782

Unsealed FBI doc exposes terrifying depth of Russian disinfo scheme (newrepublic.com)

submitted 2 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/politics@lemmy.world

171 comments fedilink hide all child comments

New court documents reveal that Russia is keeping a very, very long list of influencers to spread its propaganda.

The Russian disinformation plot revealed in a Justice Department indictment this week may just be the tip of the iceberg, according to newly unsealed court documents.

On Wednesday, the DOJ announced it would seize 32 internet domains linked to a larger Kremlin scheme to promote disinformation and influence the 2024 election. The Russian campaign, known as Doppelganger, uses AI-generated content to create “fake news” boosted through social media with the aim of electing Donald Trump.

…

Of particular note, the documents released Wednesday included an affidavit that noted a Russian company is keeping a list of more than 2,800 influencers world wide, about one-fifth of whom are based in the United States, to monitor and potentially groom to spread Russian propaganda. The affidavit does not mention the full list of influencers, but is still a terrifying indicator of how deep the Russian plot to interfere in U.S. politics really goes.

top 50 comments

sorted by: hot top controversial new old

[-] TallonMetroid@lemmy.world 110 points 2 months ago

The affidavit does not mention the full list of influencers, but is still a terrifying indicator of how deep the Russian plot to interfere in U.S. politics really goes.

Well, why not? Name and shame all of them. Normal political ads are required to tell you who paid for them (even if they only do it in the fine print). There's no reason not to hold these schmucks to the same standard just because it's TikTok vids or whatever instead of magazine or TV ads.

[-] sramder@lemmy.world 34 points 2 months ago

Not a lawoligist, but I suspect they plan on pressing charges ;-)

[-] PrettyFlyForAFatGuy@feddit.uk 26 points 2 months ago

Wont be in time for the election though, so the damage will be done

[-] BeMoreCareful@lemmy.world 16 points 2 months ago

I feel like they already got their money's worth on interfering with elections.

They nabbed up several former Soviet republics and then publicly humiliated the states with the 2016 American election.

Say what you want about Putin, be he's a helluva spy.

load more comments (5 replies)

load more comments (2 replies)

[-] just_another_person@lemmy.world 92 points 2 months ago

Guaranteed they are all over the Fediverse and probably hosting their own instances.

[-] Boddhisatva@lemmy.world 45 points 2 months ago

There are a few obvious ones around but it's against the rules to even suggest that they could be shills or bots. Hopefully this news will get the mods to start taking action against the most blatant ones.

[-] kescusay@lemmy.world 19 points 2 months ago

I, for one, will not return to allowing that particular guy back on my feed.

[-] grue@lemmy.world 15 points 2 months ago

That guy gets on my nerves, but I've read enough from him on various topics that I'm pretty confident he's a genuine user. Don't get me wrong, he's for sure an ideologue who's no fun at parties, but I don't think he's a bot or that he's saying things he was instructed to say and doesn't actually care deeply about.

There's another user, with a three-word-phrase username, that I would describe similarly.

load more comments (1 replies)

[-] Dasus@lemmy.world 11 points 2 months ago

will get the mods to start taking action against the most blatant ones.

I've heard it from a reliable source, a Lemmy.ml mod, that there's simply no Russian activity on Lemmy. Would you like to know who?

load more comments (2 replies)

[-] dragontamer@lemmy.world 35 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Yes but... Fediverse has more moderators and even server level bans where we can fight back.

It's a different political makeup here on the Fediverse. It's not like the Russians can hand money to just one or two CEOs and suddenly all of the moderators we trust here turn to the other side.

We need to keep our wits about us here. We came to Lemmy (and Fediverse) because centralized commercial control of our discussion spaces led to perverse incentives.

I only consider this political situation to be yet another test of the Fediverse. We have to survive it. But I also believe we moved to the Fediverse because we all believe we can do more about disinformation or malicious actors here on the Fediverse than on... Reddit or Facebook.

[-] InternetUser2012@lemmy.today 9 points 2 months ago

What happens when your mods are part of it?

[-] Plastic_Ramses@lemmy.world 15 points 2 months ago

Move to a different instance.

load more comments (2 replies)

load more comments (1 replies)

load more comments (28 replies)

[-] Blackmist@feddit.uk 69 points 2 months ago

Remember: If your politicians say there is no Russian interference in your elections, they are the ones who have been funded.

[-] RememberTheApollo_@lemmy.world 59 points 2 months ago

Where are my republican “there is no Russian influence in the election” now?

[-] ChickenLadyLovesLife@lemmy.world 14 points 2 months ago

I don't listen to the radio but my coworkers (school bus drivers) do so I overhear it from time to time. News reports keep mentioning "foreign interference in our elections" but scrupulously avoid mentioning a) it's Russia, and b) it's Russia interfering on behalf of Trump and the Republicans. Even fucking NPR is like this, most of the time. It should be obvious that any Republicans hearing this sort of "news" will believe it's a problem afflicting Democrats.

[-] fluxion@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

They will never hear about this in a non-obfuscated way

[-] bender223@lemmy.today 7 points 2 months ago

Shhhh....no Russian

[-] HK65@sopuli.xyz 8 points 2 months ago

No puppet, no puppet, you're the puppet!

