Using a fictitious San Francisco news outlet, Russian surrogates have disseminated “fabricated videos designed to sow discord and spread disinformation” about the Kamala Harris presidential campaign, Microsoft said in a statement last week.
One video, which “used an on-screen actor to fabricate false claims about Vice President Harris’s involvement in a hit-and-run accident,” was purportedly published by a San Francisco news outlet created days before the video was posted, the statement said. A spokesperson for the Harris campaign was not immediately available to comment.
The video generated millions of views, according to Microsoft, and was produced by a troll farm with ties to the Kremlin.
Digital experts say the Russians will likely “continue to use cyber proxies and hacktivist groups to amplify their messages through media websites and social channels geared to spread divisive political content, staged videos, and AI-enhanced propaganda,” Microsoft said.
On Monday, officials from the Department of National Intelligence and the Federal Bureau of Investigation confirmed that a fictitious San Francisco news outlet called KBSF-TV published a story on Sept. 2 falsely claiming that Harris was involved in a 2011 hit-and-run accident, according to the Mercury News.
The video claimed that a woman was paralyzed after the incident. There was no evidence to suggest that any of the events in the video ever occurred, officials said.
Of the countries tracked by the Department of National Intelligence, Russia has generated the most AI content around the upcoming election, the DNI said in a statement.
The Russian influence actors were responsible for staging the hit-and-run video, the DNI said, and also had worked in manipulating text, images and audio elsewhere.
Online registration records indicate that the KBSF-TV website was created in late August and registered in Reykjavik, Iceland.
The website was down as of Tuesday.
The FBI did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
