Infomapping
Who is this research for, and how do you use it?
This resource is designed for researchers, journalists, policymakers, and anyone interested in understanding the dynamics of information ecosystems, particularly those influenced by state actors. A key element of this system is that it recognizes that not all parties that are a part of and that support proregime ecosystems necessarily do so willfully.
It provides a methodology for identifying and classifying sources based on their behavior rather than opinion or speculation. This approach reduces bias and improves the consistency and reproducibility of research.
Use cases for this resource may include:
- Academic research: Scholars in a range of fields that address media manipulation and information disorder, like public health, journalism, decision science, risk assessment, crisis response, and others, could use this methodology to identify sources for their research and to classify those sources in a consistent, unbiased way.
- Journalism: Journalists from a range of fields could use this resource to understand the role websites play in different issue- or regime-supportive information ecosystems. This context is often difficult to understand without a birds-eye view of the connections between sources. This resource aims to provide that.
- Policymaking: Government officials or policy analysts could use this resource to understand the dynamics of information ecosystems, in this case, about pro-regime information ecosystems. This could better inform policy aims, which must understand the complex and nuanced roles within the information landscape.
- Public education: Educators or activists could use this resource to help the public understand the dynamics of information ecosystems and develop critical media literacy skills.
What does it mean for a source to be included in an ecosystem?
The inclusion of a source does not inherently indicate anything negative. We define "proregime" as framing, arguments, or ideas endorsed, promoted, or implied by regime officials, employees, representatives, allies, or contract workers. The "proregime" label does not indicate whether something is true, false, misleading, or otherwise.
The only information that can be gleaned from a source’s inclusion in a specific ecosystem is that it met the criteria outlined below for inclusion. This system recognizes and hopes to highlight that people can unknowingly support proregime information networks; whether it's intentional matters little, as this is not something that search engines and algorithms can discern or consider.
Whether the classification as a proregime website is positive or negative goes beyond the scope of this methodology and is not addressed. Outlets are classified as Tier 1, Tier 2, or Tier 3. Subtypes include Multistate and Interface, so far. There are more Subtypes that will be added in the future.
- While some of these outlets have concrete ties to the state, some included in the data do not. Consent is not required to backlink a website.
- Inclusion in the database should not be regarded as an assertion that an outlet is affiliated with a regime, nor that content is false, misleading, or otherwise nefarious. Again, this goes beyond the scope of this methodology.
Criteria for inclusion in a proregime ecosystem
Entities included in this information ecosystem report met one of three criteria.
- The website is recognized by the US federal government or an intelligence agency from one of the Five Eyes (Canada, Australia, New Zealand, the United Kingdom, and the United States) as a proregime or regime agent.
- The website is recognized as proregime or another comparable label by a research organization or media manipulation specialty outlet that employs qualified scientists, researchers, ethical investigative journalists, or other appropriate experts and shares the evidence supporting their conclusions.
- Outlets or organizations engaging in any one of the following:
- Repeatedly publishing, promoting, or citing proregime content or authors from an outlet that meets criteria one or two,
- A Tier 1 organization or representative owns another outlet’s domain, oversees editorial decisions, or provides funding to a website.
- The website owner has previously produced content for the Russian state through overt propaganda like RT or covert, such as the outlets controlled by the GRU or FSB. Alternately, the website may have published—generally false or misleading content—that can be tied to Russia, as with the 2017 Ukraine “biolabs” story published by GRU front, Cyber Berkut. Russian and Chinese state-affiliated accounts boosted the story on social media.
- A website shares or has shared a partnership with a Tier 1 or Tier 2 entity. This can be identified through disclosure on only one of the partner sites if the claim goes legally uncontested. Other avenues for identification include public records, reporting from reliable news outlets, public statements by people who have or have had an affiliation with the outlet, or other behavior that suggests intentional collaboration. Anything a disinterested, informed party might reasonably argue is a coincidence does not fulfill this requirement.
- Self-disclosure through public statements, public records, social media posts, and ethically obtained personal communications.
Why map an information ecosystem?
