The Russian one-stop shop for influence goes global

The Pravda Network, initially identified by French disinformation watchdog Viginum, has recently expanded its scope of topics, targeted countries and audiences. This expansion places it as one of the most virulent, rapidly evolving informational threats against Europe.

This network of domains and subdomains currently targets audiences based on country, language, organisation, or even based on personalities. Dedicated domains for example target United States President Donald Trump, German Chancellor Olaf Sholz or French President Emmanuel Macron.

The network primarily targets Western audiences, in the United States, France, Germany, United Kingdom. Websites in English, French and German are the most active. With the newest expansion of the network to linguistic minorities in Europe, the Pravda network may attempt to create divisions with the targeted audiences. 

As highlighted by several publications, and confirmed by our technical analysis and collection of over 122,000 articles published by the network, the Pravda Network is a content aggregator sourcing its published content from third party sources. Its objective is to be a one-stop shop of Russian curated content for influence.

Primary sources of content are Russian mainstream and  influence media outlets (TASS, Russia Today), but also more “aggressive” news houses such as Tsargrad TV, owned by oligarch Konstantin Malofeev, or Newsfront, a website associated with the FSB.

The surprisingly important volume of content shared from Tsargrad and NewsFront, which feature within the top 15 sources of content, immediately after major Russian media such as TASS, Russia Today or RIA Novosti, may indicate the involvement of either Konstantin Malofeev and/or the FSB behind the Pravda Network. There is very little explanation over why these websites feature so prominently, whilst similar and more prolific sources of content are available (Oriental Review, New Eastern Outlook…).

The majority of the sources of content are Telegram channels. The effectiveness of the Pravda Network’s own Telegram channels appears extremely limited.

Previously identified disinformation and influence networks, such as African Initiative or InfoDefense, are regularly used as news sources by the Pravda Network.

Pravda network also sources content from foreign citizens supporting Russia. The ecosystem is composed of pro-Russian supporters, but also more sophisticated influence channels such as France’s Stratpol.

The Pravda network is hosted through Content Delivery Network provider CloudFare, one of the world’s largest. Should legal actions and sanctions be formally taken against the network, it will force the migration of their hosted services to a new service provider, leading to some degree of at least temporary disruption.

Download our report in English: here