On May 11, ASD Media and Digital Disinformation Fellow Bret Schafer presented the new German Election Dashboard at a GMF Berlin event. The Dashboard is an interactive, open-source tool that allows users to track messaging from influential foreign an [...]
Germany’s federal election in September this year will mark a critical change not only for Germany but for Europe as a whole. Chancellor Angela Merkel has led Europe’s largest country and economic powerhouse since 2005, long before the specter of th [...]
Program Manager and Fellow Nad'a Kovalčíková joined StratPol (Strategic Policy Institute) for a panel titled “Civil Engagement and Participation in Defence.” Participants discussed why societal resilience is important for national security and defen [...]
Over the past year, the regimes in Russia, China, and Iran have used a combination of public diplomacy, propaganda, and overt and covert disinformation campaigns to portray their respective responses to the pandemic as superior to those of the West. [...]
In the wake of the Brazilian Health Regulatory Agency’s (Anvisa) decision not to authorize Sputnik V for import to Brazil, the Sputnik V Twitter account slammed the choice as the result of political pressure from the United States, criticized Anvisa [...]
Overview China's state-backed messengers are using India's health crisis to denigrate the United States and encourage India to step back from its deepening partnership with the United States and other democracies. According to data from the Johns Ho [...]
On Monday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) confirmed to Politico that it is working to establish a Foreign Malign Influence Center. The center, which was first authorized as part of the 2020 Defense Authorization bill, wil [...]
“Disinformation is a deliberate falsehood put out to mislead an audience. But what we see more of are true bits of information where necessary context has been removed or manipulated in a way that makes it technically true but wildly misleading.” - [...]
Russia’s coronavirus vaccine coverage last week featured, as per usual, positive news about Sputnik V—such as Argentina starting local production of Sputnik V, the arrival of Sputnik in Venezuela, and reports of the vaccine’s overall efficacy—and ne [...]
The infodemic that accompanied the spread of the coronavirus looms large, complicating efforts to contain the virus. Civil society, tech companies, media organizations, and governments must tackle it with the same deliberateness that they bring to c [...]
Russian state media and diplomats predictably denounced last week’s new U.S. sanctions on the country, which the Russian Foreign Ministry characterized as an “attack.” They also criticized the rationale behind the sanctions, blamed the United States [...]
The country’s social media offensive over Xinjiang is in overdrive — and backfiring in the West. As tensions grow between China and the world’s major democracies over human rights abuses in Xinjiang province, Beijing’s “wolf warrior” diplomats have [...]
Amid heightened tensions in eastern Ukraine, Russian state media and diplomats last week reupped their usual narratives about the conflict: blaming Ukraine for the situation, suggesting that Russia poses no threat (but hinting that Russia could inte [...]
Program Manager and Fellow Nad’a Kovalčíková joined the Atlantic Forum's Spring Conference for a panel entitled "An Alliance Bound to Lead: Converging Towards 2030." Kovalčíková, Benedetta Berti, Professor Sven Biscop, and moderator Shary Mitidiery [...]
Head of Policy and Research Jessica Brandt joined NDN to discuss the great power race between the United States/the West and authoritarian countries to vaccinate the world and be the ones to defeat the coronavirus. Related Reading: Influence-enza: [...]
Last week, Russian state media—and in one instance the Russian Foreign Ministry—continued to hammer the United States over the migrant crisis at the southern border, characterizing the situation as a humanitarian disaster and highlighting reports of [...]
Last Thursday, the House Energy and Commerce Committee held yet another hearing to grill social media CEOs about the mis- and disinformation on their platforms. While much of the hearing consisted of members soliciting soundbites from the executives [...]
Russian state media last week hammered the United States over its response to the migrant crisis at the southern border, suggesting that the Biden administration is intentionally downplaying and concealing the poor conditions. State media amplified [...]
Executive Summary The 2016 presidential election served as a wakeup call to the threat of authoritarian interference, and in the years since, many segments of American society—from the federal government to private companies and civil society gro [...]
Following the publication of the U.S. intelligence community’s assessment of foreign interference in the 2020 election, Russian state media last week highlighted predictable backlash and denials from Russian government figures, with a small amount o [...]
