CNN
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Russian propagandists exploited movie star movies from the favored platform Cameo to help their misinformation campaigns, cybersecurity researchers at Microsoft mentioned.
Beginning in July, pro-Russia social media channels started circulating movies of American celebrities that had been “deceptively edited to push anti-Ukraine propaganda,” in accordance with a report revealed Thursday by Microsoft’s Risk Evaluation Heart. The report mentioned an unknown Russia-aligned affect actor leveraged Cameo, the favored web site the place folks pays public figures for personalised video messages, to acquire these movies of celebrities, together with actor Elijah Wooden and boxer Mike Tyson.
The celebrities had been apparently unaware that these movies had been then edited in ways in which appeared to assault Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
“The quick video messages, which regularly function celebrities pleading with ‘Vladimir’ to hunt assist for substance abuse, are edited by the unknown actor to incorporate emojis and hyperlinks,” in accordance with the report. The movies had been shared extensively by pro-Russian social media accounts, after which had been additional amplified by state-backed Russian media shops, the report mentioned, the place they had been inaccurately portrayed as messages interesting on to President Zelensky.
Russia’s US embassy didn’t reply to CNN’s request for remark.
The Microsoft researchers mentioned they noticed no less than seven of those kind of manipulated movie star video messages getting used since late July 2023. Along with Wooden and Tyson, movies featured different US celebrities akin to Priscilla Presley, and actors Dean Norris, Kate Flannery and John McGinley. The celebrities named within the report didn’t instantly reply to CNN’s requests for remark.
The movies had been edited in some instances to make it appear to be they had been interviews with information shops or from a celeb’s personal social media account – and a part of broader pleas to Zelensky to get assist for a supposed substance abuse problem.
“Kremlin officers and Russian state-sponsored propaganda have lengthy promoted the false declare that President Zelensky struggles with substance abuse; nonetheless, this marketing campaign marks a novel method by pro-Russia actors searching for to additional the narrative within the on-line data area,” the Microsoft researchers said within the report.
A Cameo spokesperson advised CNN in a press release that the corporate doesn’t publicly remark “on the main points of its Belief & Security investigations.” The spokesperson added, nonetheless, that these kind of movies “would violate Cameo’s Group Pointers, and in instances the place such violations are substantiated Cameo will usually take steps to take away the problematic content material and droop the purchaser’s account to assist stop additional points.”