Stoking Conflict by Keystroke: An Operation Run by IRA-Linked Individuals Targeting Libya, Sudan, and Syria
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Facebook announced the takedown of three separate networks that targeted communities across Africa. Facebook shared the assets with the Stanford Internet Observatory (SIO) and Graphika before they were suspended. SIO collaborated with colleagues at Graphika on two reports analyzing these networks. The first network consisted of 126 Pages, 16 Groups, 211 profiles, and 17 Instagram accounts affiliated with individuals with links to the past activity of the Internet Research Agency (IRA), an entity linked to Russian businessman Yevgeny Prigozhin. According to Facebook, the network involved operators in Russia, Libya, Egypt, Sudan, and Syria and targeted individuals in Libya, Sudan, and Syria. The operation also had a Twitter presence of approximately 30 accounts actively participating in the information operation. These accounts had several thousand followers — at least one had almost 12,000 followers — but the Twitter presence was much smaller than that on Facebook. The second network is also linked to Prigozhin, but was a distinct operation that primarily targeted the Central Africa Republic. The third is linked to the French military and targeted the Central African Republic and Mali. In a joint report on these two operations, Graphika and SIO found that each campaign tried to expose the other. This is not the first time Facebook has suspended Africa-based networks linked to Prigozhin. In addition to his ties to the IRA, which in March 2020 was found to be leveraging locals based in Ghana to target the US, Prigozhin has ties to the Wagner Group, a private military mercenary organization involved in security and combat operations in areas of strategic interest to Russia. These have included the Central African Republic, Madagascar, Libya, and numerous other countries in Africa. Prigozhin’s information operations have taken the form of grey propaganda operations, such as funding and taking a majority ownership in local news stations that subsequently began to air pro-Russian content, and fully covert operations involving fake social media accounts and front media properties. In October 2019, SIO and Facebook jointly investigated a network linked to Prigozhin that had been operating in Libya, Sudan, the Central African Republic, Madagascar, Mozambique, and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Some of the tactics observed in that operation — franchising Page ownership to locals, creating front media organizations — were replicated in this most recent attempt.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Date modified | December 5, 2022 |
| Publication date | January 5, 2022; December 15, 2020 |
Creators/Contributors
| Author | Grossman, Shelby |
|---|---|
| Author | Ramali, Khadeja |
| Author | DiResta, Renée |
| Author | Beissner, Lucas |
| Author | Bradshaw, Samantha |
| Author | Healzer, William |
| Author | Hubert, Ira |
| Contributor | Thiel, David |
Subjects
| Subject | Facebook, takedown, IRA, Russia, Libya, Egypt, Sudan, Syria, Twitter |
|---|---|
| Genre | Text |
| Genre | Report |
Bibliographic information
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- User agrees that, where applicable, content will not be used to identify or to otherwise infringe the privacy or confidentiality rights of individuals. Content distributed via the Stanford Digital Repository may be subject to additional license and use restrictions applied by the depositor.
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial No Derivatives 4.0 International license (CC BY-NC-ND).
Preferred citation
- Preferred citation
- Grossman, S., Ramali, K., DiResta, R., Beissner, L., Bradshaw, S., Healzer, W., and Hubert, I. (2020). Stoking Conflict by Keystroke: An Operation Run by IRA-Linked Individuals Targeting Libya, Sudan, and Syria. Stanford Digital Repository. Available at https://purl.stanford.edu/qg973fs1649
Collection
Stanford Internet Observatory, Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies
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- internetobservatory@stanford.edu
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