tardigrada

Archived version

The Insider has obtained hacked correspondence from officers of Russia's foreign intelligence agency (SVR) responsible for “information warfare” with the West. The leaked documents, intended for various government agencies, reveal the Kremlin's strategy: spreading disinformation on sensitive Western topics, posting falsehoods while posing as radical Ukrainian and European political forces (both real and specially created), appealing to emotions — primarily fear — over rationality, and utilizing new internet platforms instead of outdated ones like RT and Sputnik.

The documents also detail localized campaigns against Russian émigrés, including efforts to discredit a fundraiser for Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation who had moved to the United States.

• The secret disinformation operation was codenamed “Project Kylo,” perhaps in reference to the antiquated Russian word for “pick-axe,” or an allusion to the Dark Side warrior from the Star Wars sequels determined to rule the galaxy. Or maybe both.

• The key emotions to prey upon, the SVR planners intoned, were “fear,” “panic” and “horror” — a psychosocial manipulation campaign straight out of the Cold War playbook of the Soviet KGB’s First Chief Directorate’s Department D. The D stood for disinformation.

• The architect of Kylo was Mikhail Kolesov, a pudgy, bald, 45 year-old SVR officer who was previously stationed in Kabul, Afghanistan. On May 23, 2022, Kolesov emailed himself a Word document titled simply, “Propaganda.” It appeared to be the outline of a presentation Kolesov was set to give three days later at a private roundtable discussion in the Russian Senate concerning “information warfare with the West.”

• That forum, headed by former Soviet diplomat turned hawkishly anti-Western senator Alexei Pushkov, featured recognizable mouthpieces of Vladimir Putin’s regime including Maria Zakharova, the Foreign Ministry spokesperson, psychological warfare specialists from the Ministry of Defense, and loyalist journalists.

• Pushkov was gravely worried about how pro-Ukrainian sentiments were dominating on Western internet platforms, and disappointed by Russian media. The Kremlin was losing on two battlefields: physical and informational. Using “old” state-controlled media organs such as RT and Sputnik “have demonstrated near-zero effectiveness for decades, not years;” and attempts to cultivate friendly social media platforms, such as Telegram channels, “does not live up to the expectations placed on performers and demiurges. Lack of creativity, hypocrisy and moralizing aggravate the current situation.”

• Kolesov’s fresh proposal, crafted in a stilted language — equal parts critical theory, pseudo-science, and marketing jargon — was therefore designed to inject a new scheme into the Kremlin’s propaganda approach: “systematic, targeted and active, offensive in nature.”

• Rather than propounding straightforward pro-Russian arguments, he suggested, the SVR should now aim to “deepen internal contradictions between the ruling elites” in the West by creating a fake NGO - in reality a cut-out funded and run by agents of the Kremlin — to whip up anti-establishment demonstrations on the territory of the glavnyi protivnik, or “main adversary".

• Fake advertisements disguised as news headlines, all crafted by SVR recruits, would be visible on most any desktop computer screen or mobile device used by target audiences in the West, luring them to click-through and land on “internet resources controlled by the Kremlin.

• "Waging network wars in EU cyberspace based on the increasing demands of Ukrainian migrants and the new waves of irritation of the local population provoked by this, according to preliminary estimates, will have a very high efficiency both now and in the foreseeable future.”

• German authorities, for exampke, have identified over two dozen legitimate-seeming news websites catering to exactly these fears, with articles headlined (in fluent German), “How Ukrainians are robbing Germany of economic prosperity.” The portals are part of a vast Russian influence operation.

• European politicians had already been clamoring about Ukrainians fleeing the war and becoming burdens on state resources. For instance, in September 2022, Friedrich Merz, the leader of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany, the country’s conservative party, had accused Ukrainian refugees of “welfare tourism,” an allegation for which Merz later apologized.

• The “leitmotif of our cognitive campaign in the [Western] countries is proposed to be the instilling of the strongest emotion in the human psyche — fear,” the [propaganda] document states. “It is precisely the fear for the future, uncertainty about tomorrow, the inability to make long-term plans, the unclear fate of children and future generations. The cultivation of these triggers floods an individual's subconscious with panic and terror.”

