Putin really wants Trump back in the White House
- Reference: 1726688063
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2024/09/18/russia_putin_trump_white_house/
- Source link:
Based on Redmond's latest research on foreign trolls' election interference efforts, the Kremlin has shifted its focus to fake news aimed at discrediting Vice President Kamala Harris and her run for the presidency now that incumbent Joe Biden has bowed out of the race.
In late August and September, two Moscow-aligned groups began pumping out phony video content "designed to discredit Harris and stoke controversy around her campaign," according to Microsoft's September 17 report
[1]PDF
.[2]
[3]Storm-1516 , a Putin-backed online troll farm known for its "outlandish fake videos and scandalous claims," produced said video content, with two pieces reaching a vast audience.
[4]
[5]
One purports to show alleged Harris supporters attacking a Trump rally attendee. "Storm-1516 intended this video, which received millions of views, to inflame political divides by stirring racial and political tensions," the threat intel unit reported.
The second video uses an actor to amplify false claims that Harris paralyzed a girl in a hit-and-run accident. This one was distributed through a fake website purporting to be a legit local San Francisco news outlet.
[6]
Meanwhile, [7]Storm-1679 , another Kremlin-linked crew, after focusing on the Paris Olympics for months, changed course to spread disinformation about Harris. Two of its videos spread conspiracy theories and false claims about her policies.
One of these that received more than 100,000 views on X just four hours after being posted on Telegram showed a phony New York City billboard promoting made-up policies.
"MTAC has observed, in three consecutive US presidential elections, synchronized shifts by all Russian influence actors to focus on denigrating the Democratic candidate in the final 90 days before election day," Redmond asserts. "MTAC assesses this synchronization on themes and messages results from top-down direction from the top of the Kremlin."
[8]White House seizes 32 domains, issues criminal charges in massive election-meddling crackdown
[9]Kremlin-linked COLDRIVER crooks take pro-democracy NGOs for phishy ride
[10]Despite Russia warnings, Western critical infrastructure remains unprepared
[11]Spamouflage trolls pretend to be American patriots on X, TikTok ahead of US presidential election
Additionally, a Russian group led by a Federal Security Service (FSB) officer that Microsoft tracks as Ruza Flood — the US government calls this disinformation effort Doppelgänger, and earlier this month [12]seized 32 internet domains owned by this crew — doesn't show any signs of slowing down its cyber-influence operations.
"In the days following the US government's seizures of Ruza Flood's web domains, we observed this actor moving media outlets from seized domains to new ones, where content can again be readily accessed," Microsoft wrote.
[13]
This gang uses typosquatted domains – sites with names that are close to legitimate ones — such as washingtonpost.pm rather than the real washingtonpost.com – to trick viewers into believing they are reading and watching content produced by reputable journos.
One of Doppelgänger's schemes to get Trump back in the White House, as detailed in a 277-page affidavit
[14]PDF
used to obtain a warrant to seize the 32 websites, is called the Good Old USA Project[15]PDF
."It makes sense for Russia to put a maximum effort to ensure that the US Political Party A point of view (first and foremost, the opinion of Candidate A supporters) wins over the US public opinion," according to this project.
While the candidates' names and political parties have been redacted, the rest of the document makes it clear that Party A is the Republican Party and Candidate A is Trump.
The American tycoon's [16]support for autocratic Russian leader Vladimir Putin – going so far as to describe the invasion of Ukraine as "genius" and "pretty savvy" – is well known.
No wonder the Kremlin's goal, as outlined in the court doc, is "to secure victory of a US Political Party A candidate (Candidate A or one of his current internal party opponents) at the US Presidential elections to be held in November of 2024." ®
Get our [17]Tech Resources
[1] https://cdn-dynmedia-1.microsoft.com/is/content/microsoftcorp/microsoft/msc/documents/presentations/CSR/MTAC-Election-Report-4.pdf
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/research&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2ZutNfyy2s6n4LgOvcE4magAAAIQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[3] https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2024/04/17/russia-us-election-interference-deepfakes-ai/
[4] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/research&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZutNfyy2s6n4LgOvcE4magAAAIQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/research&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZutNfyy2s6n4LgOvcE4magAAAIQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/research&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44ZutNfyy2s6n4LgOvcE4magAAAIQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://blogs.microsoft.com/on-the-issues/2024/06/02/russia-cyber-bots-disinformation-2024-paris-olympics/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/05/biden_cracks_down_on_putins/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/09/russia_coldriver_ngo_phishing/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/18/russia_west_critical_infrastructure/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/03/spamouflage_trolls_us_elections/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/05/biden_cracks_down_on_putins/
[13] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_security/research&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33ZutNfyy2s6n4LgOvcE4magAAAIQ&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[14] https://www.justice.gov/d9/2024-09/doppelganger_affidavit_9.4.24.pdf
[15] https://www.justice.gov/d9/2024-09/exhibits_8a_and_8b.pdf
[16] https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/mar/18/us-intelligence-trump-putin-threat
[17] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
Of course Putin wants Trump in power.
