The Consequences of the Internet for Russia's Informational Influence Abroad

Project Information

RUSINFORM

Grant agreement ID: 819025

DOI

10.3030/819025

Project closed

EC signature date 2 October 2019

Start date 1 November 2019

End date 31 October 2025

Funded under

• EXCELLENT SCIENCE - European Research Council (ERC)

Total cost

€ 1 999 535,00

EU contribution

€ 1 999 535,00

Coordinated by

UNIVERSITAT PASSAU
Germany

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Links to deliverables and publications from FP7 projects, as well as links to some specific result types such as dataset and software, are dynamically retrieved from OpenAIRE .

Publications

Book chapters (1)

Wie die Herrschaftselite Russlands den Krieg kommuniziert – „Strategische Regierungskommunikation“ in einer personalistischen Autokratie

Author(s): Florian Toepfl, Arista Beseler
Published in: Krieg der Narrative, Issue 2023, 2024, Page(s) 33-46
Publisher: De Gruyter
DOI: 10.1515/9783111331508-003

Non-peer reviewed articles (5)

Trolls Behind the Mask of Journalists: How Yevgeny Prigozhin’s Patriot Media Group Was Organized

Author(s): Serge Poliakoff
Published in: Problems of Post-Communism, Issue 72, 2025, Page(s) 416-428, ISSN 1075-8216
Publisher: M.E. Sharpe Inc.
DOI: 10.1080/10758216.2024.2438336

The Kremlin-Controlled Search Engine Yandex as a Tool of Foreign Propaganda

Author(s): Kravets, Daria; Beseler, Arista; Toepfl, Florian; Ryzhova, Anna
Published in: Russian Analytical Digest, Issue 2024, 2024, ISSN 1863-0421
Publisher: ETH Zurich
DOI: 10.3929/ethz-b-000673162

Wie deutschsprachige alternative Medien vom Kreml unterwandert und instrumentalisiert werden

Author(s): Arista Beseler
Published in: Russland-Analysen, Issue 2024, 2024, Page(s) 2-4, ISSN 1613-3390
Publisher: Forschungsstelle Osteuropa
DOI: 10.31205/ra.456.01

Nach dem Aufstand: der Untergang von Jewgenij Prigoschins digitalem Imperium

Author(s): Serge Poliakoff
Published in: Russland-Analysen, Issue 2024, 2025, Page(s) 16-20, ISSN 1613-3390
Publisher: Research Centre for East European Studies at the University of Bremen
DOI: 10.31205/ra.464.03

Brutalisierung und Repression

Author(s): Florian Töpfl
Published in: osteuropa, Issue 75, 2025, Page(s) 351-364, ISSN 0030-6428
Publisher: Wissenschaftliche Verlagsgesellschaft mbH
DOI: 10.35998/oe-2025-022

Peer reviewed articles (14)

Who are the plotters behind the pandemic? Comparing Covid-19 conspiracy theories in Google search results across five key target countries of Russia's foreign communication

Author(s): Florian Toepfl; Daria Kravets; Anna Ryzhova; Arista Beseler
Published in: Information, Communication & Society, 2022, Page(s) 1-19, ISSN 1468-4462
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
DOI: 10.1080/1369118x.2022.2065213

Conduits of the Kremlin’s Informational Influence Abroad? How German-Language Alternative Media Outlets Are Connected to Russia’s Ruling Elites.

Author(s): Arista Beseler; Florian Toepfl
Published in: The International Journal of Press/Politics, Issue February 20, 2024, 2024, Page(s) 1-20, ISSN 1940-1612
Publisher: SAGE Publications
DOI: 10.1177/19401612241230284

The Consequences of Evidence- Versus Non-Evidence-Based Understandings of the “Truth”: How Russian Speakers in Germany Negotiate Trust in Their Transnational News Environments.

