France’s presidential election is still more than two years away, but the battle to shape its outcome has already begun, and it is being fought in the shadows of the internet. The vote is scheduled for the spring of 2027, yet long before a single ballot is cast, the process is already being tested by a combination of misinformation, alleged foreign interference, and criminal complaints. Researchers tracking covert influence operations have identified a campaign linked to Matryoshka, a shadowy disinformation network aligned with Russian interests. The name is fitting: like the famous nesting dolls, this operation appears to contain layer…

Paragraph 1 Picture this: you’re scrolling through your social media feed late at night, half-awake, when a post catches your eye. It’s a dramatic headline—perhaps claiming that a common household ingredient causes cancer, or that a miracle fruit can cure arthritis overnight. Your heart skips a beat. You feel a wave of anxiety, then a flicker of anger at the “establishment” that’s hiding these “facts.” You almost share it to your private family group chat, because after all, your aunt’s neighbor’s cousin forwarded a similar thing, and they seem trustworthy. This is the daily reality of navigating health information in…