Securing Democracy Dispatch

ASD is going to Phoenix, Arizona! ASD and the McCain Institute will hold a conversation about artificial intelligence’s (AI) impact on the 2024 US elections, featuring Arizona Secretary of State Adrian Fontes and Maricopa County Supervisor Bill Gates on Thursday, October 17 at 5:30 pm MT/8:30 pm EST. Register to join us in person or online here!

Whether Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s tour of a Pennsylvania ammunition plant with top US Democrats last week was “partisan campaigning is a matter of opinion.” But it is not foreign election interference—and claims to the contrary risk weakening our understanding of this threat, Senior Fellow Bret Schafer writes.

Russian diplomats and state media focused on two main narratives this week:

• Middle East: The ongoing conflicts in the Middle East were at the forefront of Russian state media coverage last week, especially in their Arabic language outlets. In an interview with RT, Lebanese journalist Marwa Osman, a contributor to Iran’s PressTV, blasted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s United Nations (UN) General Assembly speech, saying that if Russian President Vladimir Putin behaved like Netanyahu and launched an attack on the center of Kyiv while speaking at the UN that “all hell would have broken loose.” Another commentator similarly denounced the supposed hypocrisy of the United Kingdom, the United States, and the UN, who “supposedly care about civilian lives, human rights, and international law” but who “turn a blind eye” to Israel’s “out-of-control prime minister”. Russian state media also reported that, according to US media outlets, US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin “blew up” when heard about Israel’s attack, implying that the United States’ support for Israel might be waning.
• Chemical Weapons: Adding to tensions in the Middle East and Ukraine, Russian state media spread familiar, unsettling statements about alleged “provocations” using chemical weapons. Multiple Sputnik outlets reported on comments made by Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service that alleged that the special services of NATO countries and Ukraine, in cooperation with the Syrian Civil Defense (known as the White Helmets), are preparing to stage a chlorine attack in the Idlib de-escalation zone in Syria. The purported goal of the operation, according to Russian state media, would be to discredit Damascus and Moscow on the international stage and undermine support for Russia among “Global South” countries. The second planned use of chemical weapons was supposedly revealed by Ukrainian prisoners of war who allegedly warned that Kyiv is going to contaminate water in the Kherson region of Ukraine. 

The People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) diplomats and state media focused on two main narratives this week: 

• National Day: On October 1, the PRC celebrated its National Day. Setting the tone in a message relayed by diplomats in Austria, El Salvador, France, Ghana, Nigeria, and Oman, Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Hua Chunying called the flag-raising ceremony a “powerful display of national pride”. PRC diplomats in the Philippines and Pakistan, as well as several state media outlets, highlighted the boost to local economies generated by the holiday. CGTN posted a video titled “From Abroad to Adored: foreigners share their love for China!” and CGTN’s African arm showed images of Sierra Leoneans celebrating the holiday. The Consul General in Belfast shared a “heartwarming and uplifting” video of a choir singing a pro-PRC song in Hong Kong and diplomats in Sudan and Japan amplified PRC leader Xi Jinping’s warning to Taiwan that the island is the PRC’s “sacred territory”.
• Middle East: On X, CGTN Arabic put out 829 posts last week, a 20% increase over the previous week, with 48 of the 50 most viewed posts all related to the various conflicts in the Middle East. Similarly, seven of the ten most viewed CGTN Africa posts from last week on X were about wars in the Middle East. On YouTube, CGTN Europe relayed the PRC ambassador’s condemnation of Israel’s ban of the UN Secretary General and interviewed an expert who asserted that “Israel did not win the war” because “Hezbollah has not started the war yet”. China Daily’s EU Bureau Chief Chen Weihua accused CNN of spreading “Israeli nonsense” after the killing of Hezbollah’s leader. He also claimed that “Israel wants to draw [the United States] into the war”.

US senator targeted by sophisticated deepfake impersonating former Ukrainian official: The FBI is investigating an incident in which an unknown actor likely used AI to impersonate former Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba via deepfake during a Zoom video call with US Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Ben Cardin, asking pointed questions about US policy toward Ukraine and the US presidential election. Co-Managing Director Rachael Dean Wilson told the Dispatch, “This is the evolution of a known tactic of trying to dupe lawmakers, political candidates, and other leaders into politically damaging conversations by pretending to be other, well-known individuals, often foreign leaders. For comedy, geopolitical harm, or likely both, Russian ‘prank callers’ have previously targeted some European leaders. It’s notable in this instance that it appears both video and voice-matching AI were used for an even more convincing deepfake conversation.” 

Moldova accuses Russia of interference ahead of EU referendum, election: Moldova’s government accused the Kremlin of an “unprecedented onslaught” of interference tactics ahead of the country’s referendum on EU membership and presidential election this month, including funneling more than $15 million to 130,000 Moldovan citizens associated with a pro-Russian oligarch to bribe voters to reject joining the EU and organizing the vandalization of government buildings in Chișinǎu. Senior Manager for Europe and Fellow Vassilis Ntousas said, “The combination of a critical presidential election with a vote on making EU membership a constitutional goal makes Moldova an obvious target for Russian interference operations. All intelligence on the ground suggests that the volume, intensity, and diversity of Russian efforts to meddle in this electoral cycle has been on the rise, building on tactics Kremlin-linked and/or aligned actors tested in last year’s local election and worked to sharpen since. If Russia is all in, calling out its actions as the Moldovan government did is a crucial first step, but I expect there will be more announcements and countermeasures taken in the coming days, given how high the stakes are for the country’s future direction.”

DOJ charges Iranian hackers who targeted Trump campaign: The US Department of Justice (DOJ) charged three Iranian operatives for hacking Donald Trump’s presidential campaign and sharing stolen documents with journalists and members of President Joe Biden’s then-presidential campaign. Senior Fellow Bret Schafer said, “We often talk about the fact that the weak link in our defense against foreign malign influence is the use of witting and unwitting Americans in information operations, so it is a positive sign that neither the media nor the Biden (now Harris) campaign took the bait in this case. While that points to clear learnings about our collective responsibilities in defending against foreign interference, the fact that Iranian intelligence took this route instead of, say, releasing the documents through an anonymous online account, points to the fact that they also understand this to be a critical vulnerability.”

In Case You Missed It

• The DOJ and Microsoft announced the seizure of more than 100 website domains used by Russian intelligence to steal Americans’ sensitive information and US government documents through spear-phishing attacks on US federal employees.
• DOJ officials say their ability to prosecute and take stronger actions against the harassment of election officials and voters is limited, as worries rise ahead of November.
• Arizona officials said that 218,000 voters were improperly recorded as having provided proof of citizenship, more than double previous estimates.
• German authorities arrested a woman accused of sharing German defense information to the PRC’s secret service through an agent working for a far-right lawmaker in the European Parliament.
• The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) warned that US water systems remain at risk from hackers and foreign adversaries.

Foreign Election Interference: Can democratic societies protect themselves? Senior Fellow Bret Schafer quoted in CQ Press

How’s meddling and misinformation taken shape this election cycle? Senior Fellow Bret Schafer quoted in LAist

Experts: It’s up to voters to hold lying politicians accountable. Co-Managing Director Rachael Dean Wilson quoted in KARE11

“While the [intelligence community] remains confident that foreign actors could not successfully manipulate election systems to impact election outcomes without detection, it has elevated concerns that foreign actors could instead utilize information operations to undermine confidence in the election.”

—US Senator Mark Warner, in a letter dated September 26 urging CISA to help state and local election offices combat the spread of false information ahead of the 2024 US presidential election.

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