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Czech Republic Sets Up Counter-Terrorism Unit To Counter Fake News Threat (cnn.com)
According to CNN, the Czech Republic is setting up a new counter-terrorism unit to combat the rise of fake news or "foreign disinformation campaigns." The counter-terrorism unit is called "The Center Against Terrorism and Hybrid Threats," and is due to start operating on Sunday, according to an interior ministry statement. CNN reports: The new center is intended to monitor internal security threats, including attacks on soft targets and extremism, as well as "disinformation campaigns related to internal security." Its establishment follows the publication in September of a Czech intelligence service report that identified Russian disinformation and cyber-espionage activities as a potential threat to the Czech Republic, European Union and NATO. The Czech Republic is due to hold a general election next year. According to the Czech Security Information Service (BIS) annual report, Russia in 2015 used "influence and information operations" to try to manipulate public opinion in the Czech Republic in relation to Syria and Ukraine. Russia is involved in conflicts in both these countries. Russia's hybrid warfare operations included "weakening the strength of Czech media" through "covert infiltration of Czech media and the Internet, massive production of Russian propaganda and disinformation controlled by the state," the report said. Other Russian operations included founding puppet organizations, the "covert and open support of populist or extremist subjects," and "disrupting the coherence and readiness of NATO and the EU," the report claimed. "The above-mentioned activities pose a threat to the Czech Republic, EU and NATO not only in relation to the Ukrainian and Syrian conflicts. "The infrastructure created for achieving these goals will not disappear with the end of the two conflicts. It can be used to destabilize or manipulate Czech society or political environment at any time, if Russia wishes to do so." According to the Czech interior ministry, its new unit won't be interrogating anyone, censoring online content or bringing legal proceedings, nor will it "have a button for 'switching off the internet.'" But it will monitor threats, inform the public about "serious cases of disinformation" and promote internal security expertise.
lots and lots of page views. Worse, Fake News only really works with the worst sort. Either people who aren't all there (Alzheimer's, which given aging populations is a real problem) or folks who never learned critical thinking (which, despite what the right ring will tell you, is a skill that can be taught. That's what all those English Classes are for).
The worst thing is you can't even harness Fake News for good. The sort of person who's on the ball enough to do good isn't going to fall for Fake News. Where the sort of person who is just needs a little push in the right direction to do something nasty. That's why you don't see left wing Fake News very much. The ones selling it (not good natured lefties but folks in the page views biz) admitted as much when asked in several interviews. Lefty Fake News gets debunked too fast to spread like good Fake News needs to...
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So basically the problem is that Russia is pushing its own war propaganda against government's own. Fake news is likely to be on both sides.
You haven't seen the extent of Russian trolling. The so called "Olgino brigade" (well, they have multiple offices and the one at Olgino has long since moved) dominate any comment section on a story even remotely connected to Russia, Ukraine, US, Israel, Turkey, etc, on most prominent news sites. They up-mod each other, operating many many sockpuppets through proxies in the country. While they generally speak good Polish (or in this case, Czech), they are trivial to spot: for example, they love to call any opposition "fascist" -- that's a term which was massively used in Soviet propaganda but in Poland used exclusively for Mussolini's Italy even during the commie times -- where an American would say "nazi" we have "hitlerite", so use of "fascist" stands out. In the past they had to mention "Right Sector" in every sentence, nowadays they go for UPA or Bandera. Somehow they're also extremely anti-semitic (not sure what's the gain for Russia here).
The creatures outside looked from Alt-Right to Antifa; but already it was impossible to say which was which.
In Russia they call anyone they dislike a fascist. Any government that disagrees with Putin is a fascist, any government that wants to align with the west is fascist, any nation that allied with Nazis over fear of USSR invasions is called fascist. It is sort of the equivalent of Americans calling people they don't like, socialists. Because Russia had such a rough time of it after the USSR breakup (despite that being a good thing on the whole) they tend to lean back on winning in WWII as a point of personal pride. We have dimwitted people in the US saying "you'd all be speaking German if it wasn't for us!" and so similarly the dimwitted people in Russia will accuse othesr who are opposed to Russian government policies as nazi or fascist.