Russian Disinformation Efforts on Social Media

The Russia volume of RAND's Combating Foreign Disinformation series is the most comprehensive single-source analysis of Russian social media information warfare available in the open literature. At 220 pages, it covers Russian doctrine and objectives, the infrastructure of Russian operations (the Internet Research Agency, GRU units, state media ecosystem), the tactics and content strategies deployed across platforms, and the question of effectiveness — what Russian operations have demonstrably achieved and where the evidence of impact is weak or absent.

The treatment of effectiveness is particularly rigorous and important. The report resists the temptation — common in policy and media coverage — to assume that the scale of Russian operations translates directly into political impact. The evidence is more mixed, and the authors are clear about what is known, what is contested, and what remains unmeasured. For analysts conducting threat assessment of Russian information operations, this is the standard reference, and its counter-recommendation section provides a structured framework for policy response.