"The purpose of this research is two-fold: first, to assess the effectiveness of the restrictions placed on Russian state-affiliated media by the European Union after the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine; second, to unearth potential circumvention methods and their success in enabling pro-Kr
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emlin content to reach European audiences. This report breaks down into two parts: firstly, an analysis of traffic from global and European audiences to all RT websites, as well as websites associated with Rossiya Segodnya, a media group affiliated with the Kremlin that operates various outlets, including Sputnik. For this, analysts conducted website forensics and collected website traffic data to identify all RT and Rossiya Segodnya domains and to understand who is still accessing their content and how. The second study explored how RT articles that negatively depict Ukrainians seeking refuge in Europe and elsewhere were made available through various means across the EU." (About this publication)
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"As the Russian invasion of Ukraine erupted, the country’s authorities declared a war on Western social media as well. In March, such social media giants as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram were blocked in Russia, giving their local competitor—named VK—a virtual monopoly in the country. Millio
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ns of Russian Facebook and Instagram users have flocked to this social network. Though VK may seem similar to Facebook, it is drastically different due to its proximity to the Russian government. The article examines the core peculiarities of VK and the risks its users may face, especially, in the context of war." (Abstract)
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"This paper will outline the technologies and mechanisms of Putin's information machine, how it operates during the war and the obstacles to anti-war propaganda among Russians. At the very end, we will offer some recommendations for confronting Putin's information machine at war, both of a general n
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ature and relating to specific groups of Russian society." (Page 3)
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"The publication analyzes the emerging trends of foreign authoritarian-state disinformation in the context of the war in Ukraine in a comparative manner focusing on 7 states of Southeast Europe (Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, North Macedonia, Montenegro and Albania). It examines
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the continuities and evolution in Russia’s strategies, channels and narratives for disseminating disinformation since the Kremlin’s invasion of Ukraine and the extent to which other foreign authoritarian states -Turkey, the Gulf states, Iran, have amplified Russian propaganda. The research further traces the personal and institutional pathways through which China has been able to establish its media foothold in Southeast European countries. The report offers policy recommendations for safeguarding democracy and media freedom in the Balkans against the ever-increasing pressures from authoritarianism." (Publisher description)
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"This volume explores the implications of digital media technologies for journalists’ professional practice, news users’ consumption and engagement with news, as well as the shifting institutional, organizational and financial structures of news media. Drawing on case studies and quantitative an
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d qualitative approaches, contributors address questions concerning: whether China is witnessing ‘disruptive’ or ‘sustainable’ journalism; if, and in what ways, digital technologies may disrupt journalism; and whether Chinese digital journalism converges with or diverges from Western experiences of digital journalism." (Publisher description)
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"Over the past decade, Vladimir Putin’s Russia has employed unorthodox foreign policy tools with increasing frequency, intensity, and success. Perhaps the most effective of these tactics has been the use of information warfare designed to affect decision-making in countries Russia considers to be
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its adversaries. In the target countries, these measures aim to destabilize civil society, erode trust in democratic institutions, and foster uncertainty among allies. If the United States and Europe hope to defend their economies, institutions, and identities, an immediate and effective policy response is required. To date, however, the United States and many of its European partners have struggled to develop policies that combat and counter Russian information warfare. The articles gathered here examine the tools that Russia has used against Ukraine, Poland, the United States, and the European Union, as well as the strategies that these countries have employed to combat Russian information warfare. The joint article by the four authors concisely summarizes the findings and proposes policy options by means of which the democratic countries of the West can address the challenges information warfare poses. The final article looks at Russia, examining controversies around the political role of the aggregator Yandex.news in prioritizing media news." (Introduction, page 2)
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"This report explores the social media habits of Iranian netizens and how the Islamic Republic is repressing the online space." (Publisher description)
"Täglich gibt es Berichte darüber, wie private Betreiber sozialer Medien sich problematischen Vorgaben autoritärer Herrscher beugen. Ob in Thailand, Kasachstan oder Russland, immer wieder werden als Teil von Content Moderation (CM) gezielt Inhalte entfernt oder Konten gelöscht, weil Regierungen
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sich durch Äußerungen in den sozialen Medien kritisiert fühlen. Diesen Einzelfällen liegt ein systemisches Problem von globaler Reichweite zugrunde. Die großen Betreiber sozialer Medien aus den USA bieten ihre Dienste in einer Vielzahl autoritärer Staaten an und erreichen hier Hunderte Millionen Nutzerinnen und Nutzer. Dabei laufen sie Gefahr, zu Komplizen bei der Verletzung von Menschenrechten werden. Um das Verhalten der Unternehmen hinsichtlich dieses Problems überprüfen zu können, sollte sich die deutsche Politik international dafür einsetzen, dass öffentlich einsehbare Human Rights Impact Assessments (HRIAs) verpflichtend vorgegeben werden." (Zusammenfassung)
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"The media situation in Belarus has never been easy. With Aliaksandr Lukashenka being elected president of the country for the first time in 1994, the necessary reforms to provide media freedom have never materialised. Instead, over the years various laws have lessened the rights of independent jour
