Title: Analyzing Russian Information Warfare and Influence Operations | Global Security Review
Headings: Analyzing Russian Information Warfare and Influence Operations
Analyzing Russian Information Warfare and Influence Operations
Social media and the access it provides to voter data give Russian active measures the ability to influence the outcome of an election
What is Information Warfare?
The Cyber Component
The Security Gap
Sophia Porotsky

Content: the Darker Side of Big Data, investigates the involvement of an ethically dubious “election management” firm in the 2016 presidential elections. It is necessary to consider Donald Trump’s role, complicit or otherwise, in propagating Russia’s ‘active measures’ on social media. It is also imperative to scrutinise the campaign’s use of the data analysis company, Cambridge Analytica, whose exploitation of social media enables “micro-targeted” political messaging to reach individual voters with unprecedented precision. It’s increasingly clear that both Russia and the Trump campaign harnessed social media to influence public opinion, suppress voter segments, and arguably steer the outcome of an election. The first instalment in this series will take a closer look at the concept of Information Warfare, how cyber ties into this strategy, and identify the security gap that leaves the United States vulnerable to Russia’s hostile actions. What is Information Warfare? Russian Information Warfare ( informatsionaya voyna) is rooted in Soviet thinking, dating back to the beginning of the Cold War in the form of spetspropaganda (special propaganda). Information warfare is a “holistic concept that includes computer network operations, electronic warfare, psychological operations, and information operations.” The 2010 Military Doctrine of the Russian Federation says that these measures are implemented “to achieve political objectives without the utilization of military force.” In contrast to Soviet propaganda—which the regime went to great lengths to proclaim as the truth—modern Russian information warfare does not prioritize this, modern information warfare seeks to plant seeds of doubt and distrust;