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Dany FARES

Brg. Gen (Rtd)

Russian Influence Networks Target French Elections (Source: Recorded Future) During the French elections held from June 30, 2024, to July 7, 2024, foreign malign influence operations linked to Russia were identified but ultimately had a negligible impact on public opinion and voter behavior. The Russia-linked Doppelgänger network played a prominent role by targeting French audiences with pro-Russian content through cloned websites and social media bots. This network focused on impersonating French media organizations and amplifying their content on social media using a vast number of inauthentic accounts engaged in automated coordinated inauthentic behavior (CIB). Despite these extensive activities, authentic engagement with Doppelgänger's content remained low, and its overall impact was minimal. The CopyCop network, another Russia-linked influence operation, also targeted French audiences, albeit on a smaller scale compared to Doppelgänger. CopyCop utilized large language models (LLMs) to promote pro-Russian narratives, specifically criticizing President Macron and attempting to dissuade continued European support for Ukraine. Notably, CopyCop created an inauthentic website impersonating the presidential coalition “Ensemble Pour La République,” falsely promising voters a 100€ reward, likely in an effort to discredit Macron and his Renaissance party. This tactic mirrored a previous operation in March 2024, which involved impersonating French military recruitment websites. Historically, CopyCop has maintained a French-language presence on inauthentic websites such as infoindependants[.]fr and mediaalternatif[.]fr, used to disseminate deepfakes targeting the Macron administration and publish AI-generated content plagiarized from French media. Recently, CopyCop launched two new French-language websites, veritecachee[.]fr and franceenccolere[.]fr, continuing to publish plagiarized and weaponized content, and they are likely to be used for deepfakes targeting the Macron administration. The short period between the announcement of the elections on June 9, 2024, and the actual voting dates posed significant challenges. For public and private organizations, this rapid timeline made it difficult to adequately prepare defenses against these malign influence operations. Conversely, the limited timeframe also hindered the ability of threat actors to prepare and disseminate their content effectively, reducing the potential impact. Despite their efforts, the influence networks failed to significantly shift French public opinion.

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