On May 17th, 2024, the European Council adopted a new package of EU sanctions directed against Russia, suspending the broadcasting activities of four major pro-Russian media outlets in Europe. Since the sanctioned platforms have been heavily involved in the spread of disinformation surrounding Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine, the ban of these outlets seems like an obvious and necessary step. However, given how easily Russian actors have been able to circumvent the blocking of media outlets, the question arises as to how effective the sanctions actually are.
Sanctions as a tool to limit Russian influence abroad
Sanctions generally aim to exert political and economic pressure on governments and to ensure the compliance with international norms and the maintenance of the rules-based order. They usually come in the shape of narrow or broad export bans – ranging from measures targeted at individual firms to the blocking of entire economic sectors. In the context of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine since February 2022, the sanctions go beyond these two objectives. This is because Russia is waging a war of aggression against Ukraine, which has a distinct hybrid dimension, while also targeting Western countries with severe disinformation. In the course of this hybrid warfare, Russia is increasingly making attempts to influence public opinion abroad, especially in countries that support Ukraine financially and militarily. These attempts have become gradually more successful over the course of the war, and propagandistic narratives are increasingly gaining footholds among the European public, in line with the growing resonance of Russian disinformation over the course of the war.
These tendencies have societal and political consequences. Russian conspiracy narratives are picked up and spread further by groups susceptible to them, such as right-wing sympathizers as well as left-wing populists and Eurosceptics. These groups incite agitation against Ukrainian refugees or politicians blamed for political decisions passed in the context of the war, e.g., the energy crisis in autumn 2022. In this way, these narratives cause direct damage within the population, stirring fear and panic as well as hatred and violence against marginalized groups of people.
In general, the Russian disinformation campaigns are directly aimed at weakening Western democracies. This is why these campaigns are increasingly targeted, especially since the beginning of the Russian war of aggression, most prominently by the European Union. The EU aims to counter the disinformation attempts through different means, including exposing disinformation, promoting media literacy, and sanctioning the outlets spreading disinformation. These types of sanctions are unusual when compared to conventional sanctions, because they do not pursue the usual objectives of exerting political and economic pressure on elites in the target countries. Rather, they aim to limit attempts by Russia to exert influence on public opinion in Europe.
Sanctioning pro-Russian media – the case of RT
As part of the first sanctions package adopted shortly after the beginning of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the EU banned the broadcasting of the infamous Russian media outlet RT (formerly Russia Today) across its 27 member states. Since channels such as RT are a central tool of the Russian government for the spread of disinformation outside of Russia, the European Commission has considered the ban of these platforms an effective measure to curb Russian attempts of influencing public opinion within the EU. However, the effectiveness of these sanctions can be called into question: Despite being formally banned, platforms can still be accessed in some EU member states, and Russian actors have quickly found ways to circumvent sanctions and continue their spread of disinformation and propaganda.
This can be illustrated most strikingly by the example of RT. After the EU-wide ban of RT in March 2022, the platform saw a significant drop in visitors. This drop can mainly be attributed to the blocking of the key domains by search engines.
Most domains held by RT could nonetheless still be accessed directly in the majority of EU member states almost two years after the Russian aggression, even without the use of VPN services. The reason for this is that the implementation and enforcement of EU sanctions is the responsibility of member states, who in turn must task local service providers with the banning of listed domains. This process was not sufficiently tracked by the EU, given the ongoing accessibility of many listed domains.
Domain blocking – not an obstacle to Russia’s propaganda
However, even the effective blocking of media outlets such as RT does not prevent Russian actors from continuing to spread propagandistic narratives in Europe. On the contrary, a report by the Institute for strategic dialogue (ISD) has shown how easily bans can be circumvented by the Russian side. In fact, following the sanctions package adopted in March 2022, it has become clear that the blocking of platforms has led to a diversification of Russian disinformation strategies and that attempts to influence opinion by the Russian side have shifted to other avenues.
Several strategies have become apparent. Since the ban of RT, Russia has started to use so-called “mirror websites”. These websites are an exact copy of banned RT websites which use a different, oftentimes randomized URL, allowing for supposedly banned articles to be published under a different domain. While these mirror websites are now increasingly detected and blocked correspondingly, they could easily be accessed until recently without any major obstacles.
Links to mirror websites and RT articles published elsewhere were also being massively shared via different social media platforms by profiles that could be traced back to actors affiliated with RT. This strategy allowed content produced by RT to continue to be distributed despite official channels being blocked.
Yet another strategy employed by Russian actors is the publication of articles initially published by RT elsewhere, including on unrelated websites or social media platforms such as YouTube. They increasingly spread disinformation on platforms that cannot be as easily controlled and restricted and on which the connection to Russian official actors can be concealed more easily, such as through Telegram channels. Moreover, Russian actors use so-called “doppelgänger campaigns” to copy the webpages of reputable Western media outlets and use them for the spread of disinformation under a false flag.
How effective can the ban of pro-Russian media outlets be?
Do these developments imply that the EU-imposed ban of Russian media platforms does not have any significant impact? Not necessarily. Attempts to restrict the influence of Russian propaganda do have an effect on the accessibility of the sites targeted by the ban, and they notably impair Russian actors in their capabilities. However, in light of the massive circumvention of platform bans by Russian actors, their effectiveness is called into question. Although the blocking of Russian media outlets – in the case of RT – more than two years after their ban, has now been implemented more thoroughly, the examples brought up in the article indicate how fast and dynamically the bans can be circumvented. Thus, rather than using platform bans as a central tool to limit disinformation, the EU should employ strategies aimed at the debunking and pre-bunking of information that are easily accessible and at best platform-integrated. Especially on social media this would be a crucial step, as they take on a central role for the dissemination of disinformation.
2024 marks a year of significant political elections in both Europe and the United States. Considering the significant role Russian disinformation plays and its potential to influence election outcomes, targeting and debunking Russian disinformation has to become a central aim both on the national and international level.
Generally, the spread of disinformation cannot be stopped entirely through a ban of Russian-controlled media outlets, but merely slowed down. However, this certainly does not mean that the European Union and its member states are powerless in the face of disinformation campaigns conducted by Russia. Rather, the diversification of Russian disinformation strategies must be more thoroughly considered on an institutional level, and newly implemented measures must take Russia’s ever-shifting strategies into account. Also, considering the obstacles in the implementation of platform bans, a more strategic and central approach by the EU is advisable.
Tabea Böing
