The United States on Wednesday announced a broad effort to push back on Russian influence campaigns in the 2024 election, trying to curb the Kremlin’s use of state-run media and fake news sites to sway American voters.

The actions include sanctions, indictments and seizing of web domains that U.S. officials say the Kremlin uses to spread propaganda and disinformation about Ukraine, which Russia invaded more than two years ago.

Attorney General Merrick B. Garland on Wednesday announced actions by the Justice Department, including the indictment of two Russian employees of RT, the state-owned broadcaster, who used a company in Tennessee to spread content, and the takedown of a Russian malign influence campaign known as Doppelganger.

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    • Buelldozer@lemmy.today
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      14 days ago

      What does YouTube have to do with this? I’m on YT quite a bit watching a wide array of content and I’ve yet to see anything thing Pro-Trump or Pro-Russian.

      • T00l_shed@lemmy.world
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        14 days ago

        It’s there, I also watched a wide variety of YT and it’s full of pro Russian and pro trump junk

        • Buelldozer@lemmy.today
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          14 days ago

          The closest I get to watching political content on YT is Peter Zeihan so the algorithm simply doesn’t put political junk in my feed. If you’re getting tons of politics, from either direction, in your feed its probably because you are watching political content on YT.

          That’s the best explanation I can come up with about why our experiences are so different.

          • T00l_shed@lemmy.world
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            14 days ago

            I do my best to avoid it, but I do watch things related to climate change, which for some reason some people thing is political.

          • takeda@lemmy.world
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            14 days ago

            Wouldn’t you be able to say the same thing about Facebook and Twitter?

            The issue with those networks is that they don’t react to reports. They also don’t allow to downvote.

            It is especially visible with YouTube which had downvoting from the start and decided to remove it despite user protests.

            They are tuned to promote controversial topics, which disinformation thrives with.

            • Buelldozer@lemmy.today
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              13 days ago

              Wouldn’t you be able to say the same thing about Facebook and Twitter?

              I don’t know. I haven’t used Xitter since before Elon took it over and I’m only on FB once every couple of months.

              It is especially visible with YouTube which had downvoting from the start and decided to remove it despite user protests.

              Wait, you don’t have a thumbs down button on YouTube?

              • takeda@lemmy.world
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                13 days ago

                Wait, you don’t have a thumbs down button on YouTube?

                I mean statistics. Now it makes it easier to simply ignore it and promote video to others despite it being unpopular (for example conspiracies).

      • osaerisxero@kbin.melroy.org
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        14 days ago

        Which is what will happen if you maintain a well curated feed. But most people don’t apply ‘dont recommend channel’ at the first sign of bullshit, so their feeds get filled with it in the fullness of time.

        • T00l_shed@lemmy.world
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          14 days ago

          I do! I kept spamming do not recommend on the shorts and it keeps pushing shit like that haha.

          • osaerisxero@kbin.melroy.org
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            14 days ago

            Do not recommend on videos doesn’t work in my experience, you have to do not recommend channel and then be consistent about not clicking on it when other similar content comes up

            • azimir
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              14 days ago

              I accidentally started a video way outside my usual feed. It was some right wing fascist starting to talk about replacement theory bullshit. I closed it fast, but it was like a starter gun for YT to race every kind of conspiracy theory, right wing, Nazi supporting, women hating, christofascist channel it could try out to me. I had to block channel after channel for weeks until it gave up.

            • T00l_shed@lemmy.world
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              14 days ago

              It’s hard because I would usually consume their videos on mobile. But instead I’ve just cut YT out of my life.

        • Buelldozer@lemmy.today
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          14 days ago

          I don’t even do that! I’ve just never spent any time watching political stuff on YT so presumably the algorithm knows I’m not interested in it and doesn’t show it to me.

  • floofloof@lemmy.ca
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    14 days ago

    seizing of web domains that U.S. officials say the Kremlin uses to spread propaganda and disinformation

    Maybe they could start with X/Twitter and Facebook.

  • EmpireInDecay
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    14 days ago

    AIPAC has spent $100m influencing US elections this year to ensure their preferred candidates win and we are supposed to believe Russia is the threat?

    • chuckleslord@lemmy.world
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      14 days ago

      Yeah, money is politics is bad. Also, foreign governments interfering in our elections is bad. You discovered the principle of more than one thing can be bad at once.

      • EmpireInDecay
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        14 days ago

        There are levels of bad, $100m in elections is by far worse

        • chuckleslord@lemmy.world
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          14 days ago

          No, fire hose of misinformation is worse. $100m buys a few races, maybe. Fire hose breaks down an entire societies’ trust in reality.

    • Zipitydew@sh.itjust.works
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      14 days ago

      Seriously? Your response to this is a whataboutism. And the topic is regarding Russian disinformation campaigns. Was the irony intended?

      • EmpireInDecay
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        14 days ago

        It needs to be addressed because one is being blatantly ignored, and the one being ignored is the larger of the threats

        • Zipitydew@sh.itjust.works
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          14 days ago

          The kleptocracy trying to get Trump elected (which means Palestine gets wiped out) is the less dangerous threat?

          Yeah I’m good. Have fun reposting this same broken logic talking point I’ve seen multiple .ml accounts spewing today.

          • OutForARip@lemmy.ca
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            13 days ago

            Less dangerous, are you fucking serious?

            You’re sacrificing Palestinians to genocide that you are largely responsible for it being able to happen at all, and your argument is ‘Well it’s a less dangerous threat to me’.

            Have some empathy.

          • EmpireInDecay
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            14 days ago

            If you haven’t noticed, Palestine is currently getting wiped out. I never claimed that Trump was a lesser evil or lesser threat because lesser evil or lesser threat does not exist

      • hark@lemmy.world
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        14 days ago

        Pointing out a more blatant and damaging form of election influence is not whataboutism.