Moscow behind fake TV channel and Harris hit-and-run case

œU.S. intelligence officials have confirmed that Moscow was behind a fake San Francisco TV station that broadcast outright lies about an alleged hit-and-run incident involving Kamala Harris.

Microsoft had previously identified a “Kremlin-aligned troll farm” as the creators of the fictitious San Francisco Bay Area news outlet KBSF-TV, which used a paid actor to create a fake news story about the nonexistent incident that racked up millions of views on X and was widely shared on TikTok.

On Monday, FBI officials and representatives from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence told reporters that “Russian influence actors” were indeed “responsible for staging a widely shared video in which a woman claims to have been the victim of a hit-and-run car accident at the hands of the vice president,” the FBI spokesman said. Herald-Sun reports.

Russian Troll Farm Invents Viral Lie About Harris Hit-and-Run

“This content is also consistent with Russia’s broader efforts to promote the former president’s candidacy and denigrate the vice president and the Democratic Party, including through conspiracy narratives,” an official reportedly added.

Microsoft noted in its previous report that Russian influence actors have regained momentum in their efforts to destabilize the Democratic campaign after apparently losing ground following President Joe Biden’s surprise withdrawal from the race in July.

MAGA Influencers Claim They Are Real Victims of Alleged Russian Propaganda Plot

The move comes after the Justice Department filed a series of money laundering charges against two employees of RT, a Russian state-owned news outlet, for allegedly paying millions of dollars to Nashville-based Tenet Media in exchange for creating online content designed to influence voters ahead of the November election.

Several far-right influencers, including Tim Pool and Benny Johnson, claim to have been duped by the scheme, saying they had no knowledge of the origin of the funds.

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