| [I00084 Russia turns its diplomats into disinformation warriors](../../generated_pages/incidents/I00084.md) | <i>“After the European Union banned Kremlin-backed media outlets and social media giants demoted their posts for peddling falsehoods about the war in Ukraine, Moscow has turned to its cadre of diplomats, government spokespeople and ministers — many of whom have extensive followings on social media — to promote disinformation about the conflict in Eastern Europe, according to four EU and United States officials.”</i><br><br>In this example authentic Russian government officials used their own accounts to promote false narratives (T0143.001: Authentic Persona, T0097.111: Government Official Persona).<br><br>The use of accounts managed by authentic Government / Diplomats to spread false narratives makes it harder for platforms to enforce content moderation, because of the political ramifications they may face for censoring elected officials (T0131: Exploit TOS/Content Moderation). For example, Twitter previously argued that official channels of world leaders are not removed due to the high public interest associated with their activities. |