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nalists and imposed limits on both traditional and electronic media. Following the August 2020 presidential election, which ignited a brutal crackdown against the democratic opposition, the situation has worsened. Harassment, a hijacking, and politically motivated jail terms, both short and long, intimidate Belarusians who want to exchange ideas, report wrongdoing or fight for freedom of expression and freedom for the country. In January 2022, the Belarusian Association of Journalists confirmed the presence of at least 32 journalists in Belarusian jails. On the positive side, new electronic media cannot be banned effectively and absolutely. While the regime slowly expands its presence on the internet, Belarusians trust independent media more and use it more eagerly. However, society’s distancing of itself from traditional state-controlled media is increasingly met with an angry reaction from the state apparatus, which in turn further tightens related laws. The European Union, and the European Parliament in particular, actively support independent media and civil society in Belarus, and the Council of the EU and the Parliament both address the challenges to media freedom in the country. Financial help is also provided to Belarus and was even increased at the end of 2021, with priority areas of support including ‘systematically repressed’ independent media." (Summary)
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"This report focuses on Beijing's efforts to control domestic reporting by resident foreign journalists. It is based on interviews conducted by the IFJ in December 2021 with 19 current or recent correspondents from nine countries, who work across print and broadcast and whose experience in China ran
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ges from a couple of years to several decades. It also draws from Locked Down or Kicked Out, the Foreign Correspondents Club of China's 2021 Media Freedoms Report, and earlier FCCC annual reports based on surveys of the club's roughly 190 members. The research finds that China uses a wide range of coercive methods to control foreign journalistsf reporting. These include: outright expulsions, plus threats that make journalists feel compelled to leave; denials and delays in the granting of visas so that journalists are unable to start work on schedule or must live from one short-term visa to another, unsure if they will be there the following month; lighter scrutiny of journalists from nations viewed as 'friendly' or 'unimportant', although Beijing's attitude fluctuates according to political relations between China and the home country; lawsuits alleging breaches of reporting protocols, such as identifying oneself as a journalist, which carry the risk of being refused an exit visa until the case is resolved [...]" (Executive summary)
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"The internet gained centrality as a space of public opinion and political activity that became important for the Russian state to co-opt and control as part of the broader push for control of political elites and public perceptions as Putin and his ruling party pushed to eliminate any functioning o
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pposition and cement their power. Finally, the internet gained importance as a geopolitical strategic object, given its centrality to conflicts, cyberwarfare and foreign policy operations. In the current and ongoing stage, the internet is now also an important object of critical technological infrastructure that is now also being co-opted into full state control as part of the national security and sovereignty agenda.The past decade since 2012 has seen a gradual takeover by the state of key industry players such as VK and Yandex, a crackdown on political and media elites and ordinary users, and the introduction of a swathe of new regulations, all aimed at consolidating state control over an area of importance for the national security and sovereignty agenda. Today, digital authoritarianism is an integral part of Russia’s state survival strategy and is likely to remain as such for the foreseeable future, given Russia’s current international isolation and its fraught and increasingly hostile standoff with the democratic global community." (Analysis and conclusion, page 25)
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"Since its ascent to power twenty years ago, the ruling AKP has tightened the screws on all forms of freedom of expression, both online and offline. It has introduced draconian laws, imposed internet restrictions, blocked content, and has arrested and intimidated critics on an unprecedented level. I
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n its toolbox are all three generations of information controls. The purges that took place in the aftermath of the failed military coup in 2016 have left the country in a state of continuous decline with thousands of civil servants jailed on bogus terrorism charges, media outlets shut, and an ongoing blocking of websites and targeting of social media platforms. The AKP continues to rely on the controversial Internet Bill, the Anti-terrorism Law, decreelaws, and an army of trolls, targeting critics and dissent online. The controversial app introduced by the National Police to snitch on social media accounts critical of the ruling party and its affiliates is yet another tool in the hands of the state to intimidate users and get in the way of freedom of speech online." (Analysis and conclusion, page 20)
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"There is a clear digital divide in Sudan as the number of internet users is a very low part of the population. Despite the high contribution of the telecommunication field to the GDP, the Sudanese authorities are not using this contribution to enhance and develop the ICT field to fill the gap of di
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gital illiteracy. Instead, they use taxpayer money to buy expensive equipment for censorship, without publishing these deals. Restricting the freedom of expression and using the state’s violence to repress fundamental rights and civil liberties are rooting the image of the authoritarian state in the minds of the citizens which may lead to a state of lack of rights awareness. Using and amending laws to protect the government interests indicates that the government will enact other laws to restrict the digital space in order to make access to information increasingly difficult. Government access to ICT infrastructure in Sudan will suppress net neutrality during political crises, affecting people economically and socially, specifically in relation to education and small businesses. Sudan has low transparency, frequently violates physical privacy, uses unlawful communication shutdowns, an idle access to information act, no freedom of expression, vague laws, and online surveillance, making it easy to say that digital authoritarianism is rooted in Sudan. Digital authoritarianism affects opportunities for foreign investment, stability of life, and social security." (Analysis and conclusion, page 21)
