Disinformation is not potatoes
This week, the Kremlin sought to dominate public information spaces with narratives about Russia’s attack with a nuclear-capable ballistic missile on the Ukrainian city of Dnipro. The incident was splashed across the front pages of Russian news outlets and served as the centrepiece of state-controlled TV discussions. The objective is clear: domestically, to enforce a patriotic siege mentality; internationally, to stoke fears of nuclear war, to intimidate, and to weaken support for Ukraine.
Fraudsters fighting fakes
Instead of giving this fear-mongering more oxygen, we focus on something topical, though no less revealing. Enter the Kremlin-funded ‘Global Fact-Checking Network’, a supposedly international initiative to combat bias and disinformation. Under different circumstances, the irony of this endeavour might even be laughable. But it’s dead serious – another weaponised tool to enable and amplify international manipulation.
The network was unveiled at the Kremlin-organised ‘Dialogue on Fakes 2.0’ forum in Moscow last week, hosted by the Russian government-funded NGO ANO Dialog. According to its director, Vladimir Tabak, the initiative aims to establish standards for fact-checking, inviting journalists and organisations to join after signing a so-called ‘Code of Responsible Fact-Checking’. The network claims it will develop tools to identify fake news, train professionals, and compile a public database of ‘proven false data’, accessible globally.
Fact-checking as camouflage
Training experts, setting standards, and creating tools to combat disinformation are goals EUvsDisinfo fully supports. But there’s a catch: ANO Dialog and its subsidiary Dialog Regions are Kremlin-funded entities designed to manipulate information domestically and globally to serve Kremlin interests. Its director, Vladimir Tabak, is under sanctions and in 2024, the US Treasury linked the organisation to Russia’s foreign influence operations, including AI-driven election interference and the Doppelgänger disinformation campaign.
In other words, ANO Dialog and Vladimir Tabak are themselves producing and spreading disinformation and running information manipulation operations for the Kremlin. Announcing a ‘global fact-checking network’ is just the latest iteration of a years-long campaign to copy the verbal and visual vocabulary of actual fact-checking organisations to spread lies.
Lapsha Media and WarOnFakes
In 2021, ANO Dialog signed a ‘Memorandum on Countering Fakes’, which had been set up by major Russian internet companies. It then started the ‘Lapsha Media project’, a website and social media campaign with all the trappings of a fact-checking organisation: slick promotion videos telling users to not believe everything they see online, a weekly newsletter with ‘top fakes’ and information for readers to send in their own ‘fakes’ to be checked by ‘experts’.
Lapsha media is available in Russian and targets Russian-speaking audiences, but Timofej Vasiljev, who worked for ANO Dialog in the past, set up the WarOnFakes project, a propaganda project posing as a fact-checking organisation which was available in multiple language (although it failed to gain much following among European audiences).
Deception wrapped in data
ANO Dialog disguises itself as a modern, technologically advanced NGO, whose main goal is to offer advice on communications and digitalisation to Russian state institutions. Commenting on the dangers of online disinformation and fake news fits this role. Its director Tabak is regularly quoted and invited to panels by Russian state media to talk about the dangers to society of ‘fake news’ and ‘deep fakes’ and how he and his organisation aim to fight it.
Some results of this fight were presented in a special ‘Fake News Dissemination Study’ for the above-mentioned conference. What exposes this document as a manipulative fake is its ostensible exactness. The organisation claims to have ‘revealed’ 4,051 fakes in 2023, which were allegedly seen by 12 million persons. In 2024, they claim to have identified more than 4,000 fakes, but thanks to their ‘anti-fake system’ these were so far seen by only 8 million persons. The report even includes a chart which shows which months had the highest number of fakes in the last years and a heatmap to show the total number of identified fakes in each Russian region.
No math in disinformation
By providing these numbers, ANO Dialog tries to make it appear as if it had an understanding of the total amount of fake news or disinformation in Russia. Yet there is no method to reliably measure the amount of disinformation anywhere. Disinformation is not potatoes. It is an abstract concept enabled by manipulative behaviour which comes in many different forms and happens on many different mediums and channels.