Author(s): Anna Ryzhova; Florian Toepfl
Published in: The International Journal of Press/Politics, Issue June 12, 2024, 2024, ISSN 1940-1612
Publisher: SAGE Publications
DOI: 10.1177/19401612241257872

Mapping the website and mobile app audiences of Russia’s foreign communication outlets, RT and Sputnik, across 21 countries

Author(s): Julia Kling, Florian Toepfl, Neil Thurman, Richard Fletcher
Published in: Harvard Misinformation Review, Issue 3(6), 2022, ISSN 2766-1652
Publisher: Harvard Kennedy School, Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy
DOI: 10.37016/mr-2020-110

Different platforms, different plots? The Kremlin-controlled search engine Yandex as a resource for Russia’s informational influence in Belarus during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Author(s): Arista Beseler; Daria Kravets; Anna Ryzhova; Florian Toepfl;
Published in: Journalism, Issue 24(12), 2023, Page(s) 2762-2780, ISSN 1464-8849
Publisher: SAGE Publications
DOI: 10.1177/14648849231157845

Gauging reference and source bias over time: how Russia’s partially state-controlled search engine Yandex mediated an anti-regime protest event

Author(s): Daria Kravets, F. Toepfl
Published in: Information, Communication & Society, Issue 25(15), 2021, Page(s) 1-17, ISSN 1369-118X
Publisher: Routledge
DOI: 10.1080/1369118x.2021.1933563

Facebook, the EU and Russia’s war: Challenges of moderating authoritarian news

Author(s): Julia Kling, Serge Poliakoff
Published in: Internet Policy Review, Issue 14, 2025, ISSN 2197-6775
Publisher: Internet Policy Review
DOI: 10.14763/2025.3.2036

Search Engines as “Globalizing Machines”: International News Flow Through Google During the 2020 Belarusian Presidential Election

Author(s): Kravets, Daria
Published in: International Journal Of Communication, Issue 18(2024), 2024, Page(s) 2577-2597, ISSN 1932-8036
Publisher: USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism
DOI: 10.1080/15213260701813454

Googling in Russian Abroad: How Kremlin-Affiliated Websites Contribute to the Visibility of COVID-19 Conspiracy Theories in Search Results

Author(s): Toepfl Florian; Ryzhova Anna; Kravets Daria; Beseler, Arista
Published in: International Journal of Communication, Issue 17, 2023, Page(s) 1126-1146, ISSN 1932-8036
Publisher: USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7612297

ANO Dialog: innovation in controlling Russia’s digital information

Author(s): Serge Poliakoff, F. Toepfl, J. Kling
Published in: Post-Soviet Affairs, Issue 2025, 2025, Page(s) 1-24, ISSN 1060-586X
Publisher: V.H. Winston and Sons, Inc.
DOI: 10.1080/1060586x.2025.2559218

Mapping the Global Audiences of Russia’s Domestic News:How Social Networks Function as Transmitters of Authoritarian News to Foreign Audiences

Author(s): Julia Kling
Published in: International Journal of Communication, Issue 16, 2022, Page(s) 4050–4072, ISSN 1932-8036
Publisher: USC Annenberg School for Communication & Journalism
DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.7113552

Motivated by political beliefs, not only by language: How Russian speakers in Germany compose their transnational news repertoires

Author(s): Anna Ryzhova
Published in: Sage Journals - Journalism, Issue 25(1), 2024, Page(s) 218-237, ISSN 1464-8849
Publisher: SAGE Publications
DOI: 10.1177/14648849221130557

Yandex’s Top-5 News as a Tool of Russia’s Propaganda Abroad: A Case Study of Belarus

Author(s): Daria Kravets
Published in: The International Journal of Press/Politics, Issue 2025, 2025, ISSN 1940-1612
Publisher: SAGE Publications
DOI: 10.1177/19401612251349018

Entertainment interspersed with propaganda: how non-legacy-news accounts deliver explicitly political content to mass audiences on Russia’s most popular social network VK

Author(s): Julia Kling, Florian Toepfl, Pascal Jürgens
Published in: Information, Communication & Society, Issue 28, 2025, Page(s) 1252-1269, ISSN 1369-118X
Publisher: Routledge
DOI: 10.1080/1369118x.2024.2420029