The Matryoshka disinformation network before the presidential election in Poland scares citizens of the country with terrorist attacks and crimes of Ukrainian refugees • The Insider • RIMA — Russian Independent Media Archive
The Matryoshka disinformation network before the presidential election in Poland scares citizens of the country with terrorist attacks and crimes of Ukrainian refugees
The Kremlin network of disinformation "Matryoshka" began the campaign on the eve of the elections of the President of Poland, the first round of which should take place on May 18. In the Twitter (X) and Bluesky videos, disguised as the content of the Polish and world media distributed in social networks, it is told about the supposedly increased threat of terrorist attacks and crime among Ukrainian refugees. This repeats the narratives previously used by the “matryoshka” in other European elections. About this The Insider was told by the project "Bota Bitter" ( Antibot4navalny ).
In the first “wave” of the spread of fake publications that came on April 9, the project counted 4 videos. Two of them are devoted to the risk of terrorist attacks on elections day, due to which the country's election commission supposedly even plans to postpone the vote. The video ends with a portrait of the philosopher and writer Nassim Taleb, who seemed to say that the terrorist danger in Poland is a classic example of a “black swan” (a term invented by Taleb himself and denoting an accidental, difficult to predict, but significant event).
Another video tells about the criminal network allegedly created by Ukrainian refugees who involved Ukrainian women in prostitution, and its head is called the widow of the soldier of the Azov unit Oleg Mettsenko - Katerina. Perhaps such an interest of bots in this topic is explained by the Polish elections that the presidential candidate from the Ultra Party of New Hope Slavomir Mentzen (according to polls, he takes third place in popularity with 11% of the vote) has repeatedly been criticized by Ukrainian refugees, in particular, stating that Ukrainians can count on Poland, having worked only one day (which is only one day (which is only one day (which Not true), and overload the healthcare system, forcing the Poles for a long time to wait for the queue for doctors.
Within the framework of the second “wave” of misinformation, which began on April 20, one more was added to these narratives: in the video, disguised as the information material of the Israeli special services, it is said that Mossad allegedly sent the warnings to Poland rabbis and asked them to convince Jews not to visit public places due to the threat of attacks, while separately stipulated that the Polish authorities are specified that the Polish authorities are specified that the Polish authorities These warnings ignored.
The narratives of this campaign are repeated by those used by the Kremlin disinformation networks during other significant events in different European countries.
In particular, the campaign of intimidation with anti -Semitic attacks conducted a network of Kremlin bots, under the conditional name Doppelgänger before the Olympics in Paris in 2024. Later it turned out that the Kremlin agents held hybrid online and offline promotions: in particular, they painted anti-Semitic graffiti, and then distributed photos with them on Twitter (X) through the Doppelgänger network accounts, trying to form a conviction among residents of France and other countries of Europe that law enforcement agencies and government cannot and do not want protect them from anti -Semitism.
The allegedly unprecedentedly increased threat of terrorism, which the authorities cannot cope (with the call to stay at home and not attend not only polling stations, but also any public places), the video “Matryoshka” was told before the US presidential elections and parliamentary elections in Germany, and in the second case, “warnings from Mossad” also appeared in the videos. However, as the study showed, then Russian misinformation could not reach a wide range of Internet users and actually failed.
This is not the first time the bots are also used in their campaigns of Nassim Taleb: for example, in one of the video distributed by the “matryoshka”, he allegedly predicted an attempt on the then head of the International Olympic Committee of Thomas Bach during the opening ceremony of the Olympiad in Paris.
In addition, bots regularly intimidate Western voters with stories about poisoned ballots for voting by mail - such rumors distributed during the election race in the United States, they are also used in the current “Polish” campaign.
It is also not the first time that Ukrainian refugees become the target of disinformation and slander: the project “Bota Bitter” project found more than ten videos released at different times, which are accused of theft, violence over children, drug trafficking and dangerous driving: in particular, in one of the videos that were disguised as information video of French law enforcement officers, it was said that it was said that it was said that it was said that it was said that Ukrainian refugees are to blame for more than 90% of the car in France.
At the disposal of The Insider there are references to original tweets, as well as the evidence of the belonging to the Matryoshka network who published them, which were provided by the Botan Bitter project. The Insider does not give direct links to misinforming content in order to avoid its further distribution.
