DISINFORMATIONHow the U.S. Can Counter Disinformation from Russia and China
Attempts by Russia, China, and other U.S. adversaries to spread dangerous false narratives need to be countered before they take root.
Disinformation campaigns can be a powerful tool to shape beliefs on matters of great geopolitical importance. Bad actors can deploy them against rivals to sow costly discord, create political uncertainty, and deepen divides within a community. Monitoring and “pre-bunking” even the most obscure claims is important because, if left unaddressed, their damage can be hard to undo, and in some cases, those false narratives can presage a real-life attack.
A Recipe for Disinformation
There are three steps to building an effective disinformation campaign: 1) craft an influential false narrative around an egregious lie; 2) amplify the false narrative across various channels using influence principles; and 3) obfuscate the origins of the lie.
A prime example is the Russian government’s false narrative that the United States has been developing bioweapons in Ukraine for years. Importantly, this narrative was among the earliest indicators that Russia intended to invade Ukraine. A 2022 Microsoft report [PDF] found that Russian disinformation operatives “pre-positioned” the false claim in November 2021, when it was featured on a YouTube channel operated by an American based in Moscow. When Russia invaded Ukraine three months later, Kremlin-operated news sites such as RT and Sputnik News referred to the pre-positioned report as an authoritative account that justified Russia’s invasion. This narrative has been debunked repeatedly, including by NewsGuard, a U.S.-based media watchdog whose analysts are specially trained to identify the spreading of false information. This disinformation campaign is similar to one the Soviet Union employed in 1980’s, which claimed that the United States developed HIV/AIDS as a bioweapon.
Build the False Narrative
A disinformation campaign relies on a false narrative that surrounds a lie with a sense of truth and taps into existing divides within a targeted community, which could be divisions over geopolitical issues, socioeconomic differences, or any theme that resonates. The narrative sounds believable because it has truthful elements and is associated with real-world events or people of authority. The false claim can resound with feelings of marginalization in the targeted audience.
