Eric Tucker
WASHINGTON (AP) — A Russian government-backed online propaganda campaign that spread disinformation and used artificial intelligence in the United States has been disrupted, the Justice Department said Tuesday, after seizing nearly 1,000 fake social media accounts.
Officials said the operation was part of an ongoing effort to stoking discord in the United States by creating fictitious social media profiles that purport to belong to legitimate users but are actually designed to advance Russian government objectives, including spreading disinformation about the war with Ukraine.
According to U.S. officials, the plot was hatched in 2022 by a senior editor at Russian state-run media outlet RT, which is registered with the Justice Department as a foreign agent. The scheme was supported and funded by the Russian government, with officers from Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) heading a private intelligence agency that spread disinformation through social media.
An email to RT was not immediately responded to on Tuesday.
The so-called social media bot farm debacle comes as U.S. officials sound the alarm about the potential for AI technology to influence U.S. elections and as concerns continue that foreign influence campaigns by hostile powers could shape the opinions of unsuspecting voters, such as Russia’s elaborate plot to disrupt the 2016 presidential election through a massive but hidden social media trolling campaign that was also aimed at helping Republican Donald Trump defeat Democrat Hillary Clinton.
“Today’s action marks the first time we have disrupted a Russian-backed generative AI-powered social media bot farm,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a statement. “Russia used this bot farm to spread AI-generated foreign disinformation and to expand its AI-assisted operations in an effort to undermine our Ukrainian partners and influence geopolitical views in the Russian government’s favor.”
According to the Department of Justice, among the fake posts was a video posted by someone claiming to be a Minneapolis, Minnesota resident that showed Russian President Vladimir Putin saying that the regions of Ukraine, Poland and Lithuania were “gifts” given to those countries for liberating them from Russian forces during World War II.
As part of the disruption operation, the Department of Justice seized two domain names and 968 accounts on social media platform X, formerly known as Twitter.
The FBI and Cyber National Mission Force also worked with the Canadian Cyber Security Centre and Dutch law enforcement agencies to develop a joint cybersecurity advisory on social media bot farms.
