The Internet brigades (Traditional Chinese: 網特; Simplified Chinese: 网特； Russian: Веб-бригады) ^[1][2] are state-sponsored information warfare teams that conduct psychological operations on-line. Such teams are allegedly affiliated with state propaganda departments, military, or secret police forces. They are said to disseminate disinformation and prevent free discussions of undesirable subjects in political blogs and Internet forums by using cyberstalking, cyber-bullying and other psychological warfare methods against political bloggers or other Internet users.^[3] Since the existence of Internet brigades is often officially denied, such activities may be defined as "black", covert or false flag operations (or "active measures" according to Soviet terminology).

Internet police teams in mainland China

It has been reported^[1] that in 2005, departments of provincial and municipal governments in mainland China began creating teams of Internet commentators from propaganda and police departments and offering them classes in Marxism, propaganda techniques, and the Internet. They are reported to guide discussion on public bulletin boards away from politically sensitive topics by posting opinions anonymously or under false names. "They are actually hiring staff to curse online," said Liu Di, a Chinese student who was arrested for posting her comments in blogs.

Chinese Internet police also erase anti-Communist comments and posts pro-government messages. Estimates of the number of personnel varies, and has been reported as 30000 ^[4] though this number was disputed.^[5][6] Chinese Communist Party leader Hu Jintao has declared the party's intent to strengthen administration of the online environment and maintain the initiative in online opinion.^[7]

Internet brigades in Russia

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First publications

This alleged phenomenon in RuNet was first described in 2003 by journalist Anna Polyanskaya^[8] (a former assistant to assassinated Russian politician Galina Starovoitova^[9]), historian Andrey Krivov and a programmer Ivan Lomako. All of them are immigrants. The findings of Polyanskaya and her colleagues have been shared by other individuals - writer Grigory Svirsky and psychologist Vladimir Bagryansky, also immigrants.^[3] They claimed the appearance of organized and fairly professional "brigades", composed of ideologically and methodologically identical personalities, who were working in practically every popular liberal and pro-democracy Internet forums and Internet newspapers of RuNet. These Internet teams appeared suddenly on Russian language forums in 1999. They have been allegedly organized by the Russian FSB service, the main successor of the KGB.^[3][2]

Criticism and discussions

The discussion began in the Internet forum of the "Russian Journal", just a few days after the first publication by Polyanskaya and others, and it lasted for two months.^[3] During this discussion, Alexander Usupovski, head of the analytical department of the Federation Council of Russia (Russian Parliament) dismissed the existence of such brigades as a conspiracy theory.^[10] According to Usupovski: "We would never make our country's military organizations and security services work under the rule of law and legal control, if won't learn to recognize rationally and objectively their necessity and usefulness for the country, state, society and citizens. Sweeping defamation and intentional discreditation with the help of "arguments", which are obviously false, only contribute to the extrusion of security services outside of rule of law and instigates them to chaos".^[11]

Other bloggers claimed that Usupovsky and his supporters are the governmental "Internet brigade", "FSB agents", and "bastards of SMERSH". A discussion was also conducted on the Internet forum of Moscow News^[3] [2]. Usupovsky supporters suggested to sue Ivan Lomko for libels and defamation [3] and issued various threats.[4] Grigory Svirsky claimed later that "the Internet brigade led by Alexander Usupovski is probably the most incompetent team of Russian state security services in RuNet".^[3]

Alleged Brigades on the Polish Internet

Russian "Internet brigades" allegedly appeared in Poland in 2005. According to claims of anonymous "Polish experts on Russian affairs", reported by the Polish newspaper Tygodnik Powszechny, "at least a dozen active Russian agents work in Poland, also investigating the Polish Internet. They are claimed to scrutinize Polish websites (like those supporting Belarusian opposition), and to perform such actions, as—for instance—contributing to Internet forums on large portals (like Gazeta.pl, Onet.pl, WP.pl). Anonymous "Polish experts on Russian affairs" also stated that "Labeled as Polish Internet users, they incite anti-Semitic or anti-Ukrainian discussions or disavow articles published on the web".^[12]