• 2023 saw its fair share of Russian-sponsored provocations seemingly aligned with Operation Kylo all across Europe. Research by a European media consortium revealed that a roving troupe of Russian hirelings kept turning up at protests in major cities such as Paris, Brussels, Madrid, and The Hague denouncing Western arms shipments to Ukraine. The men, the consortium concluded, had likely been hired by Russian special services.

Archived version

The Insider has obtained hacked correspondence from officers of Russia's foreign intelligence agency (SVR) responsible for “information warfare” with the West. The leaked documents, intended for various government agencies, reveal the Kremlin's strategy: spreading disinformation on sensitive Western topics, posting falsehoods while posing as radical Ukrainian and European political forces (both real and specially created), appealing to emotions — primarily fear — over rationality, and utilizing new internet platforms instead of outdated ones like RT and Sputnik.

The documents also detail localized campaigns against Russian émigrés, including efforts to discredit a fundraiser for Alexei Navalny's Anti-Corruption Foundation who had moved to the United States.

• The secret disinformation operation was codenamed “Project Kylo,” perhaps in reference to the antiquated Russian word for “pick-axe,” or an allusion to the Dark Side warrior from the Star Wars sequels determined to rule the galaxy. Or maybe both.

• The key emotions to prey upon, the SVR planners intoned, were “fear,” “panic” and “horror” — a psychosocial manipulation campaign straight out of the Cold War playbook of the Soviet KGB’s First Chief Directorate’s Department D. The D stood for disinformation.

• The architect of Kylo was Mikhail Kolesov, a pudgy, bald, 45 year-old SVR officer who was previously stationed in Kabul, Afghanistan. On May 23, 2022, Kolesov emailed himself a Word document titled simply, “Propaganda.” It appeared to be the outline of a presentation Kolesov was set to give three days later at a private roundtable discussion in the Russian Senate concerning “information warfare with the West.”

• That forum, headed by former Soviet diplomat turned hawkishly anti-Western senator Alexei Pushkov, featured recognizable mouthpieces of Vladimir Putin’s regime including Maria Zakharova, the Foreign Ministry spokesperson, psychological warfare specialists from the Ministry of Defense, and loyalist journalists.

• Pushkov was gravely worried about how pro-Ukrainian sentiments were dominating on Western internet platforms, and disappointed by Russian media. The Kremlin was losing on two battlefields: physical and informational. Using “old” state-controlled media organs such as RT and Sputnik “have demonstrated near-zero effectiveness for decades, not years;” and attempts to cultivate friendly social media platforms, such as Telegram channels, “does not live up to the expectations placed on performers and demiurges. Lack of creativity, hypocrisy and moralizing aggravate the current situation.”

• Kolesov’s fresh proposal, crafted in a stilted language — equal parts critical theory, pseudo-science, and marketing jargon — was therefore designed to inject a new scheme into the Kremlin’s propaganda approach: “systematic, targeted and active, offensive in nature.”

• Rather than propounding straightforward pro-Russian arguments, he suggested, the SVR should now aim to “deepen internal contradictions between the ruling elites” in the West by creating a fake NGO - in reality a cut-out funded and run by agents of the Kremlin — to whip up anti-establishment demonstrations on the territory of the glavnyi protivnik, or “main adversary".

• Fake advertisements disguised as news headlines, all crafted by SVR recruits, would be visible on most any desktop computer screen or mobile device used by target audiences in the West, luring them to click-through and land on “internet resources controlled by the Kremlin.

• "Waging network wars in EU cyberspace based on the increasing demands of Ukrainian migrants and the new waves of irritation of the local population provoked by this, according to preliminary estimates, will have a very high efficiency both now and in the foreseeable future.”

• German authorities, for exampke, have identified over two dozen legitimate-seeming news websites catering to exactly these fears, with articles headlined (in fluent German), “How Ukrainians are robbing Germany of economic prosperity.” The portals are part of a vast Russian influence operation.

• European politicians had already been clamoring about Ukrainians fleeing the war and becoming burdens on state resources. For instance, in September 2022, Friedrich Merz, the leader of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany, the country’s conservative party, had accused Ukrainian refugees of “welfare tourism,” an allegation for which Merz later apologized.

• The “leitmotif of our cognitive campaign in the [Western] countries is proposed to be the instilling of the strongest emotion in the human psyche — fear,” the [propaganda] document states. “It is precisely the fear for the future, uncertainty about tomorrow, the inability to make long-term plans, the unclear fate of children and future generations. The cultivation of these triggers floods an individual's subconscious with panic and terror.”

