UK Foreign Office alleges Russian cyber soldiers targeting foreign leaders

The United Kingdom on Sunday warned that Russia’s “cyber soldiers” have launched a new offensive related to the disinformation campaign that has been targeting social media platforms, seeking to legitimize the invasion of Ukraine. According to research funded by the UK, paid operatives have been working out of the offices in St. Petersburg to spread the disinformation campaign on the messaging app Telegram as well as other social media platforms to justify Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Russia has been actively recruiting and coordinating with those hired to flood the social media accounts of Kremlin critics with pro-Russia narrative. 

Trend of comments supporting Russian President Putin's war online

In a wide-ranging report, UK’s Foreign Office stated on Sunday that there has been a trend of comments supporting Russian President Vladimir Putin and the war in Ukraine on major social media platforms including Meta. The Russian trolls have developed advanced techniques to avoid detection by social media platforms. In recent weeks, the Russian disinformation campaign has amplified the pro-Kremlin narrative that appears to be made by legitimate users, the Foreign Office warned. “Traces of its activity have been found on eight social media platforms, including Telegram, Twitter, Facebook and TikTok,” it went on to add. 

The widespread disinformation campaign was targeted at the politicians and the social media audience in several countries, including the UK South Africa and India, the Foreign Office said in its report. The UK claimed that the trolls have the link tracing back to the  Russian oligarch Yevgeniy Prigozhin sanctioned by both the US and Britain for financing the Kremlin's online “influence operations.” “We cannot allow the Kremlin and its shady troll farms to invade our online spaces with their lies about Putin’s illegal war,” Foreign Secretary Liz Truss said in the statement. “The UK government has alerted international partners and will continue to work closely with allies and media platforms to undermine Russian information operations,” she went on to add. 

Russian citizens and the Russian state TV have long denied that Putin waged a war in Ukraine. As the videos of the mass killing of the civilians and other war atrocities committed by Russian forces emerged, Russians dismissed it as propaganda on part of the Ukrainian forces. The war crimes in Bucha is labelled in by Moscow as "fake". The state-controlled media has also claimed the that the civilians were being killed by the Ukrainian forces.