Exploiting TikTok for malicious influence on ukrainian audience

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Russians use the capabilities of social networks to promote Kremlin’s profitable narratives, spreading propaganda and conducting influence operations in russian federation and abroad. Since its founding such russian social networks as “VKontakte” and “Odnoklassniki” have come under increased influence of government structures. Currently they indirectly belong to the government through the “Gazprom” structures and ultimately turned into the tool of propaganda.

Simultaneously, Russian intelligence services and their contractors are trying to exploit all available opportunities to operate through popular foreign social media platforms. In addition to the most obvious tools, such as bot farms, troll factories, or placing advertisements, Russians are leveraging social media algorithms for their own purposes. The Center for Strategic Communications and Information Security explains how Russians exert malicious influence on the Ukrainian audience on the social media platform TikTok.

Why TikTok is of Interest to Russian Intelligence Services

The social network TikTok, owned by the Chinese corporation ByteDance, is one of the most popular platforms in the world. In 2023, the number of its active users exceeded 1.5 billion and continues to grow. According to the analytical company Kantar, as of the first half of 2024, no fewer than 9.4 million adult Ukrainians (aged 18–55) were using TikTok.

Research conducted by the “OPORA” network revealed that more than a quarter of adult Ukrainians use TikTok as a source of news. Moreover, in terms of audience reach and trust levels, social networks as a whole surpass television, radio, and print media.

ALSO READ: Spam, ads, fakes. How russian propaganda attacks ukrainians in social networks.

Access to social media audiences is a crucial tool for influencing opinions and behavior. Russian intelligence services aim to use this tool as effectively as possible, adapting to global changes in media consumption and the policies of each specific social network.

Topics Promoted by Russians on TikTok

Russia’s campaigns on social media target Ukraine and Western countries. These efforts are part of the broader information strategy accompanying Russian aggression, aimed at spreading disinformation and propaganda to destabilize the situation. TikTok, in particular, serves as a key platform for disseminating: 

• Anti-vaccine narratives and conspiracy theories**, including movements like “citizens of the USSR,” followers of the “corporation ‘Ukraine'” myth, and advocates for “natural persons, male and female”; 
• Content designed to disrupt mobilization efforts in Ukraine; 
• Material discrediting Ukrainian authorities; 
• Disinformation about power outages; 
• Content aimed at demoralizing Ukrainian military personnel and civilians, provoking internal divisions, societal conflicts, radicalization, and incitement to violence. 

Since 2020, conspiracy theorists have been building networks of anti-vaxxers and followers of other conspiracy theories. By 2022, their focus shifted to opposing mobilization efforts and discrediting the government. A prominent figure in this movement, Kyrylo Stremousov, eventually became an open collaborator in the temporarily occupied city of Kherson.

In November–December 2022, conspiracy theorists Anton Hura and Ostap Stahiiv coordinated their efforts to spread disinformation about the introduction of the e-hryvnia. They also falsely claimed that power outages were caused by a conspiracy between the government and businesses rather than Russian attacks on critical infrastructure.

This group of bloggers uses multiple platforms to communicate with their audience: YouTube for live streams, Telegram for text-based messages, TikTok for short video appeals. Among these, TikTok videos achieve the largest audience reach. For example, Hura’s anti-mobilization videos garnered views ranging from tens of thousands to 1.5 million, making the platform a highly effective tool for their campaigns.

Using TikTok to Undermine Mobilization in Ukraine 

TikTok has become a key platform for conducting an information operation aimed at disrupting mobilization efforts in Ukraine. For an extended period, the hashtag #TRC and related tags were among the most popular in the “News and Entertainment” category. From May 16 to June 16, 2024, approximately 13,000 videos with this hashtag were published, garnering over 470 million views. 

By July 2024, the #ТЦК hashtag became the most popular in the Ukrainian segment of TikTok. Other anti-mobilization hashtags, such as #стоптцк (#stopTRC), #народпротитцк (#peopleAgainstTRC), #спротивтцк (#resistanceTRC), and #протесттцк (#protestTRC), also gained significant traction. Additionally, the anti-government hashtag #ценемояукраїна (#ThisIsNotMyUkraine) ranked among the most popular tags. 

In one week of July 2024, over 40,000 posts using the hashtag #ценемояукраїна (#ThisIsNotMyUkraine) appeared on TikTok, with a combined reach of 10 million views. Analysts from the Texty project uncovered a network of 2,100 accounts that systematically disseminated videos with these hashtags during the summer. This network was also linked to another one specializing in promoting advertisements for Russian online casinos. 

