A new, exhaustive report from the European External Action Service and Ukraine’s Center for Countering Disinformation has pulled back the curtain on the sophisticated psychological war Russia is waging across the European continent. Since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022, Moscow has shifted its strategy from traditional military conflict to a persistent, digital campaign designed to fracture European unity. By leveraging state-controlled media, anonymous networks, and cleverly manipulated content, the Kremlin is working to alienate EU citizens from their own values and erode the support systems that allow Ukraine to pursue its path toward European integration. This is not a series of random internet trolls but a deliberate, coordinated, and well-funded machine designed to exploit the natural tensions inherent in any open society.
The core objective of this campaign is to derail Ukraine’s progress toward joining the European Union. Ever since Ukraine applied for membership just days after the 2022 invasion—and subsequent accession talks opened in 2024—the Kremlin has intensified its efforts to block this democratic progression. Kaja Kallas, the EU’s foreign policy chief, noted that these actions are far from accidental; they are a clear indicator of a profound fear. The Kremlin, she suggests, is terrified of a successful, sovereign Ukraine. By painting Ukraine as a burden rather than a partner, Moscow hopes to convince European populations that their own security, identity, and economic stability are being sacrificed to aid a “lost cause,” thereby turning public opinion against the very core of European cooperation.
To understand the scale of this operation, one only needs to look at the data. Analysts who reviewed over 240,000 social media posts across major platforms like X, Telegram, and TikTok discovered that this content garnered more than 1.39 billion views in just a year and a half. The report identified nearly 2,700 sources displaying signs of “inauthentic behavior”—coordinated networks masquerading as independent users or grassroots movements. These actors rely on emotional manipulation, often taking legitimate quotes from Western officials out of context to manufacture a false narrative of “West fatigue” or to fabricate secret, non-existent geopolitical agendas, such as the baseless claim that EU nations are secretly plotting to partition Ukrainian territory.
The strategy hits closest to home when it targets vulnerable fault lines within specific nations. Poland, for instance, has been a primary target, with propaganda efforts focusing on stoking fear and resentment toward Ukrainian refugees. By framing these refugees as a criminal or social threat, Russian operatives aim to dismantle the public solidarity that has served as a cornerstone of the European response to the war. Such tactics are emblematic of the broader Russian approach: identify where a society is already feeling the pressure—whether it be inflation, migration, or internal political disagreement—and pour fuel on those embers through constant, repetitive, and deceptive digital messaging.
This information warfare often bleeds directly into the realm of cybercrime. The report highlights that these disinformation campaigns are not just about “messaging”; they are deeply integrated with technical efforts to subvert trust in democratic institutions. As Kyrylo Budanov, chief of staff to Ukraine’s president, has pointed out, Moscow is intentionally trying to sabotage trust in reforms and weaken the European identity that Ukraine is so desperately fighting to secure. This is a multi-front attack where the internet is not just a place for communication, but a weaponized theater of operations where legal boundaries are ignored, and objective truth is treated as an obstacle to be bypassed for political gain.
To combat this, the report’s authors are calling for a much more muscular response from the international community. Simply flagging content is no longer enough. The proposed path forward involves stricter sanctions against the entities and infrastructure that facilitate this hostile content, coupled with a much tighter integration between major social media platforms and independent fact-checkers. Furthermore, there is an urgent need for robust legal frameworks—across both national and EU levels—that treat disinformation as an enforceable security threat. By modernizing our legal tools and demanding transparency from digital platforms, Europe aims to make it significantly harder for the Kremlin to treat the internet as an open playground for destroying the trust that binds democratic societies together.