Russian trolls may have spread fake videos of postal voting in Germany
www.pravda.com.ua
Fri, 21 Feb 2025 17:09:19 +0200
Before the German elections, several fake videos appeared on the Internet claiming that postal voting was being manipulated to the detriment of the Alternative for Germany AfD intelligence services suggest that a Russianled troll network is behind the lies.
Source Spiegel, as reported by European Pravda Details One video shows two alleged ballots from constituency 151 in Leipzig.
The voice claims that the AfD is not present on these ballots.
In a similar video, in which the AfD is not listed on the ballot paper, an unidentified person in the background speaks in an indignant tone I just received my voting papers, and what can I say here Its a fraud, there is no AfD, and all the others are there.
The fake videos were particularly widespread on platform X formerly known as Twitter, where they have been circulating since at least Monday.
Some of them have over 500,000 views.
In fact, the videos content is a lie.
The city of Leipzig has examined the videos and ruled out mentioned typos.
The official statement said that the fake ballots are apparently part of a targeted campaign.
According to Spiegel, security circles speculate that the fake videos were distributed by the Russian propaganda group Storm1516.
This group has spread proRussian narratives through anonymous social media accounts or websites in the past and can be linked to Russian secret services.
Microsofts IT experts consider Storm1516 to be a Russian staterun group that actively spreads disinformation.
Analysts of the US company classified the group accordingly in a report on attempts to influence the US election campaign in October 2024.
In the United States, Storm 1516 attracted attention with lies aimed at the Democratic Party and a fake video in which a photo of Donald Trump was burned.
Factcheckers from Correctiv pointed out this week that accounts that previously attracted attention by spreading content from the Russian influence operation Storm1516 are involved in spreading the current lies about the postal vote in Leipzig.
The Federal Interior Ministry said that in this case, various indicators point to the Storm1516 campaign.
The groups actions in the context of the 2024 US elections also have strong patterns.
We have to assume that this is a deliberate attempt to influence the federal election campaign, said an Interior Ministry spokesperson.
According to security sources, Storm1516 was also involved in the distribution of another fake video, launched shortly before the federal elections.
The video shows how completed postal ballots, supposedly from Hamburg, are opened and put into a shredder if the vote is cast for the AfD.
The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution has been warning the public for several months about Russias attempts to influence the federal elections.
A few months ago, the Central Office for the Detection of Foreign Information Manipulation was launched in Berlin to analyse such attacks.
Background Earlier in February, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz sharply criticised foreign interference in the Bundestag elections in favour of the farright Alternative for Germany.
Almost 90 of Germans believe that foreign actors, primarily from Russia and the United States, are trying to influence the upcoming elections through social media.
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