The report implies that what it counted was ‘fake’ or inaccurate information. But disinformation doesn’t always work with lies; it often works with half-truths, or even completely accurate information that is taken out of context or presented in a manipulative way, exaggerated, coupled with non-related events, and so on. How would that be counted? As half a fake? As a third of a fake? And who decides how much of a fake that is?
We at EUvsDisinfo have worked professionally since 2015 in countering disinformation and manipulation following a comprehensive concept, which we described in April 2020 and elaborated in July 2023.
EUvsDisinfo also maintains a database, which last week reached the sad milestone of 18,000 examples of disinformation cases. These are merely an illustration of disinformation narratives directed at the EU and its neighbours. We do not claim to be able to quantify the vast amounts of manipulative content being produced every day.
Confusion is the main goal
ANO Dialog is of course not really concerned with these questions because it is itself a major producer of manipulative content. This report is just one more attempt to make it appear that there is a Russian alternative to fact-checking organisations. It works in much the same way that Russian officials often claim that there is no free-speech in Western countries. Their argument is pure whataboutism: ‘If you say we don’t have free speech, we say you don’t have free speech. And then you will not have less free speech and we will not have more free speech’. In reality, the people listening will be a little more confused about free speech and that’s the goal.
It is about taking up space in the information environment and drowning out other voices.
Don’t be deceived!
Other things the Kremlin called fake this week:
– The West did not organise the DHL cargo plane crash in Vilnius to blame Russia
The Kremlin’s disinformation machine churned out an absurd conspiracy theory this week, claiming that the West orchestrated the crash of a DHL cargo plane in Vilnius in order to frame Russia. The theory, promoted by a Russian State Duma member, hinges on a tenuous connection to a Times article that highlighted concerns about parcel bombs and their potential use by Russian intelligence. The crash, which occurred on 25 November, involved a Boeing 737. Lithuanian authorities and DHL are investigating the cause, with initial assessments pointing to either technical issues or human error.
The case is an illustrative example of information manipulation by pro-Kremlin media. They did not wait for the results of the investigation but put out their own version of an anti-Russian conspiracy by ‘Anglo-Saxons’ almost immediately. This story was spread by the main TV station Rossiya 1 and the main Russian newswire RIA. In this way, they attempt to dominate the information environment and have search engines pick up their version of events first. It is instructive that these main outlets spread this story so soon: this allows other outlets in the pro-Russian infosphere to republish and amplify it. We have written before about how members of the presidential administration control the main Russian information environment through the use of temnik guidelines.
– North Korean soldiers are fighting alongside Russia against Ukraine
Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov called news that North Korean soldiers are being deployed against Ukraine ‘another batch of fake news’. In fact, there is evidence from US, South Korean and Ukrainian sources that the North Korean regime has sent more than 10,000 troops to join the war against Ukraine. This has also been confirmed by HRVP Josep Borrell and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte. Peskov’s reasoning for why this could not be true was interesting: because it was not reported by Russian milbloggers. An official of the country that ranks 162 out of 180 in the press freedom ranking by Reporters Without Borders apparently still relies on the credibility of independent sources for validation – ironic, given the Kremlin’s routine suppression of free speech and independent media.
– Russia receives weapons from other countries
Another example of the Kremlin’s attempt to obscure uncomfortable truths came this week when Dmitry Medvedev, Vice Chairman of Russia’s Security Council, denied that Russia receives military equipment from other countries. Medvedev claimed that the ‘absolute majority’ of weapons, missiles, and ammunition used in the war against Ukraine is manufactured in Russia. However, substantial evidence contradicts this assertion. By November 2024, South Korean intelligence reported that North Korea had sent over 9 million artillery shells, missiles, and other weapons to Russia in more than 13,000 containers since August 2023. Iran provides Russia with drones and China is providing critical components to sustain Russia’s military industry. This heavy reliance on external supplies exposes significant gaps in Russia’s own production capabilities. We said we would not mention the ballistic missiles in this review, but here we are after all.
