Russia Was Exposed for a Large-Scale Disinformation Campaign Ahead of the German Elections
In the run-up to the German elections, a large-scale campaign to discredit candidates was detected on social media; according to researchers, Russia is behind it. As part of an operation called “Matryoshka,” hundreds of fake news stories and videos created using artificial intelligence were circulated, without any evidence to support the allegations made.
According to journalists, since June 24, more than 180 fake posts targeting candidates in the upcoming election have been identified on social media platforms X, Bluesky, and TikTok.
The false content accused politicians of murder, corruption, organizing underground events, drug use, and other crimes, but no evidence or confirmation of these allegations was provided.
One of the campaign’s targets was Eric Stört, a candidate for the Saxony-Anhalt state parliament from the Left Party.
Fake posts circulated on social media claiming that he allegedly:
- had killed his grandmother for her inheritance;
- was involved in the murder of a web model;
- organized underground LGBTQ parties;
- helped manipulate student grades at the Bauhaus University in Weimar.
All of these claims turned out to be completely fabricated.
“A spokesperson for the Burgenland County Police confirmed to DW that there are no suspicions against Schter regarding murder, and no investigations are being conducted in that regard. There are also no reports of alleged sex parties at the university, nor of an alleged grading scandal at the Bauhaus University in Weimar, a university spokesperson confirmed,” the article states.
The researchers also noted that the campaign was active only on weekdays, while the spread of disinformation ceased on weekends.
According to DW FactCheck, these posts are part of the Russian disinformation operation “Matryoshka,” also known as “Overload.”
The campaign’s goal is to discredit candidates ahead of the state elections scheduled for September.
“Many of these posts are targeted attempts to discredit candidates in the upcoming state elections in Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the parliamentary elections in Berlin, and, most recently, the local elections in Lower Saxony, which will take place in September,” the article notes.
In addition, as part of the campaign, a fake video purportedly from Eurostat was circulated, claiming that Germans regret the country’s reunification.
Eurostat refuted this information, stating that it had not produced such a video nor conducted the survey mentioned in it.
Researchers noted that the campaign had virtually no impact on pro-Russian political forces—the AfD and Sarah Wagenknecht’s Alliance (BSW).
“Even on the eve of the federal elections, we observed that Russian campaigns generally sought to discredit candidates from all democratic parties and support the AfD and BSW. Therefore, what we are now seeing on the eve of the state elections is a continuation of a long-term Russian strategy to support parties that hold more pro-Russian positions and to discredit other parties and candidates,” said Yulia Smirnova, a researcher at the Center for Monitoring, Analysis, and Strategy.
According to researchers, the characteristics of the disinformation campaign point to its Russian origin, and the OSINT project Gnida links the operation to the “Storm-1516” unit of Russian military intelligence.
This was reported by DW.
