28 February 2023
Webinar
Webinar | Smoke and Mirrors: Investigating How Russian State Media Outlets Evaded Sanctions
Shortly following the start of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the European Union imposed sanctions on Russian state-affiliated media outlets RT and Sputnik, in order to curb information manipulation by Russia in the territory of the EU. From 2 March 2022, the broadcast of, and access to, these outlets and their various language versions was suspended within the EU Member States. Since then, state media outlets explored methods to direct traffic to alternative domains and maintain their reach.
Based on an ISD report exploring the digital infrastructure of Russian state media and how effective the sanctions were, this webinar will delve into the following two crucial topics:
- How ISD analysts used Maltego to map out the digital infrastructure of Russia Today and Rossiya Segodnya
- How they uncovered technical links between the organizations’ outlets and domains set up to evade sanctions ahead of measuring the reach of these domains
Meet the Speakers
Jordan Wildon is a Senior Digital Methods Manager at the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, overseeing online research projects within the US and abroad, taking responsibility for methodologies deployed to detect and analyse influence operations, disinformation and extremism. Outside of this, he develops digital research tools and his work has been featured in major news outlets worldwide.
Kevin D. Reyes is a Senior OSINT Specialist in ISD’s Digital Analysis Unit, where he leads open-source investigations methods and researches online hate, extremism and disinformation. He previously worked as the director of research and intelligence at a consulting firm, and conducted open-source investigations for law enforcement and Fortune 500 clients into illicit trade and transnational crime, including pharmaceutical counterfeiting; opioid trafficking; COVID-19 treatment scams; money laundering; corporate and charity fraud; counterfeit food and coffee; and wildlife and antiquities trafficking; as well as disinformation and extremism. Prior to intelligence consulting, Reyes worked in law library management at several law schools, and in international criminal law research at Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights in Washington DC and at the Human Rights Center at UC Berkeley School of Law. While at the Human Rights Center in 2016, he helped launch its Human Rights Investigations Lab, the first university-based, open-source investigations lab of its kind to discover and verify human rights violations and potential war crimes. Reyes received his bachelor’s from the University of California, Berkeley.
