International Media

RT Media Outlet is More Than That

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Article in the Washington Post by Catherine Belton, 9/13/24

Headline: “U.S. says Russian state media outlet runs intelligence operations”

Subhead: “The State Department accuses RT, the Russian media outlet, of running intelligence operations and procuring weapons for the war in Ukraine”

“Secretary of State Antony Blinken said new information showed that the Russian state media company RT, formerly known as Russia Today, was now being deployed by the Kremlin to conduct cyberintelligence and covert influence operations targeting countries in Europe, Africa, and North and South America. It was also being used to procure weapons for Russia’s war against Ukraine, expanding RT’s remit far beyond that of a media outlet, officials said.

. . . “RT has become increasingly entrenched as a channel voicing Kremlin propaganda in Latin America, Africa and the Middle East, and it has gone underground to operate through a web of front companies in the West, according to RT’s editor in chief, Margarita Simonyan.

“In comments posted on Telegram, Simonyan responded to Blinken by saying, ‘We have done this, are doing this and will do this.’ ”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/09/13/rt-propaganda-intelligence-weapons-ukraine/

Getting the Media Ready for the Election

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Article in Al Jezeera by By Niko Vorobyov, 9/12/24

Headling:  ” ‘Guerrilla projects’: Russia revels in US allegations of media warfare”

Subhead:  “Public figures close to President Putin goad Washington after the DoJ alleged that RT is puppeteering social media influencers.”

“Last week, the United States Department of Justice unsealed an indictment accusing a Tennessee-based company, believed to be Tenet Media, of accepting millions of dollars from the Russian state-owned media outlet RT and promoting ‘pro-Russia propaganda and disinformation across social media to US audiences’.

. . . “As well as federal indictments, the US Treasury slapped RT, whose employees are accused of funneling cash to Tenet, with sanctions.

“Separately, the Russian-born former Trump adviser and conservative pundit, Dimitri Simes, was indicted for allegedly working on behalf of another sanctioned Russian broadcaster, Channel One.

“In Russia, news of the sanctions and indictments were framed as another front of informational warfare.”

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/9/12/guerrilla-projects-russia-revels-in-us-allegations-of-media-warfare

Russian Propaganda Influences US Media – Surprise?

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Boris &  Natasha from Huffington Post

Article in New York Magazine Intelligencer by Nia Prater, 9/4/24

Headline: “Benny Johnson, Tim Pool Say They’re Victims in Russia Media Scheme”

“On Wednesday, the U.S. Justice Department unveiled a bombshell indictment in New York’s Southern District, alleging that Russia was behind the funding of a United States–based right-wing media company and that it used the business’s influencers to push disinformation and Russia-backed propaganda. The company, Tenet Media, employs several prominent conservative commentators, including Benny Johnson and Tim Pool.

“Prosecutors say that Kalashnikov and Afanasyeva helped to funnel nearly $10 million from foreign entities to an American right-wing media organization.”

https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/right-wing-creators-say-theyre-victims-in-russia-media-plot.html

 

FCM Website Attacked by Bots.

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The Friends of Community Media website (ourfcm.org) was recently under an attack seemingly by DoS bots (dedicated denial of service), designed to overload the system.  This was done with fake bot email addresses.


Many of these were fake email addresses with an address that had the domain name appended to the email address as .ru – an extension representing Russia. The FCM website  required registration before viewing. Each of these fake emails became registered and started to fill up the FCM WordPress database.

This was a mistake and made the site vulnerable.

With this attack up to10 new registrations a day started occurring starting in January, 2023. These eventually mounted up to over 5,000 fake addresses which had to be manually deleted.

To respond, the admin of ourfcm.com stopped people requiring to be registered on the site. Also, a message was sent back to some of the phony emails that said, “Mumakhala ngati nyani akuphanguka” – an appropriate phrase in another language. Responses to the FCM message were kicked back as not being real email addresses.

Unfortunately many sites like this one, are subject to attack by the deniers of free information-flow that can challenge authoritarians and dictators.

In Our Brave New World, Will News Be Delivered by Pre-programmed AI Journalist Robots?

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From the Guardian, 4/11/23:

Headline: “AI generated news presenter debuts in Kuwait media”

Sub-head:  “Kuwait News introduced Fedha, promising that it could read online news in the future”

“A Kuwaiti media outlet has unveiled a virtual news presenter generated using artificial intelligence, with plans for it to read online bulletins.

‘Fedha’ appeared on the Twitter account of the Kuwait News website on Saturday as an image of a woman, hair uncovered, wearing a black jacket and white T-shirt.

“’I’m Fedha, the first presenter in Kuwait who works with artificial intelligence at Kuwait News. What kind of news do you prefer? Let’s hear your opinions,’ she said in Arabic.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/apr/11/ai-generated-news-presenter-debuts-in-kuwait-media