Doppelganger campaign

Russian network behind fake quotes from celebrities

Til Schweiger

(Bild: www.PPS.at)

The German Ministry of the Interior is attributing a disinformation campaign with fake quotes from German celebrities to the Russian "doppelganger" network uncovered in 2022. According to a ministry spokesperson, the campaign's new tactics also include fake quotes that are "put into the mouths of prominent figures from the entertainment industry". 

Small photo tiles with celebrities and their quotes are popular on social media. However, the case of a current disinformation campaign shows that skepticism is sometimes appropriate. In connection with Russia's war against Ukraine, for example, there has been a sharepic of this kind online for some time with Til Schweiger's head and the supposed statement that Ukrainian officials are buying property in France and Italy - and that there is no need to know more about the war.

Or one with a picture of his fellow actor Jannis Niewöhner and the line that the USA would not be hurt, but Europe would. The Rammstein singer Till Lindemann had a line put in his mouth about supposedly "pointless aid for Ukraine".

These are not real quotes. Spokespeople for Lindemann and Niewöhner confirmed to the German press agency dpa that the celebrities had never made such statements. A spokeswoman for Til Schweiger did not want to comment on the authenticity. The quotes cannot be found in other media or in the dpa archive. There is also no reference to a source on the sharepics.

"Doppelganger" campaign
The German Ministry of the Interior attributes the fake quotes to the Russian "doppelganger" campaign uncovered in 2022. The ministry is aware that the campaign "is still active and has been using more than just the original tactic of imitating websites of existing quality media and public institutions for some time now", a spokesperson said.

The new tactic also includes fake quotes that are "put in the mouths of prominent figures from the entertainment industry". This technique has been used by the "doppelganger" campaign since November 2023. The ministry is monitoring developments and is in contact with platforms and international partners.

An analysis by the civil organization Reset.Tech, which deals with digital threats to democracy, also attributed the fake quotes to the Russian "doppelganger" campaign, as the US magazine "Wired" reported at the end of last year. Reset.Tech told dpa that this was recognizable because the networks followed similar patterns and used similar names.

Websites copied
The "doppelganger" campaign, also known as "RRN" (Recent Reliable News), was uncovered in 2022. In several EU countries, it spread fake websites pretending to be websites of national media or government agencies. The EU identified Russian actors as responsible for the disinformation network. At the end of July 2023, it placed five organizations linked to the Russian state and seven people on the sanctions list.

Tens of thousands of users reached
The fake Ukraine statements with the heads of celebrities were apparently deliberately circulated until at least April of this year. They can be found in Facebook's ad library, where paid posts are documented. The sharepics were targeted at users in Germany in return for money. Many of the ads have already been deleted as they are said to have violated the advertising rules of the Facebook group Meta. Nevertheless, the ad with the quote falsely attributed to Til Schweiger, for example, reached more than 190,000 users, according to the ad library.

Facebook pages with random-sounding names such as "New Programming KTV" were responsible for the ads. Most of the pages are no longer active. Who is actually behind them is unknown.

"Most aggressive exertion of influence of Russian origin"
Meta did not comment in detail on the advertisements or those responsible for the disinformation network and referred to its previous reports on the action against the "doppelganger" campaign. "Our teams continue to work with the highest priority to monitor changes in this network," a Meta spokesperson said. In its August 2023 threat intelligence report, Meta called the campaign the "largest and most aggressive ongoing Russian-origin influence operation" that the company has taken action against since 2017.

Even if photo tiles with funny or controversial statements can be shared online with just a few clicks, users on social media should make sure to check where the statements were made. "Quotes give the impression of authenticity. However, the following also applies here: If the person themselves does not express themselves in this way on other channels, doubts are justified," recommends the alliance "Deutschland sicher im Netz".