RUSINFORM SIGNED

Project "RUSINFORM" data sheet

The following table provides information about the project.

 Partnership

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 Project objective

Over the past decade, Russia’s ruling elites have massively stepped up their efforts to influ-ence media audiences abroad. Amongst others, Russia has been alleged to have sought to sway votes in Austria, France, Germany, Ukraine, and the US. This project’s overarching research ques-tion is: How, and with what consequences, have new Internet-based technologies contributed to the emergence of novel resources, techniques, and processes by which political elites in Moscow can influence media audiences abroad?

In order to address this question, a theoretical work package (WP4) will undertake the first major systematic effort to interrogate how much, or how little, we can leverage extant in-depth knowledge of former-Soviet foreign propaganda, conducted in the broadcast era, in order to make sense of Russia’s recent digitally-enabled efforts.

WP4 will be informed by three empirical WPs. They will scrutinize three heavily digitally-enabled elements of Russia’s recent efforts:

• WP1 will conduct the first in-depth study of the foreign online audiences who co-create and disseminate Russia-related content. • WP2 will produce pioneering research about how social media platforms function as key transmission channels that connect Russia’s domestic media with Russian-speaking audiences abroad. • WP3 will be the first study to scrutinize the role of the Kremlin-controlled search engine Yan-dex as a resource of foreign influence.

Methodologically, WP1-3 are highly innovative because they combine new computational methods (data mining, automated text analysis) with traditional methods (surveys, in-depth inter-views, grounded theory). In response to Russia’s recent efforts, countermeasures have been ushered in by a plurality of actors, including the EU, NATO, and NGOs. These actors will benefit immensely from the knowledge generated, which will enable them to enhance their initiatives to secure democratic elec-toral processes against undue informational interference.