MAJOR UPDATE:
As I said before, the growth and use of AI in this election will show some very
nasty stuff, and now, well: Bingo!!! It’s here as seen in the excellent AP article
below (refer to the several links in the article below) proving my prediction
true with examples of Russian disinformation; AI stunts; and now this October
22 AP story headline (AP writer Melissa Goldin contributed to this
report). The original and recent article follows this update:
“Russia is behind viral
disinformation targeting Kamala Harris and now Tim Walz, intelligence official
says”
WASHINGTON (AP) — Groups in Russia created and helped spread viral
disinformation targeting Democratic vice presidential candidate Tim Walz,
a senior U.S. intelligence official said Tuesday.
The content, which includes baseless accusations about the
Minnesota governor’s time as a teacher, contains several indications that it
was manipulated, said the official with the Office of the Director of National
Intelligence (O/DNI).
Analysts identified clues that linked the content to Russian disinformation operations, said the official, who briefed reporters
on the condition of anonymity under rules set by the office of the director.
Digital researchers had already linked the video to Russia, but this announcement is the first time federal authorities have confirmed the connection. The disinformation targeting Tim Walz is consistent with Russian disinformation seeking to undermine the Democratic campaign of Vice President Kamala Harris and now Tim Walz, her running mate.
Russia also has spread disinformation aimed at stoking discord and division ahead of voting, officials said, and may seek to encourage violent protests after Election Day.
Two recent examples of disinformation:
(1). Last month, analysts at Microsoft revealed that a viral
video that baselessly claimed Kamala Harris left a woman paralyzed in a
hit-and-run accident 13 years ago was Russian disinformation.
(2). More recently, a video surfaced featuring a man
claiming to be a former student of Tim Walz’s who accused the candidate of
sexual misconduct years ago.
Private researchers at
firms that track disinformation, including NewsGuard,
already have concluded the video was fake and that the man in the footage isn’t
who he claimed to be. The AP contacted a former employer of the man whose
identity was used in the video. The employer, Viktor Yeliohin, confirmed the
man shown in the video was an impostor.
Some researchers have also
suggested the video may contain evidence that it was created using AI, but
federal officials stopped short of the same conclusion, saying only that the video
contained multiple indications of manipulation.
Russia, China and Iran also have sought to influence the election using online AI disinformation:
(1) Russia has targeted the Democratic campaign.
(2) Iran has gone after Republican Donald Trump with
disinformation as well as hacking into the former president’s campaign.
(3) China, meanwhile, has focused its influence efforts on
down-ballot races, and on general efforts to sow
distrust and democratic dissatisfaction.
Officials also said there are no indication that Russia,
China, or Iran are plotting significant attacks on election infrastructure as a
way to disrupt the outcome.
Jen Easterly, director of the Cyber Security & Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) said: “Improvements to election security mean there is no way any other foreign adversary will be able to alter the results.”
Note: Easterly, is a retired Army Colonel
who replaced Kris Krebs whom Trump fired one day after he said the 2020
election was fair and NOT stolen as Trump advocated then and still today as seen in this reminder.
The main original article follows from here:
“Exceptionally Long Post re: Disinformation spreader, John Dougan”
He is former American, but now is a Russian citizen in Moscow see site below
(edited and formatted to fit the blog). Dougan is a traitor and turn-coat
to the nation now serving as a Putin disinformation guru from Moscow.
What a story on Dougan’s ties and efforts to disrupt the 2024 election as a Russian citizen who got there via political asylum in 2016 as a runaway felon from Florida. Amazing story of a very sick man seen the video – just watch and listen to the video of the site owner, Steven Brill of Dougan broadcast below:
NewsGuard Technologies was founded in 2018 by
Steven Brill and L. Gordon Crovitz, who serve as co-CEOs – they track and ID disinformation
posters like John Dougan.
More info on Dougan:
His emergence as a weapon of the Kremlin’s propaganda war follows a troubled
life in the United States that included home foreclosures and bankruptcy. As a
law enforcement officer in Florida and Maine, he faced accusations of excessive
use of force and sexual harassment that resulted in costly lawsuits against the
departments he worked for. He still faces an arrest warrant in Florida on 21
felony charges of extortion and wiretapping that resulted from a long-running
feud with the sheriff of Palm Beach County.
Dougan is also a former
deputy sheriff in Palm Beach County, FL where he sent voters an email posing as
a county commissioner, urging them to oppose the reelection of the county’s
sheriff.
After a four-year stint in
the Marine Corps, Dougan became that former deputy police officer first in a
small force in Mangonia Park, FL, and then with the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s
Office from 2005 to 2009.
He later masqueraded online as a Russian tech worker with a
pseudonym to leak confidential information in violation of state law, fooling
officials in Florida. He also has posed as a fictional NYC heir he called
Jessica, tricking an adviser to the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office into
divulging improper conduct by the department.
Dougan said in a written response to questions for this
article, in which he confirmed his role in these episodes: “Boy, did he ever spill ALL of the beans.”
His subterfuges were a prelude to a more prominent and
potentially more ominous deception he has been conducting from Russia.
Dougan, 51, who sought and received political asylum after
he fled to Moscow is now a key player in Russia’s disinformation operations
against the West.
In 2016, when the Kremlin interfered in the U.S.
presidential election, an army of computer trolls toiled for hours to try to
fool Americans online.
Today, Dougan may be
accomplishing much of those same tasks by himself, according to U.S. and
European government officials and researchers from companies and organizations
that have tracked his activities since August.
