ATTACK

While domestic forms of disinformation exist, this report will focus on two major foreign producers of disinformation: China and Russia. 

Russia is the pioneer of disinformation, or as they originally dubbed it “active measures”, tactics. “Active measures” is a Soviet term, referring to using intelligence operations for the purpose of influencing international events to achieve geopolitical goals—much like the disinformation tactics seen today. One of the first major influences in U.S. political arena was during the Camp David Accords, signed in 1978, by intervening in U.S. and Egyptian negotiations. Russia forged a document from the U.S. Secretary of State to the U.S. President written with offensive language about the capabilities of the Egyptian president. The document ended up being published in Syrian newspapers before being debunked publicly, causing political discord in the Camp David peace process. Russia’s goal was to undermine U.S. international standing. Today, attacks against the U.S. continue ten-fold in the era of social media, using tactics such as networks of fabricated accounts and news sites to attract users, and—more recently—American based journalists. In Sept. of 2020, on a fake news platform called “PeaceData”, the Kremlin-backed group—the Internet Research Agency—hired American journalists to write for their website, providing electronic payment. They developed a following of about 14,000, and had 13 fake accounts promoting the news source via Twitter and Facebook. Finally, one of the most infamous examples of a successful Russian disinformation campaign was the Russian Internet Research Agency’s impact on political perspectives surrounding the 2016 election. The IRA produced more than “than 57,000 Twitter posts, 2,400 Facebook posts, and 2,600 Instagram posts—and the numbers increased significantly in 2017” (PNAS). 

China is relatively new player to the realm of disinformation. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is one of the main actors in the media, attempting to launch pro-Beijing campaigns. In 2017, they launched a series of Chinese-language campaigns on Twitter to undermine democratic processes. However, China’s disinformation campaigns take more than just Chinese forms. Pro-Beijing actors have been discovered carrying out malicious activities in a range of countries, languages, and platforms. The Freedom House’s annual survey of internet freedom—“Freedom on the Net”—uncovered evidence of electoral interference by the CCP in 26 different countries. According to Sarah Cook of the Freedom House, “the CCP presides over one of the world’s most repressive regimes and an economy second only to that of the United States. If it invests heavily in this new approach to international influence, it will pose enormous challenges to democratic governments, technology firms, and internet users”, meaning large investments in AI to generate massive amounts of content. These disinformation efforts accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic, converging efforts with other malicious actors such as Russia to create disinformation narratives revolving around the United States and the pandemic. The goal of these narratives was to highlight the ‘failures’ of democracy, such as casting doubt that the virus came from China and that it had originated in the U.S. military. Bots on social media and messaging platforms amplified rumors of a mandated nationwide lockdown and the U.S. government deploying troops to deescalate the racial protests across the country. While these campaigns were mildly successful, as a new actor China’s disinformation is more simplistic and therefore easier to expose. However, joint cooperation with an experienced disinformation actor such as Russia begins to transform China’s tactics to mimic Russia’s. 

Russia and China share a goal in disinformation: undermine liberal democratic institutions. Both countries have experience in electoral interference, such as Russia with the 2016 U.S. presidential election, and China in 2018 and 2020 in Taiwanese local and presidential elections. These countries work in cohort, and their cooperation has grown significantly in the wake of COVID-19. Their intention is to exploit the openness of democracies’ cyberspace in their respective regions—Europe and Asia. This alliance does not come as a surprise. The narratives of Russia and China continue to overlap on a global scale, and amplify their symbiotic relationship of authoritarian systems. The two countries share their technologies and continue to learn from each other, thus rapidly becoming a significant threat to democracies internationally. 

DEFENSE

This report will focus on the defense tactics of two democratic-based countries: the United Kingdom and Sweden. 