• 2023 saw its fair share of Russian-sponsored provocations seemingly aligned with Operation Kylo all across Europe. Research by a European media consortium revealed that a roving troupe of Russian hirelings kept turning up at protests in major cities such as Paris, Brussels, Madrid, and The Hague denouncing Western arms shipments to Ukraine. The men, the consortium concluded, had likely been hired by Russian special services.

Archived version

Jailed Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza has been transferred to a prison hospital and his lawyers were denied access to their client, his wife said Friday.

Kara-Murza, 42, suffers from health problems that his wife Evgenia and lawyers say are directly related to alleged attempts to poison him. Russian authorities have refused to investigate the incidents in 2015 and 2017, when Kara-Murza fell seriously ill.

Prison authorities informed Kara-Murza’slawyers during a mid-Thursday visit that he had been moved from the maximum-security facility to a prison hospital in another part of the city of Omsk, Evgenia wrote on Facebook.

Doctors at that hospital stalled Kara-Murza’s lawyers’ attempts to reach him for two days, she added.

“Thus, the lawyers were never able to see Vladimir and make sure that everything was fine with him ahead of the weekend,” said Evgenia Kara-Murza.

Fears for the prominent dissident's health have grown since the opposition activist Alexei Navalny died in prison under unclear circumstances in February.

Kara-Murza, a citizen of both Russia and the United Kingdom, was sentenced to 25 years in prison in April 2023 after criticizing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and calling on Western countries to impose sanctions against the Kremlin.

A Moscow court had found him guilty of treason, spreading "false" information about the Russian army and having links to an "undesirable organization.” The sentence, one of the longest against a Russian opposition figure in recent years, drew immediate condemnation from Western countries.

Archived version

Jailed Kremlin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza has been transferred to a prison hospital and his lawyers were denied access to their client, his wife said Friday.

Kara-Murza, 42, suffers from health problems that his wife Evgenia and lawyers say are directly related to alleged attempts to poison him. Russian authorities have refused to investigate the incidents in 2015 and 2017, when Kara-Murza fell seriously ill.

Prison authorities informed Kara-Murza’slawyers during a mid-Thursday visit that he had been moved from the maximum-security facility to a prison hospital in another part of the city of Omsk, Evgenia wrote on Facebook.

Doctors at that hospital stalled Kara-Murza’s lawyers’ attempts to reach him for two days, she added.

“Thus, the lawyers were never able to see Vladimir and make sure that everything was fine with him ahead of the weekend,” said Evgenia Kara-Murza.

Fears for the prominent dissident's health have grown since the opposition activist Alexei Navalny died in prison under unclear circumstances in February.

Kara-Murza, a citizen of both Russia and the United Kingdom, was sentenced to 25 years in prison in April 2023 after criticizing Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and calling on Western countries to impose sanctions against the Kremlin.

A Moscow court had found him guilty of treason, spreading "false" information about the Russian army and having links to an "undesirable organization.” The sentence, one of the longest against a Russian opposition figure in recent years, drew immediate condemnation from Western countries.

Archived version

Here is the report (pdf)

The supply chain attack targeting widely-used Polyfill[.]io JavaScript library is wider in scope than previously thought, with new findings from Censys showing that over 380,000 hosts are embedding a polyfill script linking to the malicious domain as of July 2, 2024.

This includes references to "https://cdn.polyfill[.]io" or "https://cdn.polyfill[.]com" in their HTTP responses, the attack surface management firm said.

"Approximately 237,700, are located within the Hetzner network (AS24940), primarily in Germany," it noted. "This is not surprising – Hetzner is a popular web hosting service, and many website developers leverage it."

Details of the attack emerged in late June 2024 when Sansec alerted that code hosted on the Polyfill domain had been modified to redirect users to adult- and gambling-themed websites. The code changes were made such that the redirections only took place at certain times of the day and only against visitors who met certain criteria.

The nefarious behavior is said to have been introduced after the domain and its associated GitHub repository were sold to a Chinese company named Funnull in February 2024.

The development has since prompted domain registrar Namecheap to suspend the domain, content delivery networks such as Cloudflare to automatically replace Polyfill links with domains leading to alternative safe mirror sites, and Google to block ads for sites embedding the domain.

