What do the recent elections in France and the upcoming election in America have in common?
They’ve been the targets of a concerted Russian disinformation campaign.
France has been the target of Russian bots and fake news sites for the last two years, but efforts to disseminate false information ramped up this past fall. antibot4navalny, a collective that analyses Russian bot behavior, found that of 4,400 posts since mid-November, the majority targeted France and Germany. A slew of fake news websites have cropped up catering to French audiences — some of which were designed to closely resemble legitimate news or organization sites, including one that claimed Macron would pay voters 100 euros to vote for him and linked to a fake site almost identical to his party’s real campaign page.
Many of the fake articles and bot social media posts were aimed at diminishing French support for Ukraine. Much of the material denigrated Macron — a staunch ally and supporter of Ukraine — while lionizing the National Rally, whose leader, le Pen, has fostered ties with Putin.
According to the BBC, which has been tracking hundreds of fake news sites and articles, Russian disinformation campaigns are increasingly targeting American voters. Some of the false stories have gone viral and even been shared by U.S. lawmakers, like a story from the Moscow-based “Houston Post” that claimed the FBI illegally wiretapped Trump’s residence and one from “DC Weekly” that claimed Ukrainian officials bought yachts with U.S. military aid money.
Like the fake news spread in France, these stories often come from websites or social media accounts designed to look like real news organizations. The BBC investigation found that several of the fake news sites used names similar to existing news outlets or used the names of newspapers that have long gone out of business. On social media specifically, fake accounts try to gain credibility by using the same or a similar name as a verified account, or share doctored images that look like they came from a legitimate source.
To make them seem more authentic, fake articles may contain video or audio clips of the supposed “sources,” but the videos displayed are demonstrably AI-generated deepfakes. Sites may also pair fake bylines with photos of real people or link to other fake news websites to bolster their claims.
Sometimes, disinformation sites take a real story and change key details or have artificial intelligence rewrite it to give it a specific slant. But occasionally, the fake articles give themselves away: published stories have included AI prompts like “Please rewrite this article taking a conservative stance” in the text. On translated articles, footnotes can be found saying things such as “It highlights the cynical tone towards the U.S. government, NATO, and U.S. politicians. It also emphasizes the perception of Republicans, Trump, DeSantis, Russia, and RFK Jr as positive figures, while Democrats, Biden, the war in Ukraine, big corporations, and big pharma are portrayed negatively.”
With advances in technology, it can be increasingly difficult to discern fake news from real news at first glance, especially if we are only seeing headlines or screenshots shared on social media. And, unfortunately, the tsunami of fake news websites and social media bots is drowning out genuine news organizations. The best way to combat this scourge is to support news companies you know to be legitimate — subscribe to their papers or newsletters, engage with their posts and share their stories.
