Ciaran O’Connor: Is West waking up to Russia’s disinformation campaigns?

A sustained Kremlin-backed operation of disinformation is making harder to distinguish reality from fiction in the Russia versus the West faceoff

Ukraine's national flag waves above the capital with the Motherland Monument on the right, in Kiev. Some airlines have halted or diverted flights to Ukraine amid heightened fears that an invasion by Russia is imminent despite intensive weekend talks between the Kremlin and the West. Picture: AP

 In his 2019 book This is Not Propaganda, author Peter Pomerantsev details how following the collapse of the Soviet Union, security officials-turned academics contended that the USSR ultimately failed not because of poor economic policies, human rights' abuses or state-sponsored corruption, but because of 'information viruses' planted by Western security services through Trojan horse concepts such as freedom or speech and economic reform.

Such a theory did not enter the Russian mainstream immediately but in the past 10 years, he explains, this permanent information warfare philosophy has become central to Kremlin doctrine which now ceaselessly puts forward the argument that the West is waging an information war on Russia through NGOs, anti-corruption initiatives and news organisations.

For most observers, the opposite situation is a more accurate way of interpreting events today, and as we watch the Russian state utilise its disinformation instruments while it postures over Ukraine’s relationship with Europe, it has taken the West many regrettable lessons to arrive at this conclusion. Yet there are signs that lessons have been learnt and now that the reality is matching what we’ve been seeing online for so long, it is maybe time to help others join the dots too.

Ukraine has long been in the crosshairs of Moscow but following the 2014 Maidan revolution, Russia’s disinformation apparatus was fully deployed and the EU and its allies were simply not prepared for the overt and covert activities of the Kremlin’s information overdrive.

The invasion of eastern Ukraine and illegal annexation of Crimea were accompanied by state-controlled media disinformation campaigns that were viewed as another active front in the conflict. Online, troll factories operating like competitive disinformation start-ups used the anonymity afforded by the internet to flood digital spaces, with the overall aim being to influence public opinion at home and abroad, deny all Russian involvement and portray Ukraine as the aggressor and a threat to global security.

When MH17 was shot down over pro-Russian separatist-controlled eastern Ukraine in 2014, an investigation found that employees with Russia’s Internet Research Agency ‘troll farm’ posted over 111,000 tweets in the three days following the incident, first to claim pro-Russian rebels had successfully targeted an enemy Ukrainian plane before they changed tact and shifted the blame, claiming Ukraine was responsible for shooting down a passenger plane.

Regarding the current tensions, disinformation pumped out by Russia’s state-controlled media weaves illusory narratives about Ukrainian forces and Nato partnering to prepare an attack on Russian speakers in Ukraine together with accusations that Ukraine is planning a genocide against ethnic Russians and claims that US-backed forces are plotting a chemical weapons attack.

The information warfare toolkit refined within the troll farms of St Petersburg is now employed by a wide range of state and non-state actors globally. The ultimate goal of most disinformation campaigns is to undermine democracy and human rights, sow distrust in institutions, breed confusion among the public and engineer social, cultural and political shifts towards polarisation and extremism. Naturally then, these tactics are primarily favoured by illiberal and authoritarian regimes. The diversification and acceleration of disinformation activity globally in recent years arguably attests to the long-term disruptive influence of Putin’s dirty tricks.

Hacks, co-ordinated harassment, and targeted leaks of sensitive information are just a sample of the tactics that have been uncovered in disinformation operations in the Philippines, Brazil and the US in recent years. Such methods have been adapted and adopted by far-right and far-left political figures and, closer to home, have been used to sway elections in the EU, according to our analysis at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, a London-based non-profit that researches disinformation, hate and extremism online.

Yet, there is growing awareness and apparent readiness to counter the Kremlin’s hybrid warfare in the West. In 2015, the European Union launched a taskforce to “challenge Russia's ongoing disinformation campaigns” in eastern Europe. More recently, the US State Department has released a series of fact sheets highlighting Russia’s “persistent disinformation narratives,” which, the document states, the Kremlin uses like a template to parrot narratives about victimhood and Russaphobia, historical revisionism and multiple contrasting and overlapping unrealities as they suit Russia’s policy goals.

Ben Wallace, Minister for Defence in the UK, recently penned an article characterising claims by Russia’s defence minister surrounding the supposed chemical weapons 'false flag' provocation in eastern Ukraine as a 'straw-man' argument, stating “it is obviously the Kremlin’s desire that we all engage with this bogus allegation, instead of challenging the real agenda of the president.”

During previous crisis points and acts of Russian-backed aggression or atrocities, the West has been simply unprepared and too slow to respond to Russia’s threats and tactics. Such changes in approach and activities from the US, UK or EU hopefully point to a shift in strategies among political circles in the West that signal better preparedness across all of Europe towards Russia’s hybrid warfare. Though, as other events show, intelligence is a messy game and opaque applications of information can sometimes add fuel to the fire.

In late January, the UK Foreign Office aired reports of an alleged plot by President Putin to orchestrate a coup and install a pro-Moscow government in Kiev, yet which was light on detail. Experts such as Mark Galeotti viewed the reports with much scepticism and said such claims are commonplace in this political arena. More importantly, it contributes to errant speculation about a potential conflict. In response, the Russian Foreign Ministry dismissed the comments as disinformation, providing the Kremlin with an easy opportunity to fire back and accuse the UK and Nato of “escalating tensions” over Ukraine.

That is why, for similar reasons, it was also important to see US reporters push the State Department for more evidence rather than simply accept a claim by the US government about a Russian disinformation plot to invade Ukraine. Claims offered in times of tensions and crises, without evidence, and nearly impossible to substantiate, often run the risk of furthering scepticism among the public and we all lose as a result.

As Pomerantsev writes, we now live in a world of influence operations run amok. Ultimately, the people who stand to lose the most in any potential conflict are those in Ukraine. Their voice is the most important in this situation and, time and time again, they have used that voice to raise awareness about the deadly consequences of Russian disinformation. Perhaps this time, the West is finally listening and taking steps to mitigate and the Kremlin’s efforts are being recognised for what they are.

• Ciaran O’Connor is an analyst at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, working in the Research and Policy unit. 
• He  specialises in using open-source research to track and monitor disinformation and extremism online, with a particular focus on far-right activity and communication across open and closed networks and platforms.