Russia’s “Operation Undercut” Campaign Uses AI/Fake News to Undermine Ukraine Support

On 26 Novem­ber 2024, Record­ed Future’s Insikt Group report­ed that Rus­si­a’s Social Design Agency (SDA) is con­duct­ing a sophis­ti­cat­ed influ­ence oper­a­tion using AI-enhanced media and imper­son­ation tac­tics to weak­en West­ern sup­port for Ukraine. The arti­cle begins:

Rus­si­a’s Social Design Agency (SDA) has been run­ning an influ­ence oper­a­tion known as “Oper­a­tion Under­cut” since late 2023, aim­ing to erode West­ern sup­port for Ukraine. Using a mix of AI-enhanced media and imper­son­ation tac­tics, Oper­a­tion Under­cut employs advanced meth­ods to manip­u­late pub­lic opin­ion. Oper­a­tion Under­cut is part of Rus­si­a’s broad­er strat­e­gy to desta­bi­lize West­ern alliances and por­tray Ukraine’s lead­er­ship as inef­fec­tive and cor­rupt. By tar­get­ing audi­ences in Europe and the US, the SDA seeks to ampli­fy anti-Ukraine sen­ti­ment, hop­ing to reduce the flow of West­ern mil­i­tary aid to Ukraine…

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Key Points:

1. The oper­a­tion uses AI-gen­er­at­ed con­tent and imper­son­ates legit­i­mate news out­lets to spread dis­in­for­ma­tion across mul­ti­ple lan­guages and platforms.
2. Cam­paign nar­ra­tives link Ukraine’s mil­i­tary aid to con­tentious issues like the Israel-Gaza con­flict and 2024 US elec­tions to deep­en social divisions.
3. Oper­a­tion Under­cut col­lab­o­rates with oth­er Russ­ian influ­ence net­works like Copy­Cop to spread deep­fake videos tar­get­ing West­ern polit­i­cal events.
4. The cam­paign specif­i­cal­ly tar­gets Euro­pean and Amer­i­can audi­ences with tai­lored con­tent aimed at reduc­ing sup­port for Ukraine.