[-] InternetUser2012@lemmy.today 7 points 2 months ago

They're currently brainstorming and waiting for their orders from fox "news". I expect we'll see a bunch of posts here in a few days about how it's all bullshit and blown out of proportion. Watch the names too, they'll all be accounts created a year or so ago and haven't posted for about 7 months.

load more comments (3 replies)

[-] EarthShipTechIntern@lemm.ee 58 points 2 months ago

About damn time. Could have used this 8+ years ago. Might have stopped Drump's term in office.

[-] smayonak@lemmy.world 21 points 2 months ago

The only person who did anything helpful got sent to jail (reality winner)

[-] grozzle@lemm.ee 11 points 2 months ago

still haven't got used to that being her actual name.

[-] circuitfarmer@lemmy.sdf.org 54 points 2 months ago

Every single conservative comment I have seen about this has claimed it is made up by the DOJ. That is the extent of it.

[-] the_crotch@sh.itjust.works 18 points 2 months ago

Law and order party says the doj is corrupt next time on sick sad world

[-] JustEnoughDucks@feddit.nl 11 points 2 months ago

"DOJ is corrupt but also police can do no wrong, let's give them tanks, until they are forced to be against our riots and then they are bad again, but only until we start saying that the riots weren't us and was the deep state actors, then they never did anything wrong"

load more comments (1 replies)

[-] SassyRamen@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

To them DOJ < PUTIN

So don't expect anything different from those idiots.

[-] Zink@programming.dev 7 points 2 months ago

Better a Russian than Democrat Or Justice!

[-] LarmyOfLone@lemm.ee 49 points 2 months ago

a terrifying indicator of how deep the Russian plot to interfere in U.S. politics really goes

It is despicable but remember that they only paid right wing trolls to do what they were already doing. This is how modern corruption works. Conservative and reactionary talk radio all across the US works like this. The only reason the GOP is so successful in rural areas is they are doing the exact same shit Russia is doing. Fund extremists to continue their bullshit. You don't need a "Quid Pro Quo", you just need to pick the right weirdos to boost.

And if you think this is terrifying, think of not just what leftists think of this inside the US, think of what people all around the world think of the US election interference. For decades and decades the US has interfered and overthrown democracies. They did in Euromaidan too.

So yeah, fuck Russia, just realize many countries rightfully think the same about the USA.

load more comments (3 replies)

[-] Stanley_Pain@lemmy.dbzer0.com 26 points 2 months ago

Is anyone really surprised by this? Russia hasn't changed much in this particular way since before WWII ;).

load more comments (2 replies)

[-] RampantParanoia2365@lemmy.world 21 points 2 months ago

Cool, so just how many wars is Russia trying to fight at the moment?

[-] Daerun@lemmy.world 18 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

I'd like to see that list.

Alongside the list of influencers US is paying to spread its propaganda.

[-] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 12 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

terrifying scale

barely a percentage point compared to the fossil fuel industry's war on Green Energy

I suppose you could reasonably argue that Rex Tillerson and Vladimir Putin were already joined at the hip. But the US advertising and influencing industry is vast - $515B annually and growing. The Russians aren't even in the top ten of foreign influence peddlers. FFS, the Saudis bought golf.

[-] dragontamer@lemmy.world 28 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Saudis aren't trying to get Trump elected and directly meddle in the election.

And sure, the Saudis whitewash themselves and try to make us forget about Jamal. But Russia influence is really bad.

I'm not necessarily against foreign influence. Ukrainians have a right to make their case to us for example. But the Russian style disinfo is leading to conspiracy theories and a degeneration of our society.

[-] jonne@infosec.pub 14 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Lol yes they are. They're part owners of Twitter, which became a pro-Trump cesspool. That alone is orders of magnitude bigger than this Russian thing.

load more comments (19 replies)

[-] billiam0202@lemmy.world 17 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

Yes, what about this thing that has nothing to do with the subject of Russia influencing elections?

load more comments (4 replies)

[-] Zipitydew@sh.itjust.works 13 points 2 months ago

Wah but whatabout

[-] rsuri@lemmy.world 10 points 2 months ago

Well Russia is part of that fossil fuel industry too, and they also hire lobbyists to push fossil fuels

load more comments (1 replies)

load more comments (3 replies)

[-] Fedizen@lemmy.world 9 points 2 months ago

4/5 are outside the US, does that mean most are in the EU?

[-] disconnectikacio@lemmy.world 13 points 2 months ago

Yes, even goverments. For example orban in #orbanistan (hungary), fico in slovakia controlled putin. There are also parties controlled by putin, like afd in germany, le pen's party in france, also the brexit guy nigel farage putin's puppet

load more comments (1 replies)

[-] Ensign_Crab@lemmy.world 7 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago)

And centrists will imagine that all of it is localized entirely on lemmy, in the form of anyone to their left.

load more comments

this post was submitted on 07 Sep 2024

782 points (98.4% liked)

politics

19120 readers

2042 users here now

Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!

Rules:

Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.

Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.

Example:

Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.

That's all the rules!

Civic Links

• Register To Vote

• Citizenship Resource Center

• Congressional Awards Program

• Federal Government Agencies

• Library of Congress Legislative Resources

• The White House

• U.S. House of Representatives

• U.S. Senate

Partnered Communities:

• News