Archived version

Here is the report (pdf)

The supply chain attack targeting widely-used Polyfill[.]io JavaScript library is wider in scope than previously thought, with new findings from Censys showing that over 380,000 hosts are embedding a polyfill script linking to the malicious domain as of July 2, 2024.

This includes references to "https://cdn.polyfill[.]io" or "https://cdn.polyfill[.]com" in their HTTP responses, the attack surface management firm said.

"Approximately 237,700, are located within the Hetzner network (AS24940), primarily in Germany," it noted. "This is not surprising – Hetzner is a popular web hosting service, and many website developers leverage it."

Details of the attack emerged in late June 2024 when Sansec alerted that code hosted on the Polyfill domain had been modified to redirect users to adult- and gambling-themed websites. The code changes were made such that the redirections only took place at certain times of the day and only against visitors who met certain criteria.

The nefarious behavior is said to have been introduced after the domain and its associated GitHub repository were sold to a Chinese company named Funnull in February 2024.

The development has since prompted domain registrar Namecheap to suspend the domain, content delivery networks such as Cloudflare to automatically replace Polyfill links with domains leading to alternative safe mirror sites, and Google to block ads for sites embedding the domain.

[Edit typo.]

-Japan confirmed that the Chinese survey ship Xiang Yang Hong 22 set up the buoy in mid-June while monitoring the vessel as it sailed through Japan's exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in the East China Sea, a government source said. The open-sea area in question is surrounded by Japan's EEZ.

• Japan has urged China not to undermine Japan's maritime interests. It's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi told a news conference it was "regrettable" that China has set up a small buoy in the waters off Japan's western main island of Shikoku and north of the southernmost Okinotori Island "without explaining its purpose and other details."

• Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said the buoy, which is to monitor tsunami, was set up in the high seas "for the purposes of scientific research and serving public good.

• Last July, China installed another buoy inside Japan's EEZ near the Tokyo-controlled, Beijing-claimed uninhabited Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, prompting Japan to lodge a protest and demand its immediate removal.

• Mao said that as the islands, which Beijing calls Diaoyu, are part of China's territory and its surrounding waters are under the country's jurisdiction, it is "legitimate and lawful for China to set up hydrological and meteorological data buoys in those areas."

• China has been intensifying its military activities and maritime assertiveness in the regional waters, with Japan protesting against repeated intrusions by Chinese ships into Japanese waters around the Senkakus.

-Japan confirmed that the Chinese survey ship Xiang Yang Hong 22 set up the buoy in mid-June while monitoring the vessel as it sailed through Japan's exclusive economic zone (EEZ) in the East China Sea, a government source said. The open-sea area in question is surrounded by Japan's EEZ.

• Japan has urged China not to undermine Japan's maritime interests. It's Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshimasa Hayashi told a news conference it was "regrettable" that China has set up a small buoy in the waters off Japan's western main island of Shikoku and north of the southernmost Okinotori Island "without explaining its purpose and other details."

• Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning said the buoy, which is to monitor tsunami, was set up in the high seas "for the purposes of scientific research and serving public good.

• Last July, China installed another buoy inside Japan's EEZ near the Tokyo-controlled, Beijing-claimed uninhabited Senkaku Islands in the East China Sea, prompting Japan to lodge a protest and demand its immediate removal.

• Mao said that as the islands, which Beijing calls Diaoyu, are part of China's territory and its surrounding waters are under the country's jurisdiction, it is "legitimate and lawful for China to set up hydrological and meteorological data buoys in those areas."

• China has been intensifying its military activities and maritime assertiveness in the regional waters, with Japan protesting against repeated intrusions by Chinese ships into Japanese waters around the Senkakus.

Archived version

• Communist-run Laos has come to the fore after it opened a high-speed rail line with China in 2021 that cost the landlocked country about $6 billion. While the development is seen by many as the start of a ramp up in infrastructure that directly connects China with Southeast Asia, it has raised concerns of a build-up in debt for Laos and other smaller countries.

• China is by far Laos’ biggest creditor, accounting for about half of the $10.5 billion in external government debt. The tiny nation had $13.8 billion in total public and publicly-guaranteed debt at the end of last year, amounting to 108% of its gross domestic product.

