Thread by @ZarinaZabrisky

🚨🚨🚨Kremlin trolls’ activity: unprecedented high after a short break.

They masquerade as authentic X users; gaslight; amplify disnfo; confuse; etc

Time for a refresher on their tactics: #Kremlin propaganda playbook. 🧵w @BylineTimes

1. Pushing Kremlin Narratives->…

1. Pushing Kremlin Narratives
The Kremlin has been working  on creating a new “post-Western world order” narrative (Western countries and institutions no longer enjoying the same amount of power and influence they once did.

Major Kremlin narratives include negative narratives:

->anti-elite,
->anti-EU,
->anti-NATO,
->promoting a danger discourse (the rising extremist, migrant and Islamic terrorism threat)

and positive narratives:

->Russia and Putin as saviours of traditional values.

2. 2. Amplifying Extreme Voices

One of the Kremlin network’s most used tactics, with a variety of far-right activists, conspiracy theorists and extremists featured as commentators on its media outlets, say, guest speakers on on RT(Russia Today)

The types of groups and opinions these extreme voices are meant to: “Encourage all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements — extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes.”

3. 🔴 Rapid Fire Conspiracy/Overload

This method promotes an overflow of images of violent protests, vandalism, fire, injuries, deaths intended to  shock the nervous system and cause stress in the target audience.

🔴 Repetition of triggering words and images, rapid switching of stories and inconsistency are intended to result in depression, panic, fear and confusion.
During global information campaigns large amounts of conflicting information disorient the target audience.

🔴 The programmes deliberately create an atmosphere of danger and crisis.

With sufficient exposure, PTSD symptoms develop and cause the inability to think critically and act rationally.

The propagandists offer solutions at the time of perceived crisis.

🔴 Physiological changes to the brain alter individual and collective behaviour. 

The difference between the coverage by RT et al and most international news outlets: the volume of disturbing coverage designed to overwhelm and the deliberate strategy of audience manipulation.

4. Influence by Suggestion

Suggestion is used to target groups that lack critical thinking, such as the very religious, conformists, youth, and people in a state of panic, fear or stress. Using the “authority aura” effect, recognized leaders deliver emotionally charged speeches

Group environments, such as rallies and online forums, create the effect of “psychological contagion” and help to consolidate people around the ideas presented.

5. 5. Influence by Persuasion

Targets groups prone to thinking critically; a special focus on leaders and decision makers in society. This method uses logic, comparisons, arguments, multiple POVs, sociological polls and statistics. reporting is selective, omitting key facts.

6. 🔴 The 60/40 Method

Invented by Goebbels, the theory: if 60% of coverage is objective and reported to establish trust, 40% injects the disinformation at critical moments, taking advantage of the trust that’s been established to convince the audience. The proportion may vary

7. Trolling people that Russia perceives as its opponents in the West is long established ploy across forums, social networks, portals, chat rooms and news sites. This includes aggressive, mocking or abusive messages.

Trolls can cause significant damage:

spoil online public discussions,

spread harmful or destructive ideas,

destroy a sense of mutual trust in a community and discredit opponents.

🔴 10. Repetition

One of the basic and most effective methods of propaganda

The tireless repetition of the same statements, so that people get used to them and begin to accept them, relying not on critical thinking, but on faith mechanisms.

🔴 Disinformation is spread via seemingly unrelated sources and echo chambers to create credibility and an effect of omnipresence.

The methods below all use repetition to achieve this effect.

11. Positive Image Engineering

This involves creating a positive image of politicians or parties, in order to popularize Russia’s foreign and domestic policy agenda within foreign audiences.

🔴 12. Rotten Herring

This propaganda technique prompts a direct association between a person, group or institution and a scandalous accusation.

The sequence can be the following: first, a false accusation is circulated on social media.

Then, bots and trolls push the false accusation through related hashtags, for example.

the mainstream media reports the accusation as a story, which is then echoed by many outlets.

A public discussion ensues.

Experts, prominent public figures, laymen join in with opinions.

After a certain number of repetitions, a negative emotional response is formed about the person, group or institution being falsely accused.

Even if the fake is debunked, the negative association with the object of the accusation remain, just like the smell of rotten herring.

🔴 13. The Big Lie

This tactic is similar to the rotten herring technique, but in this case the fabricated narrative must have monstrous proportions.

14. Rumour

Rumours can significantly enhance certain stereotypes among the target population groups.
“Spetz-propagandists classify rumours into categories such as absolutely false; unreliable w/elements of credibility; plausible and authentic rumors w/elements of improbability

Rumours are also divided into categories by their emotional origin: rumour-desire; rumour-scare; aggressive-rumour.

Rumours are released at certain intervals (10-12 days), and are designed using certain rules, like layering.”

15. Half-Truths

Only reporting part of the truth in a ploy to mislead the audience and fit the Kremlin narrative is illustrated by how RT emphasizes negative events in the West, ignoring positive developments, while hardly covering or criticising the Russian government.

🔴 16. False Equivalence
This involves comparing two or more things that appear to be logically equivalent, but in fact are not.

🔴 17. Gaslighting

Gaslighting makes the opponent doubt reality and facts.

Another form of gaslighting concerns Russia’s self-declared information war.

The Russian government has accused the West of conspiracy — “orchestrated campaigns […]

aimed at discrediting the Russian press” with the aim of “suppressing the voice of the Russian media.”

You can find examples and more details on my article for @BylineTimes published in 2020.

The article has a story: in 2019, I worked for Avaaz to produce a report on Kremlin propaganda. A group of journalists worked for months; produced a report….

bylinetimes.com/2020/03/04/big…

@BylineTimes …exposing the structure and MO of the Russian propaganda. On seeing the report, Avaaz chose not to publish it. Since we signed NDA, none of us could publish it. I managed to get this part released.

In 2024, RT is still broadcasting in the EU.