The report “Russian Media Landscape: Structures, Mechanisms, and Technologies of Information Operations,” published in October 2021 by the NATO Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence, explains how Russia manipulates public information spaces using legal means.
A ‘cloud enemy’ is a proxy agent in the theatre of hybrid war who acts to inflict damage and subvert operations on the enemy’s home front by, for example, carrying out cyber-attacks against critical structures, influencing foreign public opinion leaders, or introducing agents of influence into the leadership of political parties, government structures, and defence management bodies. Any and all damage to the enemy is sanctioned as long as it falls short of triggering an actual military conflict. Among the most important and productive areas in which cloud enemies can operate to spread Russian influence ‘legally’ are Western public information spaces.
Malign influence refers to legal actions that, over time, have the intention and effect of an attack. A clear and uniform classification system with definitions would reduce bias and improve research consistency, reproducibility, and observation quality. Being transparent in observations and rationale would help people understand which actions may benefit proregime information ecosystems.
Tier Descriptions
Tier 1
Key Elements:
- Majority-owned OR -funded without editorial independence OR -operated by other state authority.
- Proregime content, which we define as framing, arguments, or ideas endorsed, promoted, or implied by regime officials, employees, representatives, allies, or contract workers.
Outlets categorized under the state's control are owned by someone living in or based in the regime state, like Russia or Belarus, for example, as press freedom does not exist in those states. Outlets receiving more than half of their funding from the state with no editorial independence or under the oversight of intelligence or other officials may be classified as regime-controlled, even if located elsewhere and funded by other means.
To illustrate categorization, let us imagine an outlet operated by an American living in Russia. This would be classified as a Tier 1 website because press freedom, practically speaking, does not exist in the Russian state.
Over 100 new laws restricting the press since the renewed invasion of Ukraine, and many dead and disappeared journalists, some of whom evidence suggests may have been killed at the behest of the Russian state. We also heard or read the testimonies of journalists harassed or attacked. Based on this and the international press freedom evaluations, we assume no press freedom.
Tier 1 outlets include RT, Sputnik, TASS, South Front, News Front, New Eastern Outlook, and Factor GMO.
Tier 2
Key elements:
- A significant relationship with a Tier 1 website or connection with the Russian state that the outlet fails to disclose.
- Creating or amplifying proregime content, which we define as framing, arguments, or ideas endorsed, promoted, or implied by regime officials, employees, representatives, allies, or contract workers.
Hoaxlines Lab defines a Tier 2 website as proregime with at least one link to a Tier 1. Links are relationships or shared employees or assets between a Tier 1 and Tier 2 website. Tier 2 websites are not in the Russian language and may conceal or deny any relationship to outlets or individuals affiliated with the Russian state.
A visitor to a Tier 2 site may not identify it as a proregime website because it may cover the national politics of a country besides Russia, which is the case with OneWorld.Press. Actions that fulfill the requirement for a significant link between the two websites include:
- Public records showing a Tier 1 owns or manages a Tier 2 outlet, shared AdSense or Analytics ID numbers, shared address, shared phone numbers, or shared tax status identifiers like two outlets sharing a tax-exempt EIN.
- Disclosure of a partnership or collaboration between a Tier 1 and Tier 2 website, including past partnerships. Only one party must recognize the collaboration if the recognition goes legally uncontested.
- Authors or employees of a Tier 1 website also write for the possible Tier 2 website or employees of a Tier 2 website being interviewed or platformed by a Tier 2 website.
- Publishing or hiring a current or former employee of a Tier 1 outlet, but only if the potential Tier 2 website also creates or amplifies proregime narratives identifiable in Tier 1 outlets.
- Repeated republishing of the content from Tier 1 or a Tier 1 website repeatedly republishing the Tier 2 website. Still, there are instances where the relationship goes in one direction, and the amplification is significant, as in the case of Reseau International. The most robust evidence would be mutual republication, citation, or promotion.
To qualify as Tier 2, republishing must repeatedly occur—three or more articles in two years—regardless of whether the content is withdrawn or removed from the site. The time frame reflects the significant periods some writers take to produce content. Global Research, Off-Guardian, and Greanville Post fall into Tier 2 because they have partnered with Tier 1 websites.
