Come for the memes, stay for the Kremlin propaganda - Bait-and-switch disinformation

Come for the memes, stay for the Kremlin propaganda Bait-and-switch disinformation campaigns in Francophone Africa July 2023 1 Come for the memes, stay for the Russian propaganda Introduction In the quest for global influence amidst its illegal war on Ukraine, the Kremlin’s interest in Africa is higher than ever before. [...] 3 Come for the memes, stay for the Russian propaganda Identification and analysis of the coordinated network Behavioural patterns By applying a standard set of metrics used to identify changes in volume, engagement and exposure of content, we were able to conduct a quantitative analysis to identify hallmark characteristics of inauthentic behavior within individual pages in the network. [...] Mutual re-sharing of posts across pages in the network to amplify the combined exposure of the content, often happening within minutes after the original posts are published. [...] At the end of the “baiting” phase, the pages rapidly underwent a visual rebranding to appear as media outlets, including changing the page’s name, creating a new logo and uploading it as a profile photo, as well as changing the cover photo. [...] Figure 8: Pro-Russian video collages, branded with the logo H Figure 8: Identical visual branding used by the pages 10 Come for the memes, stay for the Russian propaganda Analysis of Meta’s mitigation efforts Meta’s policies explicitly prohibit the creation and use of fake or misleading accounts, spam and/or clickbait content that aims to mislead or deceive users and the use of artificial means to.