Матеріали автора Yuliia Dukach

In June alone, the video with the hashtag #Recruiting office received 470 million views in Ukrainian TikTok (3 billion all-time). At the same time, 13 thousand posts with this hashtag were published within a month (62 thousand all-time). This is the first most popular hashtag in the News and Entertainment category. It is increasingly being used on the TikTokers pages, which seem to have nothing to do with the topic of the Recruiting office and mobilization. That's because this topic gets many more views.We decided to look at how and whom TikTok encourages to make videos about Recruiting office. To do this, we uploaded the latest posts by TikTokers whose videos appeared in the search results using the hashtag #Recruiting office. Along with the reach, we analyzed how many Russians are following this topic.Читати українською

"...Could Zelenskyy have ordered the Armed Forces of Ukraine to strike a children's hospital during a Russian missile attack to get more air defense systems and aircraft?" rhetorically asks a Russian propagandist on Telegram. He immediately answers himself: "Zelenskyy showed with Bucha that he is ready for any crimes against humanity..." While the ruins were still smoking, Russian propaganda launched a wide and clearly pre-planned information campaign. It consisted of the usual elements for such cases, but there was also something new: a wave of posts claiming that peace negotiations with Russia are necessary.Читати українською

On May 23, TikTok announced an update to its policy against targeted influence campaigns: from now on, all channels labeled as “state-controlled media” will not appear in recommended videos outside their country of origin. Thus, Spanish-speaking RT will not appear in the recommendation feed for the Spanish-speaking audience, and Sputnik Brasil will not appear for the Brazilian audience. But does this restriction work effectively? We decided to check the data.Читати українською

With the development of artificial intelligence capabilities, social networks are increasingly looking like an "AI dump" - a place where lazy content creators test the power of algorithms and try to go viral with other people's and synthetically processed content. We uncovered one such TikTok farm of 300 channels that, after automated processing, presented YouTube content as their own. At the same time, they were "accidentally" spreading Russian propaganda.Читати українською

The benefits of studying disinformation on YouTubeYouTube is one of the most popular social media in Poland and Ukraine: two-thirds of the people in each country have an active account and use the platform to watch entertainment and informational content. The recommendation algorithm is the heart of YouTube: personalized, high-quality selections of similar videos keep viewers on the platform to maximize advertising profits and help users find videos of interest more easily.Читати українською

Ryzyko zetknięcia się z dezinformacją na YouTube w Polsce jest niższe niż na Ukrainie. Pierwszą rzeczą, która chroni Polaków przed dezinformacją i rosyjskojęzycznymi treściami, jest brak znajomości języka rosyjskiego. Polski obszar informacyjny jest również chroniony przed dezinformacją przez prawo UE oraz zachowania i preferencje samych użytkowników, którzy oglądają znacznie mniej wiadomości na YouTube niż Ukraińcy. Wciąż jednak istnieją szare strefy i słabe punkty samej platformy, które zbadaliśmy, prosząc ponad 100 polskich wolontariuszy o zainstalowanie naszej aplikacji i zbieranie wszystkich rekomendowanych przez YouTube treści w ciągu dwóch miesięcy.

We have investigated the non-political segment of TikTok to understand whether Russian influences are penetrating through the entertainment content of this network. The weakest link is humor.TikTok shows Ukrainians videos of Russian stand-up comedians, and often it's "Zadornov-style" humor, mocking the West.Читати українською

The risk of encountering disinformation on YouTube in Poland is lower than in Ukraine. The primary shield against disinformation and Russian-language content for Poles is their lack of proficiency in Russian. 

outube has long earned the reputation of a convenient and reliable service. Two out of three Ukrainians come here for entertainment and educational content, but they also use it to watch the news and follow the twists and turns of Ukraine's political life. The recommendation algorithm is the “heart” of YouTube. In a nutshell, the better recommendations the platform offers, the more time its users spend watching videos and the more money they bring to the advertisers by watching their adverts.

At the end of October 2022, we published a data project about the Russian "Telegram occupation", in which we investigated 120 Telegram channels that were set up by the Russians under the guise of Ukrainian local news channels to prepare for and justify the Russian occupation of Ukrainian territories. However, things didn’t turn out as planned, and by the end of September 2022, almost half of these news channels stopped working. As we learnt later on, not forever. Some Telegram channels still got a chance for a second life, although again, not for long. More details about Russian activity in Telegram and what Soledar offensive has got to do with it – in the article below.