Fake videos by Russian propagandists aim to raise tensions ahead of election day

In a video posted Thursday on X, a man claiming to be a Haitian immigrant says he has already voted for Vice President Harris in Gwinnett County, Georgia, and is going to vote again in nearby Fulton County. Seated in what appears to be a van next to another alleged Haitian immigrant, he says they arrived in the US six months ago and have already become US citizens.

State and federal officials say the video was likely created by Russian propagandists trying to undermine confidence in the election.

“This is obviously fake and part of a disinformation effort. It is probably a production of Russian troll farms,” Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Thursday. On Friday, federal officials weighed in, saying they also believe the video was “fabricated” by Russian influencers.

“This Russian activity is part of a broader effort by Moscow to raise baseless questions about the integrity of US elections and to sow division among Americans,” the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Agency said in a statement. . joint statement.

The video is the latest hoax that researchers say matches the results of a Russian operation known as The storm-1516which is said to be generating a steady stream of fake material in the final days of voting. The operation is known for producing edited videos which they wash through online influencers and fake news outlets. He was linked to the notorious Clemson University Russian “Troll Factory”. which targeted the 2016 presidential elections.

In just the past two weeks, researchers at Clemson and Microsoft they linked Storm-1516 to a fake video purporting to be displayed ballots marked for former President Donald Trump destroyed in Pennsylvania and baseless allegations against the Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz. Federal officials also attributed those videos to Russia.

“I was immediately suspicious of this (Georgia) video, just seeing the style and the production value,” said Darren Linvill, co-director of Clemson University’s Media Forensics Hub, which first identified Operation Storm-1516 last year .

The subject also fits with Russian tactic to amplify existing divisive narratives of American voters, he said.

“This connects to existing stories that are being told about the Haitian community, about immigrants being used for the vote,” Linvill said. “The Russians understand these schisms and use them to spread their messages.”

The account that Linvill identified as the first to share the video on X has since been deleted. In a direct message exchange with NPR, the person who manages the account wrote, “I took it down because I wasn’t sure if it was 100% accurate and I don’t want to be responsible for wrong information.”

It’s unclear how the fake video from Georgia ended up on this X account. The account told NPR it saw the video on Telegram, but did not respond to follow-up questions.

The video continued to spread widely on social media, primarily on X, prompting Raffensperger to publicly call on X owner Elon Musk and leaders of other platforms to remove it.

“X has found these posts to be in violation of our Civic Integrity Policy and we are taking action against the posts,” said a spokesperson for X. Another X account that posted the Georgia video, which also posted other content linked to Storm-1516 , was suspended.

Facebook tags the video informing users that US intelligence officials said it was fabricated by Russian influence actors.

The successor to the IRA

In 2016, Russian agents working at Internet Research Agency in Saint Petersburg they gave him the identity of the Americans and posing as news sources on social media to push false and misleading stories to American voters.

The IRA was the creation Evgeny Prigoginethe Russian oligarch and former confidant of Russian President Vladimir PutinWHO he died in 2023. In a recent reportClemson identified connections between Storm-1516 and another group founded by Prigozhin in 2021 called the Russian Foundation for the Fight against Injustice.

“We think this is IRA 2.0. It’s the same people, the same network, it’s the same old property,” Linvill said.

Today, Linvill says Storm-1516 has refined some of the IRA’s methods. His videos sometimes appear on websites masquerading as news outlets, such as a site posing as a non-existent San Francisco television station that shared a staged video. accusing Harris of injuring someone in a 2011 hit-and-run. (There is no evidence the incident occurred.)

Some sites sharing the operation’s content are part of a network of websites masquerading as local U.S. news stations, which the company tracks misinformation. NewsGuard and the New York Times reported to be led by John Mark Dougan, a former Florida deputy sheriff who now lives in Moscow. Dougan denies working for the Russian government. However, a European intelligence agency obtained documents showing that he was working directly with Russian military intelligence, according to the report Washington Post.

Linvill says that Storm-1516 is also based on now real peoplerather than bots or fake accounts to spread their messages and videos.

He said it reflected both a change in Russian tactics and an environment in which many Americans are more receptive to claims of wrongdoing amid Trump’s continued attacks on election integrity.

“They put effort into building the network. They put in the effort to make these connections with real people,” Linvill said. “But it’s also true that people are now ready for (it). You can’t separate these things. The Russians have changed their tactics to conform to changes in our reality.”

As Election Day approaches, government officials are warning Americans to be on alert for more attempts by Russia to target confidence in the election.

“We are very concerned about how our foreign adversaries will specifically target after Election Day, during that period of time when election officials across the country are doing the incredibly important work of certifying official results,” a senior CISA official, who spoke to reporters. on condition of anonymity, he said Friday.

Linvill says he prepares for a new fraudulent video every day. “I’m sure they lined them up,” he said.

NPR’s Miles Parks contributed reporting.

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