Russian Disinformation Campaign Targets German 2025 Election

On 18 Feb­ru­ary 2025, Deutsche Welle report­ed that Russ­ian dis­in­for­ma­tion efforts were active­ly attempt­ing to influ­ence Ger­many’s upcom­ing fed­er­al elec­tion. The arti­cle begins:

Secu­ri­ty experts are sound­ing the alarm over what they say are increas­ing­ly sophis­ti­cat­ed Russ­ian dis­in­for­ma­tion cam­paigns aimed at manip­u­lat­ing Ger­many’s 2025 fed­er­al elec­tion. This comes as Ger­man intel­li­gence agen­cies report a sig­nif­i­cant rise in coor­di­nat­ed social media manip­u­la­tion, fake news web­sites, and tar­get­ed hack­ing attempts. Offi­cials believe these efforts aim to polar­ize the Ger­man elec­torate and under­mine trust in demo­c­ra­t­ic insti­tu­tions ahead of next year’s cru­cial vote. “We’re see­ing a lev­el of sophis­ti­ca­tion and coor­di­na­tion that sur­pass­es pre­vi­ous inter­fer­ence cam­paigns,” said Arne Schön­bohm, pres­i­dent of Ger­many’s Fed­er­al Office for Infor­ma­tion Secu­ri­ty (BSI). Sev­er­al recent­ly iden­ti­fied oper­a­tions appear designed to ampli­fy extrem­ist voic­es and exac­er­bate exist­ing social ten­sions, par­tic­u­lar­ly around immi­gra­tion and ener­gy policy…

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Key Points:

• Russ­ian dis­in­for­ma­tion cam­paigns tar­get­ing Ger­many’s 2025 elec­tion have increased in sophis­ti­ca­tion and coor­di­na­tion accord­ing to secu­ri­ty experts.
• Ger­man intel­li­gence agen­cies report ris­ing social media manip­u­la­tion, fake news web­sites, and tar­get­ed hack­ing attempts from Russ­ian actors
• .The inter­fer­ence efforts appear designed to polar­ize Ger­man vot­ers and under­mine demo­c­ra­t­ic trust before the upcom­ing fed­er­al election.
• Offi­cials have iden­ti­fied oper­a­tions that ampli­fy extrem­ist voic­es and wors­en social ten­sions, par­tic­u­lar­ly regard­ing immi­gra­tion and ener­gy policies.