Those groups include NewsGuard,
a company that reviews the reliability of news and information online; Recorded
Future, a threat intelligence company; and Clemson University’s Media Forensics
Hub.
Dougan has built an ever-growing network of more than 160
fake websites that mimic news outlets in the United States, Britain and France.
With the help of commercially available artificial intelligence tools, he has
filled the sites with tens of thousands of articles.
Interspersed among them are also bespoke fabrications that
officials in the United States and European Union have attributed to Russian
intelligence agencies or the administration of President Vladimir Putin.
Dougan’s outlets have been cited or referred to in news
articles or social media posts nearly 8,000 times, and seen by more than 37
million people in 16 languages, according to a report released from NewsGuard.
Two Examples:
1. The fakes recently included a fake San Francisco
Chronicle website that said Ukraine’s president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, had
smuggled 300 kilograms of cocaine from Argentina.
2. Another false narrative appeared last month in the sham
Chronicle and on another site, called The Boston Times, claiming that the CIA
was working with Ukrainians to undermine Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.
Dougan, in a series of
text exchanges and one telephone interview with The New York Times, denied
operating the sites. A digital trail of clues, including web domains and IP
addresses, suggests otherwise, the officials and researchers say.
A friend in Florida who
has known Dougan for 20 years, Jose Lambiet, also said that Dougan told him in
January that he had created the sites.
Steven Brill, a
founder of NewsGuard, which has spent months tracking Dougan’s work, said:
“He represents a massive incursion into
the American news ecosystem.”
Dougan’s activities from Moscow, where he fled in 2016 one
step ahead of the FL charges, continue to draw scrutiny from authorities in the
United States. For example: Last year, he impersonated an FBI agent in a
telephone call to Brill according to Brill.
Dougan, who acknowledged making the call in a text message
this week, had been angered by a NewsGuard report in February 2023 that
criticized YouTube for allowing videos parroting Russian propaganda about the
war in Ukraine, including some by Dougan himself.
The call prompted an FBI investigation that, according to
Brill, traced the call to Dougan’s telephone in Russia. According to news
reports and his own accounts, Dougan repeatedly clashed with superiors and
colleagues, facing numerous internal investigations.
Earlier, in 2009, Dougan moved briefly to Windham, ME to work
in another small-town police department. There he faced a complaint of sexual
harassment that resulted in his dismissal before he completed his probationary
period.
There also, Dougan started a website called WindhamTalk to
defend himself. The website foreshadowed others he would create, including one
devoted to the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office, PBSOTalk.
In February 2016, PBSOTalk
posted confidential information about thousands of police officers, federal
agents, and judges.
The next month, FBI agents
and local police officers searched his home, seizing all of his electronic
equipment.
Fearing arrest, he made
his way to Canada and caught a flight to Moscow where he sought political
asylum and has been there since.
He was indicted on the 21
Florida felony charges in 2017.
In April 2021, Dougan revived a website called DC Weekly and
published fake articles about the Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office.
According to a report in December 2021 by Clemson’s Media
Forensics Hub, the domain and IP address were shared by PBSOTalk and Dougan’s
personal website, as well as two marketing books he wrote in exile and a
security firm he operated, Falcon Eye Tech, which offered “offshore security
monitoring services.”
After Russia’s assault on
Ukraine began in 2022, his site carried articles about the war.
Then, in August 2023, the
site began to publish articles based on elaborate fabrications that the Western
government officials and disinformation researchers said came from Russia’s
propaganda units.
The baseless narratives
included claims that relatives or cronies of Ukraine’s leader secretly bought
luxury properties, yachts or jewelry, and that Prince Andrew, the brother of
King Charles III of Britain, had abducted and abused children during a secret
visit to Ukraine.
Dougan, became a Russian citizen in 2023, and he said in his
messages to the NY TIMES said he now makes a living by selling security devices
he designed for a manufacturer in China.
He denied being paid by
any Russian authorities, claiming he funds his activities himself. While
Dougan’s sites have focused on Russian narratives about the war in Ukraine, the
researchers and government officials say he has laid the foundation for
interference in the unusually large confluence of elections taking place around
the world this year.
From the diplomatic
service of the EU wrote in a report last month, in part: “This suggests a “risk of an expanded
operation scope in the near future, potentially targeting diverse audiences and
democratic systems in Europe and other Western nations for various strategic
objectives.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
My 2 Cents: Once again for “poorly educated that Trump said
he loves” that we all now call MAGA, I hope this reminder of the differences
between “misinformation vs. disinformation”
helps you improve your education level.
Here that refreshment:
Misinformation is information made
or placed by a simple mistake not covertly and not made with malice, intent,
or definite purpose – like a white or bold-face lie.
vs
Disinformation is information purposely placed with the full
intent to cause harm, disruption, distrust, and chaos. In more modern times it
is placed covertly to disrupt or topple established governments, competing political
systems around the globe for self-interests, and for political, military,
financial, or more devious purposes and gain.
The word “disinformation” is
the English transliteration of the Russian word: “дезинформация.”
That word was
derived from the former KGB’s “Black Propaganda Department” handbook
that shows how Joseph Stalin coined the term, even giving it a French-sounding
name and falsely claiming it had Western origin, that being a false statement itself.
Precise Russian use of the word began in the now defunct USSR’s “Special Disinformation Office” in 1923.
Example: Operation INFEKTION (Operation: Infection) also was an old Soviet
disinformation campaign to influence opinion that the U.S.
had invented and spread AIDS that many
believed.
A bit long post but a critical piece of information. Hope you agree.
Thanks for stopping
by.
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