TL;DR: I want to learn about disinformation. Where do recommend I start?

Background:

I’ve been a bit apprehensive about disinformation for a while now more than ever with the rising tide of post truth content on the internet and the active toppling of governments from within using info warfare. I’m also seeing a whole lot of users in suspicious activities online who, for example, leave spicy live bait in political comment sections. So I’ve gotten suspicious and also curious about this secret world behind the veil.

I’m not exactly sure of what I’m looking for because of this unknown unknown, so bear with me. I’m imagining learning about an underlying theory with illustrative examples that relate to modern groups and their tactics.

I’m thinking of something more robust than articles or blog posts and yet less dense than academic material, so maybe some books or long-form videos would be great, although any format is welcome. I wonder if there are reliable & trustworthy authors, science communicators, intelligentsias, or researchers themselves who put out this accessible content.

I’m familiar with the book An Ugly Truth: Inside Facebook’s Battle for Domination that exposes the play-by-play of foreign disinformation farms in American politics during the 2018 election. I thought it was great but limited in scope to Facebook along with the few countries it touches on. But learning about the rest of the nations along a broader timeline would be more ideal.

Do you have any suggestions? What would be a right approach to get myself soaking wet in the topic?

  • breakfastmtn@lemmy.ca
    12·
    2 days ago

    A good place to start might be a book like ‘Autocracy, Inc.’ by Anne Applebaum. Unrelated to this but her book on the Holodomor, ‘Red Famine,’ is amazing too. She’s an expert on modern authoritarianism. The book’s about autocrats in general but deals a lot with disinformation and propaganda. It’ll give you a pretty high level view of who those people are, what their goals are, and how disinformation fits into their strategies. A big part of recognizing disinfo is being able to evaluate whose interests a piece of (dis)info might serve.

    You’ll find a lot of books about Russian disinformation because Russia has been the most active, the most ambitious, and the most successful at weaponizing propaganda. I’d look for books written by academics but who are writing for a popular audience. ‘Active Measures’ by Thomas Rid is an example. That book in particular goes into the origin of disinformation in the Soviet Union (the term was actually coined by Stalin) and how it carried over into modern Russia. Russia’s a good starting point too because everyone else has copied them like crazy – although they’re now openly collaborating, Republicans are stealing from this playbook.

    Bellingcat is good resource to get into the anatomy of disinformation networks and operations. They’re the gold standard in open source investigations and have uncovered some insane shit – disinfo networks, Russia downing MH17, a network of Russian illegals (like in ‘The Americans’). Reports like this one are extremely detailed and get into the nuts and bolts of how propaganda networks are structured and how information passes through them. Their ability to track down spies using the Russian equivalent of door dash is internet MacGyver shit too.

    Caroline Orr Bueno is a disinformation researcher whose newsletter Weaponized Spaces also dives pretty deep into disinformation networks, often tracing it back to a single point of origin. She links to a lot of great resources and is super accessible. She’s also awesome. I assume she’s moved on to bsky but she used to be on Mastodon and would answer any questions you had about her work. Good person!