Facebook Busts Russian Disinfo Networks as US Election Looms

They targeted users in a number of countries, including Syria, Ukraine, Turkey, Japan, the UK, and Belarus, as well as the United States to a lesser extent.

Earlier this month, Microsoft announced that it had caught Russia's Fancy Bear hackers targeting hundreds of campaign-adjacent organizations. Facebook warned repeatedly on Thursday that despite the successful takedown, it's still bracing for whatever might come next.

Russian efforts have evolved, he added, to enlist unwitting users to amplify their messages and to build websites that exist outside of the social media platforms to avoid detection.

In other words, the actors were likely tied to Fancy Bear, also known as APT 28, the group also responsible for hacks of the Democratic National Committee and Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign.

Instead, they engaged with a broad array of topics connected to Russian interests, including the war in Ukraine, the Syrian civil war, the election and protests in Belarus, Russia's relationship with NATO, and politics in Turkey.

The Fancy Bear-linked campaign developed phony personas, posed as journalists, and built groups that purported to be local in target regions.

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Original article