Topic: Influence Operations

China, Department of Homeland Security

(U//FOUO) DHS Report: Chinese Municipal Government Publishing Anti-US Social Media Content With Limited Reach

A People’s Republic of China (PRC) municipal government-controlled media outlet is very likely directing a cluster of English-language, coordinated inauthentic Twitter accounts that posted content denigrating the United States (see graphics). The cluster of accounts, which we have dubbed SPICYPANDA, has been active from at least January 2021 and has published sophisticated content, but it failed to grow a follower base thus far. DHS attributed SPICYPANDA to the municipal media entity Chongqing International Communications Center (CICC) based on its leadership’s creation of SPICYPANDA’s anti-US messaging campaign, its overt ties to a website promoted by the accounts, and its Western social media messaging accolades and capabilities.

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Department of Homeland Security

(U//FOUO) DHS Bulletin: Online Foreign Influence Snapshot August 2022

We judge that narratives driven by Chinese, Iranian, and Russian state media, and proxy websites linked to these governments, often involve fact-based articles as well as editorials; these publications may include misinformation, disinformation, or factual but misrepresented information. This monthly “Snapshot” compiles English-language narratives, which we assess are intended for US and Western audiences, and highlights both consistent trends and emergent messaging, which we assess to reveal foreign actors’ changing influence priorities. We judge that, typically, China uses state and proxy media—including US-based outlets—to try to shape diaspora conduct and US public and leadership views; Iran state media manipulates emerging stories and emphasizes Tehran’s strength while denigrating US society and policy; and Russia uses both state and proxy media to amplify narratives seeking to weaken Washington’s global position relative to Moscow’s.

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Department of Homeland Security

(U//FOUO) DHS Bulletin: Moscow’s Invasion of Ukraine Impeding Reach of Russian State Media in the West

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has spurred Western governments, social media companies, and individuals to limit or disengage from Russian state media outlets, likely degrading many outlets’ ability to directly message to Western audiences through 2022. This Western response impedes the ability of critical elements of Russia’s influence ecosystem to recruit and retain culturally adept media talent, shape in-country reporting, maintain a perception of media independence, and generate revenue. These setbacks affect multiple facets of RT’s and Sputnik’s operations, hampering the prospects for a speedy reconstitution of their Western-facing efforts. These actions, and others being considered by Western countries, go well beyond previous efforts to counter Moscow’s use of its state media outlets to spread mis-, dis-, and malinformation (MDM), such as deplatforming, foreign agent registration, and social media labeling of content.

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U.S. Army

U.S. Army Techniques Publication: Chinese Tactics

ATP 7-100.3 describes Chinese tactics for use in Army training, professional education, and leader development. This document is part of the ATP 7-100 series that addresses a nation-state’s military doctrine with a focus on army ground forces and tactical operations in offense, defense, and related mission sets. Other foundational topics include task organization, capabilities, and limitations related to military mission and support functions. ATP 7-100.3 serves as a foundation for understanding how Chinese ground forces think and act in tactical operations.

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Department of Homeland Security

(U//FOUO) DHS Bulletin: Iranian Influence Efforts Primarily Use Online Tools to Target US Audiences, Remain Easily Detectable for Now

We assess that Iran likely will continue to rely primarily on proxy news websites and affiliated social media accounts to attempt sustained influence against US audiences, while we expect intermittent, issue-specific influence attempts via other means (e.g., e-mails). We base this assessment on Iran’s actions since at least 2008 to build and maintain vast malign influence networks anchored by proxy websites, as well as Iran’s attempts to find new avenues to re-launch established malign influence networks after suspension. Tehran employs a network of proxy social media accounts and news websites that typically launder Iranian state media stories (stripped of attribution), plagiarize articles from Western wire services, and occasionally pay US persons to write articles to appear more legitimate to US audiences.

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Department of Justice

Department of Justice Report on the Investigation into Russian Interference in the 2016 Presidential Election

The Internet Research Agency (IRA) carried out the earliest Russian interference operations identified by the investigation-a social media campaign designed to provoke and amplify political and social discord in the United States. The IRA was based in St. Petersburg, Russia, and received funding from Russian oligarch Yevgeniy Prigozhin and companies he controlled. The IRA later used social media accounts and interest groups to sow discord in the U.S. political system through what it termed “information warfare.” The campaign evolved from a generalized program designed in 2014 and 2015 to undermine the U.S. electoral system, to a targeted operation that by early 2016 favored candidate Trump and disparaged candidate Clinton. The IRA’s operation also included the purchase of political advertisements on social media in the names of U.S. persons and entities, as well as the staging of political rallies inside the United States. To organize those rallies, IRA employees posed as U.S. grassroots entities and persons and made contact with Trump supporters and Trump Campaign officials in the United States. The investigation did not identify evidence that any U.S. persons conspired or coordinated with the IRA. Section II of this report details the Office’s investigation of the Russian social media campaign.

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Office of the Director of National Intelligence

Director of National Intelligence Cyber Threats to Elections Lexicon

This reference aid draws on CTIIC’s experience promoting interagency situational awareness and information sharing during previous significant cyber events—including cyber threats to elections. It provides a guide to cyber threat terms and related terminology issues likely to arise when describing cyber activity. The document includes a range of cyber-specific terms that may be required to accurately convey intelligence on a cyber threat event and terms that have been established by relevant authorities regarding technical infrastructure for conducting elections.

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Maryland

Applied Physics Laboratory Paper: The Need for Intelligence Community Sponsored Influence Research

Military Information Support Operations (MISO) is a critical capability in contemporary conflict. Its success depends upon the application of social and behavioral science to analyze target audiences, craft messages, and measure the outcome of their dissemination (Spitaletta, 2013). Recent operational experience has exposed weaknesses in US capability that require redoubled effort to conduct research on the mechanisms and methods of influence and their effective application. In particular, the US needs to better understand the doctrines of adversaries and to develop countermeasures against them. The modern Russian manifestation of information confrontation, often attributed to Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces Valery Gerasimov, adapts historical Russian and Soviet tactics of maskirovka (surprise, camouflage, concealment, mimicry, disinformation, and deceptive maneuver) in the contemporary information environment (Thornton, 2015). These approaches are a combination of not only overt military but also covert intelligence tactics that, when executed by disciplined professionals, can achieve a variety of economic and geopolitical effects (Pacepa & Rynchlak, 2013).

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Department of Defense, Department of Homeland Security, Joint Chiefs of Staff

Joint Staff Strategic Multilayer Assessment: Influence in an Age of Rising Connectedness

In the pluralized, multipolar world, in which military and economic sources of power are widely distributed and technologies are making nation states increasingly more porous, the US and its partners face significant challenges on how best to adapt and thrive in a period of revolutionary changes. These factors may change the way US analysts, planners, and operators evaluate approaches in order to affect and direct the outcomes of military operations. To date, such courses of actions to a large extend have focused on compelling adversaries through the threat or application of force to achieve victory (i.e., “control”). In this changing geopolitical/technical landscape, it is increasingly clear that the DOD needs complement “control” with an explicit focus upon “influence” factors and forces that produce desired behavioral outcomes across complex and intermeshed human and technical systems.

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