ALSO READ: How Russian special operations are trying to disrupt mobilization in Ukraine

Among the most common types of video content accompanying these hashtags are:

• Real and staged videos of conflicts involving employees of the Territorial Recruitment Centers (TRC), including scandals, fights, and forceful detentions;
• Staged videos aimed at provoking negative emotions towards TRC staff (e.g., provocative behavior by “military personnel,” flaunting of corrupt wealth, etc.);
• Narratives about abuses and conflicts, justifications, and calls for violence against TRC staff;
• Advice from TikTok lawyers and “human rights defenders” on how to evade mobilization;
• Out-of-context or poorly framed quotes from military personnel about the need for mobilization;
• Staged videos normalizing and promoting draft evasion, illegal border crossing, and romanticizing the image of the “draft dodger” (e.g., interviews and monologues from “draft evaders” and their “relatives,” videos showing extravagant lifestyles abroad, positive songs about “draft dodgers,” etc.);
• Identical videos** claiming the total corruption of Ministry of Defense officials, Ukrainian Armed Forces generals, and TRC leaders, featuring AI-generated voiceovers and slideshows of expensive real estate, luxury cars, and other luxury items;
• AI-revoiced excerpts from news broadcasts;
• Fake news about the mobilization of teenagers, women, etc.

In January 2024, TikTok bloggers in both Russian and Ukrainian shared a story claiming that a man in Kharkiv killed a TRC employee to take revenge for the mobilization of his sick son.

The fake story was based on a real incident: the domestic murder of a 57-year-old civilian man in the village of Dubivka, Derhachi community, Kharkiv district. The popularity of the “narrative retelling” format is due to the use of the image of a “simple guy” (a neighbor or acquaintance), which the audience tends to trust more than “the authorities.”

Between 2022 and 2023, there was a shift from the normalization of passive draft evasion (hiding from Territorial Recruitment Centers) to active evasion (conflicts with TRC staff, fleeing abroad). Since at least the beginning of 2024, efforts have been underway to normalize violence (armed attacks on military personnel, arson of military vehicles, and similar acts).

The key tools are fake news retellings and maximum attention to real incidents (reposting videos of events and retellings in the absence of other media content).

“Illegitimate President,” Internal “Divisions,” and Other Topics for Russian IPSOs on TikTok 

Since the end of 2023, TikTok has become a platform for spreading the narrative of “illegitimacy” regarding Volodymyr Zelensky after May 21, 2024, when his five-year presidential term is set to end. TikTok “lawyers” either called for elections to be held during the war and accused the president of usurping power and establishing a dictatorship, or urged him to transfer his powers to the Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada (allegedly according to the Constitution). In spring 2024, these same ideas were voiced by the Kremlin, including Vladimir Putin and his spokesperson Dmitry Peskov. 

The first to introduce these “usurpation” claims into the Ukrainian media space was former Member of Parliament Ihor Mosiychuk, who used his TikTok, YouTube, and Telegram channels to spread messages synchronized with current Russian IPSOs.

Since spring 2023, the synchronized spread of the so-called “French animated series” began on TikTok and other platforms (including via Facebook ads). This series promoted narratives about external governance and total corruption, depicting the President of Ukraine as a drug and alcohol-dependent individual. 

ALSO READ: Operation “Usurpation”: How and why the Kremlin is trying to question Zelensky’s legitimacy

Using short, emotionally charged videos posted on TikTok and other platforms, activities are carried out to artificially create and amplify existing social fault lines, generate and radicalize conflicts along the following lines: 

• Military vs. civilians
• Military vs. police
• Military vs. government 
• Society vs. government 
• Civilians vs. police
• Ukrainian speakers vs. Russian speakers
• Residents of regions vs. Kyiv residents 
• Eastern residents vs. Western residents 
• Regional residents vs. internally displaced persons (IDPs)
• Citizens in Ukraine vs. refugees abroad, etc. 

To set one group of citizens against another, both real and staged conflict videos are used, alongside TikTokers’ retelling of real and fake news, often employing manipulations, generalizations, and other tactics.

In order to demoralize civilians and military personnel, Russians post videos on TikTok featuring Ukrainian prisoners of war, promoting a positive image of the Russian military (“invincible army”), Putin (“strong leader”), etc. Similar videos are targeted at audiences in other countries.

TikTok’s algorithms make virtually any Ukrainian user vulnerable to harmful content created by Russians. The algorithms automatically determine the content that the user will view and include videos from channels they are not subscribed to in their feed. According to research from analytical centers Tracking Exposed and NewsGuard, TikTok practices “shadow promotion” of Russian propaganda content. 

Although in March 2022, TikTok formally exited Russia (the mobile app became unavailable in the App Store and Google Play Market) and only returned in May 2024, during this entire period, Russian videos continued to be published on the platform, which were part of information operations, promoted the aggressive war against Ukraine, and so on. 

As in other social networks, Russian bot farms operate on TikTok. They are used to post identical comments, like videos to promote them, repost content from other channels, and report pro-Ukrainian videos with the aim of blocking them.