View of The national flag of the Russian Federation with view of St Basil's Cathedral at sunny day in Moscow, Russia
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A third of Americans have fallen for Russian disinformation — and for other false online claims.
An online survey carried out between February and March this year by leading market research and analytics organization YouGov, commissioned by data analysis and news rating firm NewsGuard, presented a nationally representative sample of 1,000 respondents with 10 false claims that have spread widely online. These included three that originated from or were mainly spread by Russian media outlets.
Respondents were asked to mark each claim—all of which have been authoritatively and widely debunked—with a response of “True,” “False,” or “Not Sure.”
And, the researchers found, Americans are falling for Kremlin disinformation to an alarming degree, along with other false claims relating to health and medicine, elections and international conflicts.
Indeed, of the 10 false presented, 78% of respondents believed at least one, and fewer than 1 in 100 managed to correctly identify all 10 claims as false.
A quarter believed, for example, that up to half the U.S. aid money given to Ukraine was stolen by Ukrainian officials for personal use. More than half incorrectly thought that Ukraine sold Hamas weapons that had been donated by the U.S.
Meanwhile, fewer than half of respondents correctly identified as false the claim that COVID-19 vaccines have killed between 7.3 and 15 million people worldwide, while 1 in 5 said they believed the claim to be true.
These claims were made on the basis of numbers described as arbitrary by experts, and not based on any research.
"The false narrative is based on an inaccurate analysis of deaths reported after Covid vaccination to the U.S. Vaccine Adverse Events Reporting System, a U.S. government database that collects unverified reports of adverse reports following vaccination," said NewsGuard. "The analysis was conducted by Edward Dowd, a former portfolio manager for investment management company BlackRock, who has no medical background and has previously made false claims about Covid-19 vaccines."
Gullibility appears to cut across party lines, with respondents identifying as Democrats just as likely as Republicans to believe at least one of the 10 false claims.
Republicans were, though, more likely to believe Russian disinformation claims than their Democratic counterparts, with 57.6% falling for at least one Russian disinformation claim, compared with just 17.9% of Democrats and 29.5% of people who didn't identify with one particular party.
Russia is spending significant amounts on promulgating misinformation in the U.S. Last year, for example, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted two people for funneling nearly $10 million through a Tennessee-based content creation company to publish misinformation about Ukraine.
And around the same time, the Justice Department seized 32 internet domains that the Russian government and Russian government-sponsored actors had been using to try and influence the 2024 elections.
"An internal planning document created by the Kremlin states that a goal of the campaign is to secure Russia’s preferred outcome in the election," said then–attorney general Merrick Garland.
"The sites we are seizing were filled with Russian government propaganda that had been created by the Kremlin to reduce international support for Ukraine, bolster pro-Russian policies and interests, and influence voters in the United States and other countries," Garland added.
All in all, said NewsGuard, Russian disinformation efforts targeting Americans continue to accelerate, and they’ve become increasingly sophisticated in recent years.
"In the ongoing battle between fiction and reality, fiction—much of it created by Russia’s robust disinformation machine—appears to be winning," it warned.