How the Spread of Disinformation affects the Russia-Ukraine War

Russia has been spreading disinformation to gain the upper hand in its years-long battle with Ukraine, according to Germany’s Federal Ministry of the Interior and Community. Authoritarian states like Russia have been using this tactic for decades to remain in power.

Disinformation is prevalent throughout the Russia-Ukraine War. Both sides have spread their narrative to gain a geopolitical advantage.

Victor Oleynik, an entrepreneur and former Russian journalist, said, “Governments across the political systems frequently employ this technique to influence public opinion, shape narratives, suppress dissent and legitimize their actions.”

The Kremlin has told the Russian people that the invasion of Ukraine was a “special military operation.” Meanwhile, Ukraine has used social media platforms to combat Russian narratives about the war.

“Manipulating public opinion generally is extremely easy, and a lot of psychological studies demonstrate that people are always more likely to believe ideas that seem widely supported by others,” Oleynik said.

A 1951 Asch Conformity Experiments study confirmed that 75% of people are likely to agree with the popular opinion..

Alexey Gorbachev was a former Voice of America journalist specializing in foreign policy and the Russia-Ukraine war. “In countries with oppressive regimes, like Russia or Ukraine, where there is military censorship, people would more likely trust disinformation, just because they have limited sources.”

As a former journalist, Oleynik recognized his role in spreading disinformation. “Unless you're a really good journalist, you're just sometimes part of the problem,” he said.

Russian government-run media outlets effectively spread disinformation to keep and garner support for their regime. REN TV is a government-owned media outlet that aligns with Russian President Vladimir Putin’s political ideologies.

Oleynik says there is a link between authoritarianism and spreading disinformation, but it is not limited to authoritarian states. 

It is hard to decipher disinformation because “The presence of disinformation, in particular, is often the blend of truth and falsehoods,” Oleynik said.

Russia and Ukraine have fought to make their narrative the main one throughout the war. War from the 20th to the 21st century has transcended from confrontational battles to proxy wars and information wars. 

“If you look into Russian or Ukrainian media outlets. It's an active battlefield, and the role in the battlefield is to win and defeat your enemy,” Oleynik said. “It's not to provide an objective truth, and that's exactly what it's been looking like.”

Ksenia Turkova is a former Russian journalist who worked for independent media in Russia and Ukraine. She noted the difference between journalists in both countries, “I’ve never seen any fear in Ukrainian journalists,” Turkova said. “I think it’s a cultural and historical thing in Ukraine. It was always fighting for itself throughout history.”

The methods of spreading disinformation have changed throughout the years.

“Government media or bloggers [used to] fake the story completely. But right now, it's changed. It's more about actual news, which is spread under a certain angle, with missing key aspects,” Gorbachev said.

Turkova recalled a key piece of disinformation at the beginning of the war when Russia bombed a maternity hospital in Mariupol. “There were two different women, and Russia was trying to say it was all staged because one was a makeup artist.”

Russian disinformation comes in all forms: visual, written, and audial. Although Turkova said  Russia is using a new form of disinformation, “They basically teach artificial intelligence to spread their narratives.”

Turkova has been affected by Russian disinformation even while living in the US as recently as one month ago. They did a fake interview with her after Voice of America was shut down, posing as a reputable Russian news outlet. Later, she found their published story mocking former Russian journalists called “Traitors: Why did they run out of money?”

“It’s not a very pleasant experience because you feel like you’ve been rejected by your country.”

Image courtesy of the Federal Ministry of the Interior of Germany