Spotlight
Latest Research
August 2024
Pro-Russia, pro-Wagner activity surges following Mali and Wagner forces’ defeat in battle
An inauthentic network of YouTube channels pushed pro-AES and anti-Ukraine narratives after the Tinzaouaten confrontation
August 2024
TikTok accounts target West Africa with AI-generated content promoting Putin and regional leaders
TikTok accounts with thousands of followers spread pro-Russia and anti-France narratives
August 2024
How AI tools fueled online conspiracy theories after Trump assassination attempt
Deepfakes, cheapfakes, and AI-fueled scams spread online following the shooting; in other instances, real footage was dismissed as fake
August 2024
AI in Cyber and Software Security: What’s Driving Opportunities and Risks?
This issue brief discusses the drivers of evolving risks and opportunities presented by generative artificial intelligence (GAI), particularly in cybersecurity, while acknowledging the broader implications for policymakers and for national security.
August 2024
Russia uses video games in Africa to spread anti-Western propaganda
A Hearts of Iron IV mod exemplifies how video games can become propaganda tools
August 2024
Hezbollah videos document usage of drones and weapons systems
Recent Hezbollah propaganda videos show surveillance drones monitoring sensitive Israeli sites, use of anti-tank guided missiles
August 2024
Pro-Russian Facebook pages spread anti-French, anti-UN content in West Africa
Network of inauthentic pro-Russian pages spread false claims targeting elections, France, and the UN peacekeeping mission in CAR
August 2024
Russia-linked operations target Paris 2024 Olympics
Cross-platform efforts denigrated France’s handling of the games and fomented fear of a potential terrorist attack
August 2024
China deployed anti-US narratives in chaos following Trump assassination attempt
Chinese messaging on state media and social media worked to position itself at a volatile moment in domestic US politics
In-Depth Reports
June 2024
User in the Middle: An Interoperability and Security Guide for Policymakers
When technologies work together, it benefits users and the digital ecosystem. Policymakers can advance interoperability and security in tandem by understanding how each impacts the other.
June 2024
“Reasonable” Cybersecurity in Forty-Seven Cases: The Federal Trade Commission’s Enforcement Actions Against Unfair and Deceptive Cyber Practices
The FTC has brought 47 cases against companies for unfair or deceptive cybersecurity practices. What can we learn from them?
June 2024
Another battlefield: Telegram as a digital front in Russia’s war against Ukraine
In this new report, the DFRLab investigates the role of Telegram in Russia since the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine
April 2024
Markets Matter: A Glance into the Spyware Industry
The Intellexa Consortium is a complex web of holding companies and vendors for spyware and related services. The Consortium represents a compelling example of spyware vendors in the context of the market in which they operate—one which helps facilitate the commercial sale of software driving both human rights and national security risk.
February 2024
Hacking with AI
Can generative AI help hackers?
By deconstructing the question into attack phases and actor profiles, this report analyzes the risks, the realities, and their implications for policy.
February 2024
TikTok: Hate the Game, Not the Player
How Strategic and Regulatory Confusion Around TikTok Prevent an Effective National Security Response
January 2024
Design Questions in the Software Liability Debate
Software liability—resurgent in the policy debate since its mention in the 2023 US National Cybersecurity Strategy—describes varied potential structures to create legal accountability for vendors of insecure software. This report identifies key design questions for such regimes and tracks their discussion through the decades-long history of the debate.
November 2023
This Job Post Will Get You Kidnapped: A Deadly Cycle of Crime, Cyberscams, and Civil War in Myanmar
In Myanmar, cybercrime has become an effective vehicle through which nonstate actors can fund and perpetuate conflict.
August 2023
Protecting point-to-point messaging apps: Understanding Telegram, WeChat, and WhatsApp in the United States
A year-long project on protecting users’ data and privacy that analyzes the growing use of point-to-point messaging platforms in the United States and the implications their design and governing policies have for user privacy and free speech.
Projects
Russian War Report
As Russia’s aggression in Europe heats up, the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab) is keeping a close eye on Moscow’s movements across the military, cyber, and information domains.
Foreign Interference Attribution Tracker
The DFRLab’s Foreign Interference Attribution Tracker (FIAT) is an interactive, open-source database that captures allegations of foreign interference relevant to the 2020 election. This tool assesses the credibility, bias, evidence, transparency, and impact of each claim.
Election Official Handbook: Preparing for Election Day Misinformation
As part of the Election Integrity Partnership, the DFRLab has analyzed roughly four hundred cases of election-related dis- and misinformation on social media. This memo gathers the findings and issues recommendations for US election officials: they must prepare for viral falsehoods online that persist for weeks.
Dichotomies of Disinformation
Via the DFRLab’s Github: This project isolates “political disinformation campaigns.” Dichotomies of Disinformation proposes and tests a classification system built on 150 variable options. Our intent is to establish a replicable, extensible system by which widely disparate disinformation campaigns can be categorized and compared.
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