Russia has stepped up its disinformation operations against the US Olympic Games in Paris, this time with a new video in which the CIA appears to be warning Americans about traveling on the city’s subway. CBS News found that the fabricated video, which includes a false warning about a “high risk” of an attack, originated from Russian channels before making its way to X and Facebook, where it has racked up at least 100,000 views across platforms .
CBS News
The video is “a fabrication, has no connection with the CIA and does not represent the views of the CIA,” a CIA spokesperson told CBS News. U.S. officials have not warned Americans about traveling by subway during the games, which start on July 26 and end on August 11. The Paris Olympic Games Organizing Committee said that “safety is the top priority of Paris 2024.”
The fabricated video comes from the same Russian disinformation network that Microsoft discovered in early June that used AI to create a fake Netflix feature film starring Tom Cruise. “Russia-linked actors hope to sow disinformation and make it appear as if there is a chance of violence during the Games,” Clint Watts, general manager of Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center, told CBS News.
Russian athletes will not be allowed to participate in the Games under their own flag due to the country’s large-scale 2022 competitions. invasion of Ukraine. Watts said the Russian government has a long history of operations related to the Olympics, and said the ban is likely “part of the motivation behind these operations.”
A CBS News investigation has revealed an early version of this latest fake CIA video on Telegram, a popular messaging app, posted by an influential Russian military blogger with 200,000 followers who regularly shares content from the Russian government and state media. Shortly afterwards, two identical articles – one in English and one in French – appeared on running bogus news websites by a separate Russian disinformation network.
From there it spread to other social media platforms including X, TikTok, Facebook and LinkedIn. CBS News estimates the video has been viewed at least 100,000 times.
CBS News
On June 13, a new video was published on Telegram branded France 24, claiming that a French official criticized the CIA for alarming the public about the terror threat in the Paris metro. CBS News confirmed that the video was fabricated, not produced by France24 and part of the same Russian disinformation network as the others.
Alexis Prokopiev, co-founder of the French human rights group Russie-Libertés, told CBS News that this is part of a broader strategy to undermine trust in American and European officials. “There is a clear strategy from Vladimir Putin himself to polarize opinions, to create more distrust of institutions.”
CBS News
European Union officials are investigating Meta and elections in early June. The EU is also investigating Telegram to determine whether the platform’s size qualifies for stricter regulation in Europe, similar to Meta and X.
A Meta spokesperson confirmed to CBS News that the latest fabricated CIA video violated CIA policy and has been removed from the platform. A TikTok spokesperson also confirmed to CBS News that the video had been removed for violating its community guidelines.
CBS News reached out to Telegram for comment and received an automated response. A TikTok spokesperson shared the company’s community guidelines in response to a request for comment, LinkedIn shared its false and misleading content policy but did not comment on the CIA video, and X did not respond to a request for comment.
Watts said he expects Russian networks to further ramp up disinformation tactics Olympics. This includes using trending news headlines to attract people to misleading posts and influence them to share the false content.
Watts said that the videos from this particular disinformation network are generally not widely shared or have much engagement outside of Russian channels, thanks in part to researchers who track and report on these operations.
