After launching its bloody large-scale war against Ukraine in late February, Russia tried to ensure the zombification of its population by shutting down Western social media channels and domestic opposition media. The Kremlin has combined strict censorship with criminal punishment for anyone who didn’t toe the official line of its so-called special military operation.
But the invasion proved so globally outrageous that even Chinese and Indian TV channels – Russia’s key allies serving audiences of billions – reported on the madness without straight support of Russia and often standing on the side of Ukraine.
As the Kremlin attempted to churn out fake news and propaganda – using paid bloggers and experts with enough English to appear on television – their voices were drowned out by coverage of Russia’s real actions and war crimes by global media outlets like the BBC, CNN, France 24, The New York Times, etc.
Many countries around the world responded by banning those Russian TV channels which spouted the Kremlin’s twisted narrative.
But Russia, the golden champion of disinformation, never gives up. By the end of March, a month into Russia’s aggressive and cynical invasion, the Kremlin’s messaging became more prominent in India, China, Turkey, Israel, the Arab states and Latin America.
After backing itself into a corner as an economic pariah, the Kremlin has taken to hiring well-known bloggers to promote its narrative to swathes of ordinary Russians and (where possible) beyond. This includes using mom bloggers, as well as beauty, fashion and entertainment industry specialists.
Such bloggers post praise for the Russian army, downplay the effects of sanctions, defend Russia’s top leaders and discuss noble victories over “Ukrainian Nazis”. All this while Russian soldiers are killing the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine, raping and torturing women and children, and bombing schools, hospitals and homes.
Kristina Potupchik
Kristina Potupchik, a Russian political strategist, social media specialist and Kremlin mouthpiece, had previously been accused of bribing bloggers to promote Kremlin narratives, pressuring traditional media, as well as tracking and reporting on the behavior of oppositionists and activists. All of this surfaced from e-mail correspondence uncovered by hackers in 2012.
Today, opposition Russian journalists believe she is back working for the Kremlin. When I asked journalists about the veracity of this claim they said they had no information about Potupchik’s return to the Kremlin. But since she remains a member of the team of Vladislav Surkov, Putin’s former aide who was fired in 2020, they wrote it off as “irrelevant.”
Since the first day of the war, Potupchik has promulgated the Kremlin line, and uses her Telegram channel, where she has over 140,000 subscribers, to spread Russian lies and propaganda. She also visited Mariupol and posted claims on Instagram that Russia never shelled the Drama Theater.
One Russian fashion blogger (her Instagram account was shut down) cut up clothes from “enemy” Western brands on camera. Others pretended to have connections with key decision-makers to justify claims that Moscow was succeeding in its military operation and that everything was going according to plan.
In parallel, bloggers who promote Russian narratives on the ground have started popping up in Russian-occupied territories. Some describe how good it is to live in Crimea, annexed by Russia in 2014, and in the southern region of Kherson which is now under Russian occupation. Others describe the benefits of living in the Donbas pseudo-republics, namely the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics.
Kira.Bonye and the Moldovan information space
Moldovan blogger Kira.Bonye, launched her TikTok account in late March and gained about 50,000 subscribers in two months. In her videos, she personifies different countries as members of a family.
The audience just can’t get mad at “baby Belarus” with her big naive eyes and playful, protruding ponytails. She describes how the once big family of the USSR broke up and “baby Belarus” tried to live happily with her mother Russia and older sister Ukraine. Then, Ukraine turned into a complicated teenager and quarreled with “mom”.
The playful blog is not remotely reminiscent of today’s Belarusian dictatorship, where Alexander Lukashenko, in power since 1994, runs in front of cameras with machine guns and gives orders to beat, imprison and torture those who protest against rigged elections.
Kira.Bonye portrays Poland as a greedy sister, who just wants to “take a bite” out of Ukraine. The U.S. is shown as a bully, while the EU, with blue hair, tries to fight mother Russia, albeit unsuccessfully. She presents President Volodymyr Zelenskyy as an empty-headed fool and exaggerates Ukrainian patriotism to an absurd scale to make Ukrainian patriots look foolish.
Everyone who sees these videos will note the amount of time that has evidently gone into preparing them. This of course is how bloggers make money – by creating attractive videos for well-paying clients. And by devoting her life to such interpretations of geopolitics, Kira.Bonye knows she can make a fortune quite easily.
Russia has certainly been trying to reinforce its narrative in Moldova, which – when I last visited in 2014 – was pouring out of every crevice. In an attempt to stave this off, Moldovaʼs Parliament passed a law on June 2 to combat misinformation, banning broadcasts of Russian news and propaganda shows.
The vast evidence shows how Russia is weaponizing social media and information and is tirelessly developing its propaganda machine. The free world must wake up and take steps to fight back on the virtual battlefield as well as on the frontline.