LiveJournal fighters allegations

A member of National Bolshevik Party Roman Sadykhov claimed that he worked for a year as a "spy" in a recently created organization "Russia the young", directed and paid from the Kremlin. He alleged, among other things, that teams of "LiveJournal fighters" are created by "Russia the young".^[13] Roman Sadykhov claimed that he was present at a "secret speech" of Vladislav Surkov, who told that "Their ideological work in LiveJournal is extremely important"^[14] and that people's brains must be "nationalized" (Russian:"Надо мозги национализировать"). He cited Vladislav Surkov who allegedly said the following:

"We are losing in the Internet in that respect. It is always easier to break down things than to do something positive. [Your actions] are jokes and minor infractions. Not only our methods, but also our goals must be radical. We must blow this romantics out of them [our opponents]. It is important not to protect the authorities - this is understood, but we need to attract young people who can work creatively in the Internet. This is an important communication place of young people. Make them interested in conversations with you."^[14]

Alleged Behavior

According to Polyanskaya group, the behavior of people from the Internet brigades has distinct features, some of which are the following:^[2]

• Propaganda of the Communist ideology, and constant attempts to present in a positive light the entire history of Russia and the Soviet Union, minimizing the number of people who died in repressions.
• Boundless loyalty to Vladimir Putin and his circle.
• Respect and admiration for the KGB and FSB. The key word which "will force them to reveal their true colors is lustration". The brigade will cry out in a choir about "bloody repressions by democratic murderers" and "witch hunts" after mentioning this word.
• Hatred of dissidents and human rights organizations and activists, political prisoners and journalists, especially Anna Politkovskaya and Sergei Kovalev.
• Anti-Americanism and anti-Westernism.
• Accusation of Russophobia against everyone who disagrees with them.
• Tendency to accuse their opponents of being insane during arguments.
• Round-the-clock presence on forums. At least one of the uniform members of the team can be found online at all times, always ready to repulse any “attack” by a liberal.

Tactics

According to Polyanskaya group,

• Individual work on opponents. "As soon as an opposition-minded liberal arrives on a forum, expressing a position that makes them a clear "ideological enemy”, he is immediately cornered and subjected to “active measures” by the unified web-brigade. Without provocation, the opponent is piled on with abuse or vicious “arguments” of the sort that the average person cannot adequately react to. As a result, the liberal either answers sharply, causing a scandal and getting himself labeled a “boor” by the rest of the brigade, or else he starts to make arguments against the obvious absurdities, to which his opponents pay no attention, but simply ridicule him and put forth other similar arguments."^[2]
• Accusations that opponents are working for “enemies”. The opponents are accused of taking money from Berezovskiy, the CIA, the MOSSAD, Saudi Arabia, the Zionists, or the Chechen rebels.
• Making personally offensive comments, especially of sexual nature.
• Remarkable ability to reveal personal information about their opponents and their quotes from old postings, sometimes more than a year old.
• Teamwork. "They unwaveringly support each other in discussions, ask each other leading questions, put fine points on each other’s answers, and even pretend not to know each other. If an opponent starts to be hounded, this hounding invariably becomes a team effort, involving all of the three to twenty nicknames that invariably are present on any political forum 24 hours a day."^[2]
• Appealing to the Administration. The members of teams often "write mass collective complaints about their opponents to the editors, site administrators, or the electronic “complaints book”, demanding that one or another posting or whole discussion thread they don’t like be removed, or calling for the banning of individuals they find problematic."^[2]
• Destruction of inconvenient forums. For example, on the site of the Moscow News, all critics of Putin and the FSB "were suddenly and without any explanation banned from all discussions, despite their having broken none of the site’s rules of conduct. All the postings of this group of readers, going back a year and a half, were erased by the site administrator."^[2]

Internet brigades in Russian literature

The alleged FSB activities on the Internet have been described in the short story "Anastasya" by Russian writer Grigory Svirsky, who was interested in the moral aspects of their work.^[15] He wrote: "It seems that offending, betraying, or even "murdering" people in the virtual space is easy. This is like killing an enemy in a video game: one does not see a disfigured body or the eyes of the person who is dying right in front of you. However, the human soul lives by its own basic laws that force it to pay the price for the virtual crime in his real life".^[3]

Miscellaneous

Organized teams of information fighters are becoming an increasingly common phenomenon. Some of them are not sponsored by the state, but can push different political agendas,^[16] be involved in astroturfing,^[17] or participate in election campaigns.^[18]

References

See also

• Information warfare
• Harassment by computer
• Jingjing and Chacha
• Computer crime
• Internet censorship in the People's Republic of China
• Astroturfing