For those who missed it:
https://www.politico.com/news/2022/02/23/trump-putin-ukraine-invasion-00010923
This is an interesting take as you think Trump likes Putin with this supposed 'praising'. I would hazard a guess that you think people who you don't like or who hold opinions you disagree with are not as clever as you are because you must be smart for having the correct opinions. A very classic trap. What Putin did with the eastern parts of Ukraine was actually very clever, especially when he waited for a weak US leader in President Biden before really kicking off.
This is the same attitude that saw people laughing at Trump when he warned Germany about their reliance on Russian gas. "Trump is so stupid!!!1" Well Germany is in recession and their manufacturing industry is in serious trouble. And before anyone tries to claim otherwise, I work for a very large German manufacturing company and my German colleagues are on reduced hours and some are on basically a furlough scheme.
Make (some of North) America Grate Again
Just a reminder than in 2019 Mexican artist Cosimo Cavallaro made a wall of cheese 1,000 feet long on the Mexican-US border, in order to Make America Grate Again. It's not relevant to this article but reading this article made me sad and I like to be reminded that some people really put the effort into puns.
Eric Hoffer had Donald Trump COMPLETELY figured out YEARS AGO---
"I can never forget that one of the most gifted, best educated nations in the world, of its own free will, surrendered its fate into the hands of a maniac."
"Passionate hatred can give meaning and purpose to an empty life."
"It is by its promise of a sense of power that evil often attracts the weak."
"Rudeness is a weak imitation of strength."
"Rudeness luxuriates in the absence of self-respect."
"You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you. "
"It has often been said that power corrupts. But it is perhaps equally important to realize that weakness, too, corrupts. Power corrupts the few, while weakness corrupts the many. Hatred, malice, rudeness, intolerance, and suspicion ARE THE FAULTS OF WEAKNESS. The resentment of the weak does not spring from any injustice done to them but from their sense of inadequacy and impotence. We cannot win the weak by sharing our wealth with them. They feel our generosity as oppression."
"It is by its promise of a sense of power that evil often attracts the weak."
"A multitude of words is probably the most formidable means of blurring and obscuring thought. There is no thought, however momentous, that cannot be expressed lucidly in 200 words."
"I CAN NEVER FORGET THAT ONE OF THE MOST GIFTED, BEST EDUCATED NATIONS IN THE WORLD, OF ITS OWN FREE WILL, SURRENDERED ITS FATE INTO THE HANDS OF A MANIAC."
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"The only power a poet [philosopher] has is the ability to warn." --anon
Re: Eric Hoffer had Donald Trump COMPLETELY figured out YEARS AGO---
That's nice. We had peace and stability around the world when Trump was last in power.
Biden and Harris? Not so much!
Re: Eric Hoffer had Donald Trump COMPLETELY figured out YEARS AGO---
"Rudeness is a weak imitation of strength."
Does this apply to all the abuse and ad-hom attacks from the lefties on El Reg forums?
"You can discover what your enemy fears most by observing the means he uses to frighten you. "
Works both ways, the political establishment is utterly terrified of Trump as they have a cushy thing going lining their own pockets while they convince the plebs that only they can solve the very same problems they created.
"Hatred, malice, rudeness, intolerance, and suspicion ARE THE FAULTS OF WEAKNESS"
All traits of the political left. Now we wait for the replies proving my point :)
Good!
Trump in office means WW3 is much less likely which, in my book, is a good thing.
The Democrats need to wake up to the reality of the situation before it's too late. We are in a multipolar world now. China and the rest of the BRICS have Russia's back, since they know if Russia should fall they could be next. Gone are the days when the US was powerful enough to take on the rest of the world combined. The global south will no longer be coerced and bullied into submission.
Re: Good!
You're basically channeling Chamberlain and his appeasement strategy with Hitler. Didn't he look foolish when Hitler kept going. Anyone who thinks Putin would stop at Ukraine is a complete fucking moron. He's openly said he wants back Russia's empire days, which encompassed a lot more than Ukraine's land.
Microsoft's threat intelligence team
"Russia really wants Donald Trump to be the next US President, judging by reports from American government agencies and now Microsoft's threat intelligence team."
Remind us again how Microsoft is just a software company and not just a sidearm for the 3LAs.
So everyone in this group/team is a "Microsoft TIT" , that's nothing to be proud of.