Felix Carte, who has a deep background as a disinformation expert, is a senior researcher at the Germany-based Mercator Foundation and a senior advisor to Reset, an NGO that studies the impact of social media on democracy.
Mr Carte previously worked at StratCom, the strategic communications arm of the EU Foreign Affairs Department. During his stay, he contributed to the development of EU policy to counter digital threats.
In an interview with RFE/RL’s Tatar-Bashkir service, Karte spoke about the tactics used by authoritarian regimes like Russia to spread disinformation around the world, including the presidential election in Moldova and the European Union. He highlighted the recent malicious efforts in the referendum on integration.
RFE/RL: You’ve seen a deepfake video showing how a suspected Russian actor bribed politicians, bought votes, and targeted Moldova’s President Maia Sandu during the recent vote and referendum. You explained in detail how it spread. Sandu himself called this an “unprecedented attack on democracy.” Can you tell us some details about this Kremlin-backed campaign?
Félix Carte: There is a lot of international media reporting on these tactics in detail. For example, in the weeks before the election, Moldovan authorities discovered large sums of cash on passengers returning from Moscow on transit flights, amounts that raised suspicions due to their frequency and size. Authorities seized $1.5 million in one day, suspecting it was intended for political influence.
Moldova’s police chief told the BBC that as of early October, around 130,000 Moldovan voters had received payments related to the scheme, representing around 10 per cent of Moldova’s active voters. The country’s chief anti-corruption officer also traced suspicious financial flows linked to fugitive oligarch Ilan Shor, who now lives in Russia. He pointed out that Mr Scholl was directing funds to influence voters to oppose Moldova’s pro-EU referendum and path to European integration.
Kremlin-linked sources also infiltrated Moldovan social networks. For example, they are promoting deepfakes, artificially generated videos that are now cheap and easy to create.
One such video allegedly showed Sandu mocking the poverty of his people. Another fake video, which Mr. Sandu had to publicly debunk in his New Year’s speech, shows Mr. Sandu forbidding Moldovans from drinking tea with berries, a drink that many Moldovans love. It was incorrectly shown that the
These are classic cases of disinformation, tactics aimed at sowing distrust in democratic governments and stirring up anger.
RFE/RL: You’ve written about the “mirror tactics” that authoritarian regimes like Russia employ in disinformation campaigns. Could you please explain how it works?
Carte: Indeed, “mirror politics” is a tactic in which propaganda activists denounce the very actions and strategies of their opponents. The Kremlin frequently uses this tactic to confuse audiences and deflect blame. For example, Kremlin propaganda often accuses Ukraine and the West of engaging in “Nazi” acts and of trying to destabilize Russia, but of course it does not want to wipe out and destabilize democratic governments abroad. , it is the Kremlin itself that is trying to suppress it. society.
Similarly, the Kremlin accuses “Western countries” and specific groups, such as LGBTIQ, of “interfering” with Russia, even though it is clearly Russia that interferes and interferes with other countries’ elections and media. continues to do so. This is the very practice of mirror politics. Its purpose is to blur the lines between truth and falsehood, right and wrong, and ultimately to make people unable to tell the difference between democracy and tyranny, and to become indifferent to who is governing.
This tactic is more effective in some countries than others. For example, in Slovakia, public support for NATO membership fell from 72 percent to 58 percent. According to the think tank GLOBSEC (based in Slovakia), the majority of Slovak citizens no longer believe that Russia is primarily responsible for the war in Ukraine.
RFE/RL: How is Russia using the war with Ukraine in its disinformation campaign?
Karte: As I mentioned earlier, Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine (in 2022) is a comprehensive deception aimed at misrepresenting Ukraine as a “Nazi regime” and creating a false pretext for the invasion. An information campaign preceded and ran concurrently. The main goal of Russian disinformation is to undermine public support for Ukraine in Western countries such as the United States and Germany.
For example, so-called “doppelgänger” campaigns have expanded their reach by spreading pro-Russian rhetoric through fake websites and social media accounts, and even by impersonating trusted news organizations. Key themes include questioning the effectiveness of sanctions against Russia, amplifying negative sentiment against Ukraine’s leadership, and stoking fears about Ukrainian refugees in Europe.
RFE/RL: How does conservative rhetoric fit into Russia’s disinformation efforts?
Carte: Russian propaganda seeks to resonate with conservative European populations who may feel that social changes threaten traditional norms, such as ‘wakeism’, family values, LGBTIQ rights, etc. often utilizes conservative rhetoric. A notable example is the “Gayrope” narrative, which frames European tolerance as moral decline and a threat to family values.
In this context, (Russian President) Vladimir Putin is portrayed as a strong man who can “save” Europe from what has been called the “woke virus”, and someone like (President-elect) Donald Trump of the United States The depiction is repeated.
Of course, the Kremlin’s interest in these conservative values is purely strategic. Far from truly defending traditional values, the Russian government and its illiberal allies across Europe are defending Europe’s peaceful order, free markets, and even Christian values such as honesty, compassion, and humility. It threatens the core pillars of maintenance.
The Kremlin’s strategy is to manipulate socially conservative audiences and appeal to those who feel overwhelmed by social change, while at the same time drawing a line between traditional center-right parties and far-right extremists. The purpose is to make it ambiguous. They appeal to common conservative concerns in order to capture center-right audiences, feeding them content that stirs fear and hostility.
Russia’s goal here is ultimately to strengthen pro-Russian extremist parties at the expense of traditional conservative parties.
RFE/RL: How important is technology, or artificial intelligence, in today’s disinformation campaigns?
Karte: I think we tend to overestimate the role of new technologies like AI in disinformation. Consider the US election. According to U.S. authorities, Russia interfered in the election process by sponsoring YouTube influencers in the U.S. to spread pro-Russian content, particularly content supporting Trump.
These influence operations are costly and effective, but they do not rely primarily on AI tools like ChatGPT. The real harm lies not with the AI itself, but with the vast resources devoted to Russian malice and disinformation.
RFE/RL: Is Europe ready to counter disinformation campaigns? What can it do better?
Carte: The EU has taken substantive steps to combat disinformation more than a decade ago, including establishing specialized task forces in diplomatic institutions, supporting independent media and researchers, and regulating social media platforms. I have been teaching.
But Russian propaganda continues to stay one step ahead by concealing its origins and complicating attribution through intermediaries and commercial organizations. Furthermore, some political parties within the EU are actively spreading pro-Russian rhetoric, making effective countermeasures more difficult and highlighting the complexity of combating disinformation within the EU’s internal borders. I’m doing it.
This transcript is an abridged version of a text interview conducted via LinkedIn.