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"This guide is intended to provide user-friendly, practical guidance for journalists and newsrooms seeking to understand the Russian “fake news” laws, and how they’ve been applied to local and international press." (Page 1)
"The government of Zimbabwe and the ruling ZANU PF party are bent on ensuring that the status quo is preserved at all costs. As evidenced by findings in the Civic Media Observatory, the digital sphere has been identified as a threat to the country’s national security, insofar as deposing the curre
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nt political junta from power is concerned. The Arab Spring, which led to the deposing of leaders in the MENA region through social-media-organised protests certainly placed a lot of African governments on high alert about the potential transformative power of digital space. This has led to more governments, including that of Zimbabwe, enacting digitally repressive legislation aimed at curbing any form of political mobilisation on social media. Zimbabwe’s engagement with Russia, China, Iran and Israel for the acquisition of invasive spyware and biometric technology for mass surveillance purposes is premised on the ruling party’s overarching desire to control the population and retain political power. The fact that almost all deals are shrouded in a dark veil of secrecy bodes badly for civil society, human rights defenders, independent journalists, and opposition party members as the ends to which such technology will be applied are not publicised. The identification and tracking of journalists who expose corruption within government circles and their subsequent detention implies that digital technologies are being used as part of what Dragu and Lapu term preventive repression." (Analysis and conclusion, page 25)
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"This report provides a framework for understanding China's discourse-power ambitions [...], the strategy China has developed to achieve them, and an initial assessment of the successes and limitations of these efforts to date. The report begins by tracing the evolution of China's conception of disc
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ourse power, from China's period of reform and opening in 1978 to the current era under President Xi Jinping. The next section takes a closer look at how the party-state has been restructured, in part, to help operationalize China's goals to gain "the power to speak" and "the power to be heard." The third section focuses on China's strategy for gaining discourse power by centering itself in the ecosystem of global connectivity. This strategy includes gaining the "power to speak" by using social and digital media platforms to shape local information environments in its favor. It also includes gaining the "power to be heard" by promoting the CCPapproved norm of "cyber sovereignty". Lastly, this report provides a brief assessment of both the successes and limitations of China's discourse-power operations." (Introduction, page 4)
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"Disinformation and misinformation have been amplified in the digital age. In order to combat their increasing presence in our everyday lives, we have to first educate ourselves on what disinformation is. In this post, Jakub Ferencik looks at this question in some detail, primarily by analyzing Vlad
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imir Putin’s usage of disinformation in politics. He first demarcates between disinformation and misinformation, points to some examples in Putin’s early tenure as the President of Russia, and compares them with the use of disinformation during the pandemic in order to show why people lose trust in traditional media sources. Finally, Ferencik addresses the two most avid producers of Russian disinformation, RT and Sputnik, and briefly discusses why they have become so prominent." (Abstract)
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"Against the background of the media commercialization reform since the 1990s in China and drawing on the case of »X-Change« (2006-2019), Wei Dong investigates the entanglements between emotion and subjectivity, ideology, identity and hegemonic power in the multimodal text of the program. The focu
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s lies on the ways in which emotions are appropriated and disciplined by regimes of power and identity, and the ways in which affect - in this case primarily kuqing (bitter emotions) communicated by the material and the body - have the potential to challenge or exceed existing relations of power in the mediascape. Wei Dong shows how Chinese reality TV provides a historical and theoretical opportunity for understanding the affective structures of contemporary China in the dynamic process of fracture and integration." (Publisher description)
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"This Media Landscape Guide was produced in January 2022. It provides a snapshot of the media at this time in Belarus. It provides an analysis of the recent shocks to the media landscape and an overview of the different types of media and information sources available for Belarusians: digital media
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platforms, social media and messaging platforms, television, radio, and print. It covers the main and most popular media outlets." (Introduction, page 4)
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"This paper is the summary of the results of a research project lasting over six months, covering domestic and foreign hidden malign influence activities pursued through the so-called "grey zone" media in three countries - the Czech Republic, Serbia and Hungary -, during a period of heightened inter
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national tensions related to Russia's invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Political Capital has assessed in numerous studies how the Kremlin or the Hungarian hybrid political regime has used their extensive media empire to conduct active measures or political smear-campaigns in service of political or geopolitical goals. In this study, we set out to understand the inner workings of clandestine disinformation campaigns carried out by mostly anonymous media actors to conduct or influence political campaigns, specifically in the run-up to the Czech, Serbian and Hungarian elections, and destabilise the region in general after the outbreak of the war." (Page 2)
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