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Kremlin officials have been “directly” involved in co-ordinating disinformation efforts aimed at achieving Russia’s geopolitical goals and undermining its Western opponents
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April 13, 2022 • 11 hours ago • 3 minutes reading • 240 comments Members of the Canadian Army during the Crystal Arrow 2022 exercise on March 7, 2022 in Adazi, Latvia. Photo by Paulius Peleckis / Getty Images
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OTTOVA – Russia is spreading fake photos, falsely claiming that the Canadian military is fighting on the front line in Ukraine, according to the digital spy agency of our country.
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The Security Service of the Communications (CSE) said on Wednesday that it was part of a new disinformation campaign by Russia targeting Canada.
Kremlin officials have been “directly” involved in co-ordinating disinformation efforts aimed at achieving Russia’s geopolitical goals and undermining its Western opponents, according to recently declassified information published on social media by the CSE.
Recently, CSE says that Russia has not only used state and local media sources to spread misinformation, but has also increased its influence among “non-state, pro-Russian” voices that reach millions of people, namely on social media.
“The Kremlin’s efforts to manipulate the global audience are evolving through various communication platforms, which often include anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, anti-LGBTQ + material, anti-immigrant comments, anti-globalist sentiment and QAnon content,” the CSE warned. The statement did not mention any of these platforms.
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Russia is also spreading misinformation through state-controlled online publications, deliberately designed to look and sound just like legitimate media.
CSE declined to provide the names of retail outlets, social media pages or online influencers it found to be spreading Russian misinformation and misinformation, citing operational security concerns.
But Russia’s efforts are now also being deliberately targeted at Canada, as it is trying to misrepresent that NATO and Canadian troops are actively stationed in Ukraine to fight Russian troops invading their western neighbor.
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This is happening through fake stories planted in Russian-backed publications.
“This included a false account of the presence of Canadian forces in the Donbass region, which was in line with the news of the arrival of Canadian forces in Ukraine to secure the Canadian embassy in Kyiv,” CSE said, citing the events of one week. previously. Putin began the invasion of Ukraine on February 24.
But the Cyber Defense Agency also found that the Kremlin had ordered these publications to publish “doctoral” images of CAF members on the front line fighting Russia in Ukraine.
In other cases, the publications claim that the Canadian military has committed war crimes, although none of them are actually located in Ukraine.
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CSE declined to provide examples of forged photos to warn Canadians of counterfeit images, again citing operational security concerns.
But spokesman Evan Koronevsky said some examples came from planned future Russian disinformation campaigns, which the CSE had learned in advance through secret intelligence reports.
“We believe it is worth highlighting both Russia’s planned and ongoing disinformation activities related to their illegal and unjustified invasion of Ukraine,” Koronevsky said in an email.
“Russia’s disinformation activities are not focused solely on the Ukraine-Russia geographical area,” he added. “Rather, they are aimed at both Russian and Ukrainian-speaking audiences around the world, including Canada.
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Canada’s spy agencies have repeatedly warned that Russia is one of the biggest supporters of cyber threats against the country. They also say Russia is an “extremely capable threat”, known for encouraging disinformation campaigns to pursue its interests and deter its opponents.
The latest information from CSE comes after the first warnings two weeks ago that there are numerous Russian disinformation campaigns that have reached the ears of Canadians since the beginning of the war, and is likely to increase.
Examples included fake Russian stories about Ukrainians and anti-war protesters in Russia.
For example, CSE said it had found evidence that Russia had promoted false stories that Ukrainians “exhumed the bodies of dead soldiers, women and children” and then hid the evidence via mobile cremation devices.
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Two weeks ago, the CSE also warned: “We have seen Russia’s efforts to promote stories that falsely categorize Russian protesters and citizens who oppose the invasion as supporting neo-Nazis and genocide.
The agency concluded that Russia is not surprisingly spreading a false media story that its invading forces are attacking only military targets in Ukraine. This is an unsubstantiated statement that Russian officials have repeatedly insisted on at the UN, as well as in interviews around the world.
On Tuesday, the mayor of Mariupol, a Ukrainian city that has seen the fiercest fighting with Russian troops since the February 24 invasion, estimated the civilian casualties at 21,000.
• Email: cnardi@postmedia.com | Twitter: ChrisGNardi
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