The Russia watchPutin’s fear of democracy; Fancy Bear targets diplomats; Facebook weak filters, and more

What scares Vladimir Putin the most? It’s still democracy. (Daniel Hoffman, Cipher Brief)
President Donald Trump seized upon Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s 37-page indictment with a tweet that the Russians were laughing over their successful information war against the U.S. For President Vladimir Putin, espionage against what he and his Soviet predecessors call their “Main Enemy” is no laughing matter. Relentlessly focused on degrading U.S. institutions, Putin is deadly serious about the cyber warfare he is so effectively waging against us. Putin’s strategy is ruthlessly focused on shaping our political discourse by simultaneously supporting extreme, antithetical positions. There was no better example of this strategy than the Kremlin bots staging simultaneous post-election rallies in favor of Trump and protesting Trump’s election.

Trump has done nothing to stop Russia from meddling in the 2018 midterms (Alex Ward, Vox)
“You don’t just wait here and play defense, you also go out and stop this from happening again,” an expert said.

Report: Russia probed at least 7 states’ voter systems before the 2016 election (Jen Kirby, Vox)
Federal and state officials say there is no evidence votes were changed.

Follow the Russian natural gas (Brian E. Frydenborg, War is Boring)
If you want to understand Carter Page

State Department targeting Russia with anti-propaganda program (Jenna Lifhits, Weekly Standard)
Pentagon will transfer $40 million in funding for counter-messaging effort, a big chunk of which will go to fight Russian disinformation.

Mueller asking if Trump knew about hacked Democratic emails before release (Katy Tur and Carol E. Lee, NBC News)
Special counsel Robert Mueller’s team is asking witnesses pointed questions about whether Donald Trump was aware that Democratic emails had been stolen before that was publicly known, and whether he was involved in their strategic release, according to multiple people familiar with the probe.

Fancy Bear targeting North American, European diplomats (Dan Kitwood, Axios)
Fancy Bear, the believed-Russian espionage group thought to be behind the hacks of the Democratic National Committee and Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, appears to be targeting North American and European foreign affairs officials, including a European embassy in Moscow, according to a Palo Alto Networks report.

Facebook’s ad confirmation process won’t stop the Russians (Christopher Burgessm Security Boulevard)
Without a doubt, if you are on the advertising services side of the Facebook house you’ve been sitting in a kitchen with the oven on broil and all four burners on high—the kitchen is hot. The social network is being viewed by many as culpable in allowing the Russian intelligence services to use their advertising infrastructure in such a way as to cause considerable decisiveness within the U.S. electorate.