Home / Tactics Personas posing as locals 1 Description as reported A China network posed as locals in three country-specific clusters 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025 1 AI-generated profile photos 1 Description as reported Profile photos likely generated using artificial intelligence 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, China network 1 Account farm 1 Description as reported Operators ran a separate farm that created more fake accounts 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, China network 1 Journalist and activist personas 1 Description as reported Accounts posed as female journalists and pro-Palestine activists 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, Iran network 1 Trending hashtags 1 Description as reported Use of trending hashtags such as #gaza 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, Iran network 1 Self-commenting 1 Description as reported The network commented on its own content, likely to appear more popular 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, Iran network 1 Paid ads 1 Description as reported Ad spend of about US$177,000 by a Romania network and about US$70 by an Iran network 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025 1 Cross-platform backstopping 1 Description as reported Personas had matching presences on YouTube, X and TikTok 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, Romania network 1 Proxy infrastructure 1 Description as reported Operators used proxy IP infrastructure to hide their origin 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, Romania network 1 Anonymous-submission Pages 1 Description as reported Pages claimed to display anonymously submitted posts 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, China network 1 Comments on politicians' posts 1 Description as reported Accounts commented on posts by politicians and news entities and drove people to off-platform websites 1 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2025, Romania network 1 Typosquatted news domains 2 Description as reported Misleading news domains, including typosquatted sites, with fake journalist and student personas 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, Endless Mayfly 2 Pages posing as local media 2 Description as reported Freelance social media managers ran Pages posing as local media 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, network aimed at sub-Saharan Africa, likely working on behalf of individuals in Russia 2 Undeclared political ads 2 Description as reported Pages ran political ads without declaring them 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, network aimed at sub-Saharan Africa, likely working on behalf of individuals in Russia 2 Text obfuscation 2 Description as reported Meta lists text obfuscation among the network's tactics 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, network aimed at sub-Saharan Africa, likely working on behalf of individuals in Russia 2 Return after removal 2 Description as reported Operators came back with fake accounts after removal 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, network aimed at sub-Saharan Africa, likely working on behalf of individuals in Russia 2 Fictional reporters 2 Description as reported Fake media branding and fictional reporters with backstories 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, network with links to individuals based in Russia, aimed at Moldova 2 Impersonating a political party 2 Description as reported Fake accounts impersonating Poland's governing Civic Coalition 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, Belarus network 2 Hack-and-leak amplification 2 Description as reported Amplification of hack-and-leak material 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, Belarus network 2 Joining civic groups 2 Description as reported Fake personas across the political spectrum joined civic groups, without paid ads 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, Poland domestic network 2 Generative AI for profiles and posts 2 Description as reported Generative AI used for profile pictures, biographies, images, captions and comments 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, India domestic network 2 Non-political filler posts 2 Description as reported Non-political posts used to make accounts appear authentic 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, India domestic network 2 Covert video interviews 2 Description as reported Video interviews with local residents under a Voice of Gagauzia brand, used to covertly advance campaign messaging 2 Example report Q2/Q3 2025 report, Moldova domestic network 2 Perception hacking 3 Description as reported Actors try to create the perception that they are everywhere 3 Example report The State of Influence Operations 2017-2020 3 Influence operations for hire 3 Description as reported Commercial firms run operations for clients 3 12 Example report Adversarial Threat Report, First Quarter 2023 12 Websites posing as news outlets 3 Description as reported Networks built websites posing as news outlets 3 4 Example report What We Saw on Our Platforms During 2024's Global Elections 4 Domains in Google News and Discover 5 Description as reported 85 domains blocked from Google News and Discover in one December 2025 entry, attributed to Russia 5 Documented by Google TAG 5 Example report TAG Bulletin: Q4 2025 5 Blogs and ads accounts 5 Description as reported Entries list Blogger blogs and Ads accounts next to YouTube channels, for example 5 channels and 1 Blogger blog critical of Moldova in October 2025 5 Documented by Google TAG 5 Example report TAG Bulletin: Q4 2025 5 Large channel networks 6 Description as reported 6,484 YouTube channels in one PRC entry in September 2025 6 Documented by Google TAG 6 Example report TAG Bulletin: Q3 2025 6 Human narration and talk show formats 7 Description as reported Real human voice narration, a talk show format with a host and animated political cartoons 7 Documented by Google TAG 7 Example report DRAGONBRIDGE activity disrupted in 2022 7 Mixing with apolitical content 7 Description as reported Influence content mixed in with high quality apolitical content 7 Documented by Google TAG 7 Example report DRAGONBRIDGE activity disrupted in 2022 7 AI-generated replies to own posts 8 Description as reported Some networks generated replies to their own posts to create an appearance of activity 8 Example report Disrupting deceptive uses of AI by covert influence operations 8 AI translation and article writing 8 Description as reported Doppelganger translated and edited articles, and IUVM generated and translated long-form articles, as attributed by OpenAI 8 Example report Disrupting deceptive uses of AI by covert influence operations 8 Bulk AI-written comments 9 Description as reported Short social media comments generated in bulk in English, Chinese and some Urdu 9 Example report June 2025 report, Sneer Review 9 Fake veteran personas 9 Description as reported Profile images created for fake US veteran personas 9 Example report June 2025 report, Uncle Spam 9 Posing as residents of target countries 9 Description as reported Accounts posed as residents of the US, UK, Ireland and Venezuela 9 Example report June 2025 report, STORM-2035 9 Outreach and social engineering 9 Description as reported Polished correspondence and translated messages aimed at extracting information from strangers 9 Example report June 2025 report, VAGue Focus 9 Inauthentic AI-generated accounts 10 Description as reported Listed by EUvsDisinfo among behavioural indicators for linking channels to threat actors 10 Documented by EEAS, EUvsDisinfo 10 Example report FIMI Exposure Matrix 10 Many accounts across many platforms 11 Description as reported Over 500 FIMI incidents in 2024 used at least 25 platforms and at least 38,000 accounts 11 Example report Inside the infrastructure of FIMI operations, 19 March 2025 11 Nothing matches. 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Notes Tactics are listed as the reporting body described them. Origin and attribution in each example are the reporting body's own findings 1 ,2 9 Meta cautions that sharing a campaign's links or interacting with it is not enough to attribute accounts to the campaign without corroborating evidence 1 Rules and charges change. Check the official source linked on this page before you pay or travel. Spotted an error? Email hello@influenceopsrecords.com .
