UNCOVERED: How two information portals - OneWorld.press & ObservateurContinental.fr - hide their ties to InfoRos – a news agency previously linked to Russian military intelligence (GRU) according to reports by @washingtonpost and @stanfordio (1/n) disinfo.eu/publications/h…
In March 2020, we stumbled across an article from the French website “Observateur Continental” repropagating the false claim from the US law professor Francis Boyle about “COVID-19 being a perfect bioweapon”. (2/n) lemonde.fr/les-decodeurs/… 
Created in April 2019, ObservateurContinental.fr presents itself as an “independent and non-profit information portal”. There are no mentions of any editorial leadership nor information about the ownership structure. (3/n)
Looking at the public domain registration, we found that the Russian news agency InfoRos is listed as the “technical contact” for ObservateurContinental.fr. (4/n)
As our report shows, we were also able to demonstrate that some of the first pieces published by Observateur Continental in April 2019 were French translations of articles produced by InfoRos in Russian. (5/n)
The website’s editorial leadership is unclear. For example, the exact same interview has been published twice on the website:
- In the first one, “InfoRos” was mentioned as the interviewer (by mistake);
- the second one only mentions “Observateur Continental”. (6/n)
- In the first one, “InfoRos” was mentioned as the interviewer (by mistake);
- the second one only mentions “Observateur Continental”. (6/n)
Another interesting detail: when the page you are trying to reach on Observateur Continental cannot be found on their server, a 404-error message appears in Russian. perma.cc/4YEA-H5XQ (7/n)
While Observateur Continental remains a rather small media outlet, we discovered that its articles are repeatedly reproduced on alternative media outlets and conspiracy websites with a much larger audience. (8/n)
For example, we found 184 articles on the French conspiracy website ReseauInternational.net & more than 50 articles on Mondialisation.ca (FR-speaking version of the Canadian conspiracy website GlobalResearch.ca), which had originated from Observateur Continental (9/n)
We also discovered that some stories from Observateur Continental were amplified all over Europe. For instance, an article linking NATO to the outbreak of COVID-19 in Europe was translated and used as a source by some controversial Czech and Slovak websites. (10/n)
According to our findings, Observateur Continental proactively looked for “partners” to spread its content. On the French reinformation website Adoxa, some articles were presented as “in partnership with Observateur Continental”. (11/n)
In the comments section of the French blog “lesmoutonsenragés.fr”, its founder also explained that they regularly reproduce content from Observateur Continental “at the request” of its owners. (12/n)
Interestingly, we identified two main contributors to Observateur Continental, Olivier R. (71 articles) and Mikhail G.E (62 articles), who previously worked for media outlets such as Sputnik or Novorossia. (13/n)
Observateur Continental has also been continuously running ads on Facebook that have not been labelled as related to social or political issues. (14/n)
Investigating the source code of ObservateurContinental.fr, we discovered a rather unusual piece of code: “forms-base-el—input”. (15/n)
Using the publicwww search engine, we could only find this specific code on ObservateurContinental.fr, Russian websites openly managed by InfoRos, and OneWorld.press. (16/n)
Deepening our investigation into source codes, we identified another specific piece of code on OneWorld.press named “anonseslistblock”, which appears only on similar Russian-based websites ran by InfoRos. (17/n)
Going further, we also discovered that Observateur Continental and One World have similar media directories, containing evidence of links between both websites and Gazeta-Star.ru – a local Russian media tied to InfoRos. (18/n)
One World has already been flagged by @EUvsDisinfo. However, no links with InfoRos were previously disclosed. More information here: euvsdisinfo.eu/one-world-one-… (19/n)
We found other similarities between One World and Observateur Continental:
- a “non-profit entity”;
- no disclosure of ownership or editorial leadership, and
- their content is often republished on similar websites (e.g. reseauinternational.net, globalresearch.ca). (21/n)
- a “non-profit entity”;
- no disclosure of ownership or editorial leadership, and
- their content is often republished on similar websites (e.g. reseauinternational.net, globalresearch.ca). (21/n)
One World also ran ads on Facebook, targeting the Indian population with divisive messages on China-India relations. (22/n)
Here is a summary of the technical links between ObservateurContinental.fr, OneWorld.press and InfoRos. (23/n)
Both websites hide their links with InfoRos. In December 2018, an article from @washingtonpost presented InfoRos as “a front organization for the GRU unit 54777”.(24/n) washingtonpost.com/world/europe/h…
A report called “Assessing GRU Online Operations” from @stanfordio also highlighted that Facebook attributed a suspended page named “Victory for Peace”, managed by InfoRos, to the GRU in 2015. (25/n) fsi-live.s3.us-west-1.amazonaws.com/s3fs-public/po…
What we think is interesting here is that the strategy we observed resembles the one described by @Stanfordio: “achieve influence by feeding its narratives into the wider mass-media ecosystem with the help of think tanks and affiliated websites”. (26/n) fsi.stanford.edu/news/potemkin-…
Also, this strategy “either did not view maximizing social audience engagement as a priority or did not have the wherewithal to do so. To the contrary, it appears to have designed its operation to achieve influence in other ways”. (27/n)
As explained in one of our recent blogposts, attribution is a complex task. In that regard, we encourage everyone to be careful before drawing definitive conclusions based on our findings. (28/n) disinfo.eu/publications/b…
Still, our report demonstrates that there is an extreme opacity around both InfoRos and those behind websites such as Observateur Continental and One World, which have been identified as often spreading disinformation. (29/n)
We are also aware of the sensitivity of this publication, and that it will probably be read through lenses ranging from "I see Russians everywhere" to "you are working for NATO". (30/n)
In this case, you will find our other OSINT investigations and studies on our website, which have covered a wide range of countries (India, Ukraine, Poland, Spain, France, and Cameroon) and topics (e.g. COVID-19). (31/n) disinfo.eu/publications
For French speakers, you can also read the piece written by @nextinpact who covered our investigation. (32/n) nextinpact.com/news/109064-le…
Final words about our investigation (33/n)
On a related matter, please have a look to this excellent investigation from @Graphika_NYC ⬇️
