Russia
Russia was mentioned in the report as a prime example of a country that pushes disinformation campaigns to stir up division. Despite not finding evidence of Russian interference during the 2021 elections, the report noted Russia is engaged in disinformation efforts related to its war against Ukraine and highlighted that “Canada’s strong support of Ukraine could affect whether Russia tries to influence the next election.”
As the DFRLab has extensively documented, Russian influence operations, such as Doppelganger and Operation Undercut, are known to
target several countries in
different languages and across different platforms to spread distrust about the leaders of these countries and sow doubt about efforts to support Ukraine during the war. Such manipulation also includes spreading false narratives about elections. During the 2024 US election, for example, the DFRLAB examined how Russia-linked media
used Russian-language and English-speaking media outlets to amplify false voter fraud claims and undermine the electoral process.
In September 2024, officials in the United States and Europe revealed that Canada was a target of Russia’s Operation Doppelganger. Fake articles attacked Trudeau and the Liberal Party. Furthermore, the
US Department of Justice issued an indictment against Canadian-owned company
Tenet Media, linking them to pro-Kremlin disinformation operations. While the investigation focused on attacks targeting the United States,
reports that emerged following the indictment highlighted that narratives targeted Canada as well.