...]
Hamilton Toplines: August 23–29, 2021
Russia Last week, Russian diplomats and state media continued to provide extensive coverage of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the associated fallout. Russian Twitter accounts monitored on Hamilton 2.0 mentioned Afghanistan more than any ot [...]
Hamilton Toplines: August 16–August 22, 2021
Russia Last week, Russian state media and diplomats continued to focus on the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan, highlighting chaotic scenes on the ground, criticizing the Biden administration’s efforts, and amplifying confusion and tension between t [...]
How Authoritarians Can Exploit Apple’s Child Safety Initiatives
Much has been said about Apple’s recently announced “Child Safety” initiatives. The focus has been (rightly so) on the perceptions of user privacy and implications of content processing happening on user devices versus cloud servers. Child safety pr [...]