• Laos’ external debt payments in 2023 reached $950 million, almost double the amount compared to 2022,, making the country defer $670 million in principal and interest payments. The World Bank has said in the past that such moves have provided temporary relief in recent years.

• Laos' development is seen by many as a further chapter of China's 'debt-trap diplomacy' as Beijing offers developing countries financial loans under often opaque condition, leaving them grappling with repayments while it supports China’s efforts to expand its economic and political influence in foreign countries.

• For example, Sri Lanka fell into default for the first time in its history back in 2022 after its foreign reserves dwindled. Last month the South Asian nation said it reached final restructuring agreements worth $10 billion, including with an Official Creditor Committee of bilateral lenders and China’s Exim Bank. Sri Lanka's port, however, is now owned by China.

• China dismissed the “debt-trap diplomacy” allegations.

• Indonesia is preparing to impose tariffs and use other means to protect its textile industry from imports from China, the latest in a series of countries and blocs such as the US and the European Union, which are responding to the flood of goods out of the world’s largest manufacturing nation.

• After the government in Jakarta rolled back some import restrictions earlier this year, protests from thousands of textile workers are pushing the government to introduce new curbs. Indonesia imported almost 29,000 tons of imports of woven fabrics made from artificial filament yarn last year. Goods from China accounted for most of that.

• It’s unclear whether the government is considering imposing only safeguard duties or also other tariffs. "We have actually provided many fiscal instruments to protect the textile industry, including safeguard duties and anti-dumping duties, which are usually related to unfair trade that harm the domestic industry,” said Febrio Kacaribu, head of fiscal policy agency at the finance ministry.

• Indonesia has maintained an overall trade surplus for the last four years. However, the surplus with China flipped to a deficit in May, driven by imports of machinery and plastic goods.

• Indonesia is preparing to impose tariffs and use other means to protect its textile industry from imports from China, the latest in a series of countries and blocs such as the US and the European Union, which are responding to the flood of goods out of the world’s largest manufacturing nation.

• After the government in Jakarta rolled back some import restrictions earlier this year, protests from thousands of textile workers are pushing the government to introduce new curbs. Indonesia imported almost 29,000 tons of imports of woven fabrics made from artificial filament yarn last year. Goods from China accounted for most of that.

• It’s unclear whether the government is considering imposing only safeguard duties or also other tariffs. "We have actually provided many fiscal instruments to protect the textile industry, including safeguard duties and anti-dumping duties, which are usually related to unfair trade that harm the domestic industry,” said Febrio Kacaribu, head of fiscal policy agency at the finance ministry.

• Indonesia has maintained an overall trade surplus for the last four years. However, the surplus with China flipped to a deficit in May, driven by imports of machinery and plastic goods.

Archived version

• Nepal has shied away from signing a plan to implement China’s ambitious Belt & Road Initiative (BRI) in the Himalayan nation. Resisting immense pressure from Beijing, Nepal’s Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal refused to greenlight the signing that would have paved the way for the implementation of nine mega and more than a dozen major BRI projects in Nepal.

• That’s because soon after Nepal signed the BRI framework agreement in May 2017, India launched a massive but silent campaign to educate and explain Nepal’s political leadership, economists, bureaucrats, diplomats, academia, media and civil society leaders the pitfalls of China’s BRI to them, making Nepal’s top politicians and others fully aware of China’s sinister plan to ensnare nations into a debt trap through the BRI.

• PM Deuba eventualky told China that Nepal would only agree to a small component of the cost of BRI projects in the form of loans. However, the interest on such loans should not be more than what multilateral lending agencies like the World Bank and Asian Development Bank (ADB) charge for their loans (one per cent per annum).

• This was not acceptable to China which charges more than two per cent on the loans it gives to other countries to finance BRI projects. Also, China insists on the contracts for these projects being awarded only to Chinese companies and refuses to do away with or water down penalty clauses (in case of failure to repay the loans on time).

What also worked against China was Nepal’s experience with the Pokhara International Airport which cost US $ 305 million. China’s Exim Bank provided a loan of about US $ 215 million at 2 per cent interest. Chinese firms were awarded contracts for construction and technical works.

Allegations of shoddy construction, inflated costs and mismanagement by the Chinese have fuelled public anger against China in Nepal. The airport has turned into a huge liability (read this) since no commercial and scheduled flights are operating from there.