Acting Director David Salvo joined Julie Mason to discuss Russia’s tools, tactics, and motivations for attempting to interfere in the U.S. elections. Related reading: Leaks, Lies, and Altered Tape: Russia’s Maturing Information Manipulation Playbook [...]
Program Manager and Fellow Nad’a Kovalčíková joined the Geremka Foundation to discuss information manipulation in Europe and possible policy measures to better address it, with a focus on EU, Poland and Western Balkans. Disinformation is currently [...]
A messaging strategy is only as good as the goal it serves; as Xi Jinping has made clear, China is seeking to make the world safer for its brand of authoritarianism by reshaping the world order. An analysis of messaging from China’s diplomats, state [...]
Just as the other EU countries, the Visegrad states are endangered by the amplification of manipulated information, and the coronavirus pandemic has only contributed to the problem. Combatting disinformation is a whole society effort that requires a [...]
With the advent of COVID-19 vaccines in Europe, there is hope for an end to the pandemic. But vaccination campaigns have come under fire by the mainstreaming of conspiracy theories such as QAnon and conspiracy videos like Plandemic, which erode trus [...]
Prior to President Biden’s address to the nation last Thursday, Russian state media covered speculation and reported concerns about Biden’s lack of press conferences, at times questioning his physical and/or mental health. They also highlighted an i [...]
Every few years gives rise to a novel social media app that takes smartphone users by storm. Clubhouse, the invite-only, audio-based app that feels like TED Talks meets 1980s radio call-in show, has rapidly grown in recent months, offering a platfor [...]
Last week, a prominent theme in Russian messaging around coronavirus vaccines targeted the prospect of Sputnik V’s approval in the EU, with the vaccine’s Twitter account calling for the EU’s European Medicines Agency to review and approve it (the ap [...]
Russia and China, as well as Iran to a certain extent, have used the coronavirus pandemic as an opportunity to interfere into democratic discourse and to present themselves as internationally responsible actors, while at the same time undermining de [...]
Introduction When Vladimir Putin announced last August that Russia had granted regulatory approval for Sputnik V, the world’s first coronavirus vaccine, it signaled—albeit perhaps prematurely—not only a potential turning point in the fight to end th [...]
Media and Digital Disinformation Fellow Bret Schafer joined Josh Hamilton on The Jist. Bret and Josh first spoke three to discuss the weaponization of information and the threat to democracy. Now, three years later, things have unfortunately not gott [...]
Last week, Russian state media seized on a story involving “leaked” U.K. Foreign Office documents that allegedly revealed the “UK government's covert operations aimed at tarnishing Russia's image.” The outlets used the story to accuse both the U.K. [...]
In July 2020, fact-checking and news organizations across Europe and the United States picked up on an emerging disinformation campaign that alleged Ukrainian soldiers died after testing an experimental U.S. COVID-19 vaccine. The story, which was de [...]
Last week, Russian state media and diplomats highlighted various instances of alleged censorship by social media companies—a recurring theme in Russia’s external messaging. State media cited Twitter’s ban of Project Veritas as an example of politica [...]
Program Manager and Fellow Nad’a Kovalčíková joined the European People's Party podcast to discuss lessons learned from the Covid-19 infodemic, authoritarian countries’ effort to undermine democracies, the role of good and bad communication strategi [...]
Program Manager and Fellow Nad’a Kovalčíková joined the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights for an interview as part of their “AI and Covid-19 Digital Disinformation Initiative” series in partnership with the Organization for Security a [...]
Program Manager and Fellow Nad’a Kovalčíková joined the Montreal Institute for Genocide and Human Rights for an interview as part of their "AI and Covid-19 Digital Disinformation Initiative" series in partnership with the Organization for Security a [...]
In last week’s coronavirus vaccine developments, U.K. medical journal The Lancet published the results of a peer-reviewed study that placed Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine’s efficacy at a level comparable to that of leading Western vaccines. Russian stat [...]
For several years, the Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD) has been monitoring and cataloging instances of authoritarian interference in the transatlantic space. In 2018, ASD launched the Authoritarian Interference Tracker, an online database that [...]
Overview On January 31, 2021, a new immigration route for British National (Overseas) (BNO) passport holders came into force in the United Kingdom. The BNO was a document created for Hong Kong citizens who wanted to maintain ties with the U.K. after [...]