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.
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 [...]
Mandatory Vaccinations, Covid-19 Origin, and A National Holiday: July’s Top Findings from the 2021 German Elections Dashboard
July saw a continuation of foreign actors’ active engagement in German online political discourse through state-backed media and diplomatic accounts. As in previous months, Russian actors put a particular emphasis on disseminating anti-vaccination n [...]
Hamilton Toplines: August 9–August 15, 2021
Russia Last week, Russian state media and diplomats focused heavily on the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan and the Taliban’s campaign to seize control of the country. Alongside coverage of the unfolding chaos and humanitarian crisis, Russian accoun [...]
Hamilton Toplines: August 2 – August 8, 2021
Russia Last week, Russian state media and diplomats continued to focus heavily on the Tokyo Olympics, celebrating Russian successes and amplifying President Putin’s claim that the ban of Russia’s name, flag, and anthem for violating anti-doping rule [...]
A Post-Merkel German Foreign Policy: A Look Into the Parties’ Election Agendas
Why It Matters After 16 years of government under Chancellor Angela Merkel and 8 years in a so-called “grand coalition” between the CDU/CSU and the SPD, it is all but certain that the federal elections in September will bring a change in government [...]
Hamilton Toplines: July 26-August 1, 2021
Russia As with most international media outlets, Russian state media outlets focused heavily on coverage of the Tokyo Olympics last week, a topic discussed in more detail in a recently published ASD blog post. They also continued to stoke vaccine sk [...]