The United Kingdom has been subject to the of disinformation tactics of Russia. In 2017, the U.K. electoral commission investigated Russian influence in the 2016 Brexit campaign and the 2017 elections. In 2018, the National Security Capability Review captured more malign Russian behavior on U.K. platforms, thus kickstarting the 2018 Russian Doctrine. The goal of this doctrine was to widen diplomatic efforts with other countries also victimized by disinformation, and fed into the U.K. Defend Democracy Program of 2019. The focus was on building resilience, and limiting the supply of disinformation through exposing, countering, and punishing mal-actors. The U.K. analyzed previous Russian tactics to apply lessons-learned to combating future disinformation activities. The Cabinet’s office developed a Rapid Response Unit (R.R.U.) to further prevent the spread of disinformation. The Cabinet Office allowed the R.R.U. to take all actions necessary to protect the U.K. right before or immediately following a major political decision or election. Outside of the Cabinet Office, the U.K. government as a whole seeks to strengthen their relationship with the private sector in an effort to work collaboratively on dismantling disinformation. The Online Harms White Paper from 2019 specifically outlined enhanced measures such as a code of ethics, the ability to launch legal action, and requirements to prove sources of information on social media companies. The U.K. believes that a strong cooperation between the government and private sector social media companies is necessary to assess disinformation tactics. Finally, the U.K. focused on the resilience of their citizens, developing awareness campaigns such as “Don’t Feed the Beast”. They strive to enhance media literacy nationally, running digital literacy campaigns aimed not only at the public domain, but politicians as well. 

In 1940, Sweden established an information agency to combat un-Swedish propaganda during the Cold War. Today, prompted by Russian influence in 2016 general elections, Sweden has developed various disinformation defense tactics. The Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency conducts threat assessments of foreign actors and campaigns, and publish reports for public exposure and consumption. Sweden makes it a priority to prepare for, and defend against, disinformation campaigns and foreign influence operations preceding elections. The Swedish Civil Contingencies Agency also focuses on developing handbooks to educate police and local election authorities about the reality of disinformation and the threat it poses. The Swedish government works with electoral and police authorities to conduct efforts countering disinformation such as forged news stories. As of 2018, Sweden has taken major actions to secure their political environment. Their new plan to protect their elections involved allotting approximately 6.7 million USD dollars (60 million Swedish krona) to improve resistance to disinformation. This included raising awareness to Swedish political parties and citizens about the issue, and bringing in representatives from Swedish media and social media platforms to discuss these issues with the public sector. In August of 2018, Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Loven created a committee to investigate a potential psychological defense unit against disinformation. This unit is still active today, with the former police director appointed to lead its operations in May of 2020. The Swedish government also invested 1.5 million USD in creating a new online platform designed to prevent the spread of false information with an algorithm to perform auto-fact checking. The State Media council has also focused on educating the public sector through new teaching materials implemented in Swedish classrooms to improve visual media literacy regarding false news and propaganda. These defense efforts have been successful, in that the Strategic Dialogue and Institute of Global Affairs at the London School of Economics has found no clear evidence of coordinated disinformation influence, or bot tactics, during the last two Swedish general elections. 

The United States has been subject to attempts to undermine the democratic process, as mentioned previously with information surrounding the 2016 Presidential election—as outlined in the Mueller Report V.— and, more recently, COVID-19. However, it is arguable that not enough is being done to prevent the spread of disinformation, specifically in the proceedings of the 2020 Presidential election. As seen in the defense tactics of the U.K. and Sweden, it is critical that governments, social media companies, and citizens work together in investing in long-term resilience. While democracies should not turn to censorship of platforms, effective regulatory solutions that other democratic governments have implemented should be assessed for possible implementation in the United States. The U.S. government should begin to enforce transparency standards for all media platforms and develop rapid response teams like the U.K.. As of today, the disinformation focus for the U.S. has revolved around election periods—as election interference from foreign entities is illegal—which while those periods are important, it does not cover the scope of the true threat. Within the Executive Branch of the U.S. government, the Global Engagement Center (G.E.C.)—which is a part of the State Department—focuses on countering disinformation through the Public Diplomacy Bureau. Their tactics include funding research to counter-disinformation tactics and to develop new technologies useful for counter-disinformation efforts. The Department of Defense funds the G.E.C. through the National Defense Authorization Act. A Foreign Interference Task Force was established in Oct. 2017 by the Federal Bureau of Investigation to address threats of disinformation, however little has been noted to come out of this. Within the Legislative Branch, Congress has added provisions to the 2019 National Defense Authorization Act to counter disinformation efforts. This included establishing a new position in the National Security Council responsible for countering foreign malicious interference. In Oct. of 2017, the Honest Ads Act required platforms to identify political advertisements as such. However, this act could more effective in combatting Russian-placed advertisements with misleading information. Additionally, political ads make up a small portion of the industry therefore representing a minuscule portion of disinformation. The Senate introduced the Data Protection Act of 2018, which outlined responsibilities of providers of information, however the act was not re-introduced to the new Congress—although it has been passed in the U.K.. Congress has also held hearings with social media company executives, however they have not provided specific steps or focus in assessing the problem to these executives.