RT and Sputnik still reach US audiences despite Big Tech suppression on behalf of Ukraine
Silicon Valley’s efforts to suppress “Russian propaganda” – meaning outlets like RT and Sputnik – on behalf of Ukraine may have reduced their reach, but they still reach more Americans than before the outbreak of fighting in Ukraine, Microsoft has revealed in a report on the ongoing cyber-war on the side of Kiev. RT and Sputnik still get as many monthly page views as a major US corporate outlet, the tech company said.
Kiev has relied on a “coalition of countries, companies, and NGOs” for cyber defense, moving its digital infrastructure to the public cloud hosted in the West, according to the report titled “Defending Ukraine: Early Lessons from the Cyber War,”published on Wednesday and signed by Brad Smith, president and vice chair of Microsoft.
The 30-page pamphlet seeks to label any news reports coming out of Russia as Kremlin propaganda and “global cyber influence operations” to support the war effort in Ukraine. They “combine tactics developed by the KGB over several decades with new digital technologies and the internet” to “take advantage of the longstanding openness of democratic societies and the public polarization that is characteristic of current times,” according to Smith.
Microsoft claims that “Russian cyber influence operations” led to an 82% increase in the spread of propaganda in the US and 216% in Ukraine, and that “the tech sector’s efforts in early March to curtail the amplification of narratives from RT and Sputnik likely helped reduce the spread of Russian propaganda back to pre-February levels.”
According to Microsoft’s estimates, RT and Sputnik still get anywhere from 60-80 million average monthly page views in the US, making alleged Russian influence “on par with a major publication like the Wall Street Journal.”
The company co-founded by Bill Gates bases these estimates and assessments on the Russian Propaganda Index (RPI), a tool developed by its “AI For Good Lab.” The lab has also used “a wide variety of internet sources and other identifying characteristics” to determine and even predict which sites might be considered Russian propaganda online, relying in part on outfits like NewsGuard and the Global Disinformation Index (GDI).
The US has a constitutional ban on overt censorship, but the Silicon Valley-based YouTube has blocked access to “Russian state media” channels across the globe since the conflict in Ukraine broke out.
Having blocked RT and Sputnik in the European Union on March 1 at the request of EU governments, YouTube announced days later that it was expanding this censorship globally, and including all channels “associated with Russian state-funded media.”
The EU’s Council of Ministers banned RT and Sputnik on March 2, citing the conflict in Ukraine, and said it would remain in effect until Russia stops conducting what it called, “disinformation and information manipulation actions against the EU and its member states.” Australia, Canada and the UK have followed suit.
RT (Russia Today) is a state-owned news organization funded by the Russian government. The information provided by this news source is being included by the Libertarian Hub not as an endorsement of the Russian government, but rather because it is being actively censored by Big Tech, Western governments and the corporate press. During times of conflict it is imperative that we have access to both sides of the story so we can form our own opinions, even if both sides are spewing their own propaganda. The censorship of RT, despite likely being a propaganda outfit for the Russian government, reduces our ability to hear one side of the conflict. For that reason, the Libertarian Hub will temporarily republish the RSS feed from RT. Visit https://rt.com