Tier 3
Key elements:
- No significant relationship with a nation-state or a Tier 1 or Tier 2 publication.
- Amplifies or creates proregime content or is repeatedly republished by the state if the content is misleading or false.
As one may intuit, content creators and amplifiers either generate content that frequently favors the regime’s preferred narrative–which requires no collaboration or cooperation–or republishes content from Tier 1 and Tier 2 regularly. Regularly is defined as at least one piece of content per month for three consecutive months. At the same time, this may seem like a small amount of content, but maintaining a high percentage of quality reporting is key to effective disinformation.
The audience experience with the outlet providing reliable, complete information increases the believability and subjective impression of truth when viewing misleading or false content. For this reason, websites that publish non-stop propaganda may have a smaller devoted readership but fail to reach a wider audience.
In contrast, an outlet like the state-controlled Russia Today reaches a much larger audience. This may be related to quality, respectable reporting by the outlet, which means reaching people not seeking conspiracy content or proregime views.
Tier 3 websites include Reseau International and The Unz Review.
Subtypes
Some websites have a subtype, which means they perform a unique role or specific function in the information network. Not all websites have a subtype, but they also belong to a tiered category if they do. For instance, a website can be a Tier 1 outlet if the Russian state controls it, and it can also be part of the Multistate subtype if it publishes content from another authoritarian state, such as China or Iran.
New subtypes will be added in the future.
Interfaces
Key Elements:
- Respected scholars publish content on the website.
- Actors with a history of spreading disinformation have also published work on the site.
- Reliable and unreliable websites alike cite the outlet.
This section was the most difficult to define. Websites in this category have published proregime disinformation or authors known to create or amplify content for the state. The difference between Tier 2 and Interface is that Interface websites publish expert commentary and may have relationships with legitimate scholarly organizations. The desire for a website to avoid public scandal could be weaponized against interface websites.
Outlets in this category maintain credibility and may be cited by reliable and unreliable websites. Addressing them may present a social or political conundrum because of the potential for an offense by the truly respectable parties associated with the site. Media manipulation tactics in content from proregime actors published on interface websites may be more subtle–the seemingly well-reasoned historical revisionist essay, the carefully framed policy proposal that uses false equivalency.
Although only one outlet exists in this category at this time, it is an area that warrants more attention because of the potential for influencing people who are themselves highly influential or authoritative in their field.
An example of an Interface website is Modern Diplomacy.EU because it has been cited by the Washington Post, anti-abortion website LifeSiteNews, and the Russian Foreign Ministry, which lists Modern Diplomacy.EU as a partner on its website.
Multi-state
Key elements:
- Publishes content or promotes outlets aligned with more than one nation-state.
- Websites within that nation-state's ecosystem backlink the website or organization. For example, websites within the proregime ecosystem backlink to InfoBRICS. InfoBRICS promotes Russian state-affiliated outlets and supports proregime messaging from Iran and China.
Multi-state organizations may exert influence through policy, social alliances, or financial contributions. These organizations include individuals or outlets that are part of the proregime ecosystem but may also include countries like China or Iran and represent a collaborative effort by foreign states. An example of a website categorized as Multi-state is the InfoBRICS website or The Alt World, which shares a Google Analytics ID with Iranian websites.
The Alt World has worked with outlets and authors known for working for or collaborating with the Russian state: Scott Ritter (article), Alastair Crooke (article), Eva Bartlett (article), and Dilyana Gaytandzhieva (article). While no concrete link exists between this website and Russia, it is a prolific amplifier and pro-Kremlin content creator.
Dilyana Gaytandzhieva republished the GRU-authored bioweapon disinformation article about bioweapons in Ukraine on her website (2022). The Alt World appears tied to the Iranian information ecosystem and shares an IP address with nearly 200 websites. Many of the websites end in “.ir,” indicating they are likely Iranian websites. The Alt World also shares a Google Adsense ID (ua-141828316) with another website, bsof.ir. At least one of the IP addresses appears to route through Germany.