The BBC has revealed a Russian propaganda effort employing thousands of false TikTok accounts to disseminate false information concerning the war in Ukraine.
Its videos often get millions of views and appear designed to weaken backing from the West.
In a number of countries from Europe, there have been reports alleging that senior Ukrainian officials and their family members made purchases of luxury vehicles or villas abroad following Russia's incursion in February 2022.
The role of the counterfeit TikTok videos was noted by Anastasiya Shteinhauz, the daughter of former Ukrainian Defence Minister Oleksiy Reznikov, as a factor in the latter's dismissal in September of last year.
TikTok stated that it has removed over 12,000 bogus accounts originating from Russia, and the BBC detected an additional nearly 800 of these accounts.
Ms Shteinhauz revealed to the BBC that she was alerted to the Russian disinformation campaign when her husband called her unexpectedly while she was away on holiday.
He told her, "It looks like you now own a villa in Madrid," and sent her a link to a TikTok video narrated by an AI-generated voice that suggested she had acquired a house in the Spanish city.
Ms Shteinhauz initially disregarded the video, believing it to be an isolated incident; but when the next morning she was given another TikTok video with claims that she had acquired a villa on the French Riviera, it began to spread among her circles culminating in her spouse receiving it.
Ms Shteinhauz declares that she does not possess any real estate in Spain, France, or other overseas locations outside of Ukraine.
BBC Verify conducted an investigation and determined that the pictures of the houses in Madrid and Cannes originated from two local property websites and were both still available for purchase.
Videos were made with the objective of targeting her father.
Ms Shteinhauz has been sent videos from a large group of false TikTok accounts pretending to be legitimate users from Germany, France, Poland, Israel and Ukraine; this network being based in Russia.
By exploiting hashtag searches and the suggested content of TikTok, BBC Verify was able to uncover hundreds of comparable videos focusing on an array of Ukrainian authorities.
Accounts with stolen profile pictures, such as those of Scarlett Johansson, Emma Watson, and Colin Farrell, were responsible for the posts.
With few exceptions, just one video was posted by them - a strategy employed by TikTok which is fresh and designed to slip past detection and control the platform's way of suggesting videos to users.
It seemed to be a synchronized endeavor: at times videos showed up on different accounts on the same day and included similar or almost identical dialogues.
The inquiry conducted by BBC Verify revealed consistent, circumstantial evidence that might indicate a possible Russian origin of the system.
This included mistakes commonly made by Russian speakers, such as including some Russian phrases not found in other languages. Moreover, a considerable number of the videos had links to a website previously exposed by Meta as part of a network run by people in Russia, pretending to be legitimate websites from the West.
BBC Verify conducted an examination of a series of videos that sought to malign Mr Reznikov, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, and other Ukrainian officials by depicting them as prioritizing personal gain over the people of Ukraine and the current battle taking place.
They steered clear of directly accusing anyone of misbehavior, but indicated that some public officials had, at a time of conflict, acquired extravagant real estate or commodities - assertions which, upon verification, invariably turned out to be baseless.
Ms Shteinhauz opines that the persistent insinuations had an influence on her father's firing: "It impinged upon my dad's life and his job."
Mr Reznikov, who was previously acknowledged as a major contributor to Ukraine's initiatives to solicit arms support from Western nations, was discharged from his role as defence minister in September.
Ms Shteinhauz commented that a single video would not likely have created an impact, but "when multiple clips get shared from different parts of the globe and from within the nation, then it begins to have an effect".
In the midst of an anti-corruption effort and various controversies concerning the procurement of supplies and tools for the military at inflated costs at the Defence Ministry, Mr Reznikov lost his employment, though he was not charged with corruption.
President Zelensky declared that the ministry requires new approaches in light of their decision to replace Mr Reznikov. Despite his lack of direct allusion to any corrupt practices, his statement was met with appreciation in Ukraine due to the multiple allegations of corruption attached to people working under Mr Reznikov.
Roman Osadchuk, a researcher from the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab who worked jointly with the BBC to look into the network, declared that the false accounts focused on Ukrainians were attempting to erode their confidence in their government.
He declared that they are attempting to reduce Ukraine’s capability to withstand adversities and prevent Ukrainian citizens from resisting the Russians.
According to Renee DiResta, technical research manager at Stanford Internet Observatory, the attention of these videos was specifically directed towards exposing corruption in Ukraine's war effort, mainly to a Western audience.
The charges of corruption leveled against Ukrainian officials could be used to weaken support from European nations for the Ukrainian fight.
When contacted, a representative from TikTok stated that they are continuously and constantly striving to apprehend those who try to impact their community through underhanded practices. They have expelled a hidden sway effort from Russia, part of an inquiry set off by TikTok where the BBC also made a contribution.
TikTok stated it is currently in the process of determining the originator of the network, and has discovered fake videos that are in both Italian and English.
Despite TikTok's attempts to discontinue the network, within the weeks since BBC Verify identified the accounts, the app has presented us with multiple other videos that seem to be a part of the same network.
A few of the articles were distributed as recently as late November and centered on recent occurrences.
The graphics in this project were designed by Katherine Gaynor.
Katherine Gaynor was responsible for the graphics in this project.
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