@article{BeselerToepfl2024, author = {Beseler, Arista and Toepfl, Florian}, title = {Conduits of the Kremlin's Informational Influence Abroad? How German-Language Alternative Media Outlets Are Connected to Russia's Ruling Elites}, series = {The International Journal of Press/Politics (ISSN: 1940-1620)}, volume = {30}, journal = {The International Journal of Press/Politics (ISSN: 1940-1620)}, number = {3}, publisher = {SAGE Publications}, address = {Los Angeles, CA}, issn = {1940-1612}, doi = {10.1177/19401612241230284}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:739-opus4-16755}, pages = {659 -- 678}, year = {2024}, abstract = {Extant research on alternative media in Western democracies has focused on scrutinizing their content, organization, production, and audiences. However, the extent to which alternative outlets are linked to powerful foreign actors has not yet been analyzed, despite the fact that a plethora of outlets have openly sided with Russia after its full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, spreading the Kremlin's propagandistic narratives. To fill this gap, this study adopts a case study approach. It selects Germany as a revelatory case of a key target country of Russia's foreign influence efforts, raising the question of how and to what extent German-language alternative media outlets are connected to Russia's ruling elites. Grounded in qualitative analysis of a wide range of documents, this study proposes a categorization that divides the connections into three different types: organizational, media, and personal connections. Subsequently, it is demonstrated that half of the analyzed German-language alternative media outlets maintain at least one of these three types of connections to the Kremlin. These findings contribute to our knowledge of alternative media, as well as Russia's overt and covert foreign influence operations, the so-called "active measures." They also highlight the need for more transparency in alternative media landscapes in democratic contexts across the globe.}, subject = {-}, language = {en} } @article{ToepflKravetsRyzhovaetal.2022, author = {T{\"o}pfl, Florian and Kravets, Daria and Ryzhova, Anna and Beseler, Arista}, title = {Who are the plotters behind the pandemic?}, series = {Information, Communication \& Society}, volume = {26 (2023)}, journal = {Information, Communication \& Society}, number = {10}, publisher = {Taylor \& Francis}, address = {London}, doi = {10.1080/1369118X.2022.2065213}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:739-opus4-19119}, pages = {2033 -- 2051}, year = {2022}, abstract = {This article advances extant research that has audited search algorithms for misinformation in four respects. Firstly, this is the first misinformation audit not to implement a national but a cross-national research design. Secondly, it retrieves results not in response to the most popular query terms. Instead, it theorizes two semantic dimensions of search terms and illustrates how they impact the number of misinformative results returned. Furthermore, the analysis not only captures the mere presence of misinformative content but in addition whether the source websites are affiliated with a key misinformation actor (Russia's ruling elites) and whom the conspiracy narratives cast as the malicious plotters. Empirically, the audit compares Covid-19 conspiracy theories in Google search results across 5 key target countries of Russia's foreign communication (Belarus, Estonia, Germany, Ukraine, and the US) and Russia as of November 2020 (N = 5280 search results). It finds that, across all countries, primarily content published by mass media organizations rendered conspiracy theories visible in search results. Conspiratorial content published on websites affiliated with Russia's ruling elites was retrieved in the Belarusian, German and Russian contexts. Across all countries, the majority of conspiracy narratives suspected plotters from China. Malicious actors from the US were insinuated exclusively by sources affiliated with Russia's elites. Overall, conspiracy narratives did not primarily deepen divides within but between national communities, since - across all countries - only plotters from beyond the national borders were blamed. To conclude, the article discusses methodological advice and promising paths of research for future cross-national search engine audits.}, language = {en} } @article{KravetsRyzhovaToepfletal.2023, author = {Kravets, Daria and Ryzhova, Anna and Toepfl, Florian and Beseler, Arista}, title = {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}, series = {Journalism}, volume = {24}, journal = {Journalism}, number = {12}, publisher = {Sage}, address = {Thousand Oaks}, doi = {10.1177/14648849231157845}, url = {http://nbn-resolving.de/urn:nbn:de:bvb:739-opus4-16430}, pages = {2762 -- 2780}, year = {2023}, abstract = {Extant research demonstrated that the algorithms of the Kremlin-controlled search engine Yandex, compared to those of its US-based counterpart Google, frequently produce results that are biased toward the interests of Russia's ruling elites. Prior research, however, audited Yandex's algorithms largely within Russia. In contrast, this study is the first to assess the role of Yandex's web search algorithms as a resource for Russia's informational influence abroad. To do so, we conduct a comparative algorithm audit of Google and Yandex in Belarus, examining the visibility and narratives of COVID-19-related conspiracy theories in their search results. By manually analysing the content of 1320 search results collected in mid-April to mid-May 2020, we find that, compared with Google, (1) Yandex retrieves significantly more conspiratorial content (2) that close to exclusively suspects US plotters to be behind the pandemic, even though the virus spread from the Chinese city of Wuhan across the globe.}, language = {en} }