Imagine scrolling through social media and pausing at a post from @BanglaExpatSharjah. The account appears to belong to a Bangladeshi worker living in Sharjah, one of the emirates of the United Arab Emirates. It might share everyday observations, complain about the weather, or comment on the challenges faced by migrant laborers in the Gulf. To the casual eye, it seems human. It has a name, a location, a persona. But according to a threat intelligence report released by Anthropic in September, that account was not what it appeared to be. The handle formed part of a collection of synthetic personas…

On a Saturday in Mogadishu, inside a government building where diplomatic protocols and camera flashes usually rule, Somalia’s Minister of Information, Culture and Tourism, Abdifatah Qasim Mohamud, sat down with Deniz Demir, the coordinator of the Center for Combating Disinformation at the Turkish Presidency’s Directorate of Communications. The purpose was to talk about strengthening cooperation against disinformation and misleading narratives. Around them were Somali officials: Abdishakur Ali Ahmed, the director of the ministry’s Strategic Communication Department, and Mohamedkafi Sheikh Abukar, the director of Somali National Television. The official statement after the meeting said the two sides discussed the dangers that…