The Microsoft Threat Analysis Center released a new report on Tuesday that reveals a shift in Russia’s efforts to influence the U.S. elections from “denigrating President Biden to undermining the new Democratic nominee Vice President Harris.” MTAC observed a “synchronized shift” by three Russian influence operation actors – Storm-1516, Ruza Flood (also known as Doppelganger), and Storm-1679- towards undermining the current Vice President.
Russian actors apparently struggled to pivot their operations after President Biden bowed out of the race in July, but Microsoft tracked an uptick in “outlandish fake conspiracy theories” being spread by the Russian actor Storm-1516 by late August. For example, Microsoft points to two inauthentic videos that attack Harris and her campaign, each of which received millions of views online.
The first false video depicts an attack by alleged Harris supporters on a supposed Trump rally attendee. The second video used an even more sophisticated method to spread a false narrative about Harris: Russians created a fake “local San Francisco media outlet” and laundered the video through that fake publication. The video used an actor to state false claims that Harris paralyzed a girl during a 2011 hit-and-run accident.
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In an accompanying blog post, Clint Watts, the general manager of Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center describes the shift as “aimed at exploiting any perceived vulnerabilities in the new candidates.” He notes that the public should expect Russian actors to continue to use cyber proxies and hacktivist groups to amplify messages in the lead-up to the election, adding they’ll be spreading divisive political content, staged videos, and AI-enhanced propaganda.
The team at Microsoft noted that the other Russian influence actor, Storm-1679, had been focused on spreading disinformation about France and the Olympics, but also shifted efforts at the beginning of September to advancing conspiracy theories and false claims about Harris’ policy.
Iranian and Chinese-backed efforts remain on the radar of the intelligence community and the MTAC team, who say in their report that Iranians will continue their activity, which could even include hacking efforts. The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the FBI, and CISA released a joint statement in August after Iran appeared to hack into former President Trump’s campaign through an outsider adviser and then peddled stolen documents to media outlets. MTAC also noted in Tuesday’s report that China seeks to seed doubt and confusion among American voters instead of directly backing a particular candidate or party. Scripps News previously reported on a network of inauthentic Chinese election influence operations dubbed “Spamouflage.”
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Microsoft has released previous reports on 2024 election influence operations and anticipates one final pre-election update to come out in mid-October. Brad Smith, the vice chair and president of Microsoft, is expected to testify before a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Wednesday with other technology companies about foreign threats to this year’s elections.
