Analyzing the role of media orchestration in conducting disinformation campaigns on blogs

Social media is undoubtedly a widely used communication platform that affords easier sharing and access to information. Even though social media is used for benevolent purposes, a few use this platform for deviant activities such as cyberbullying, cyber warfare or propaganda, disinformation and fake news dissemination to influence the masses. With the availability of inexpensive and ubiquitous mass communication tools like social media, disseminating false information and propaganda is both convenient and effective. Social media in general and blogs in particular act as virtual spaces where narratives are framed. In order to generate discourse, web traffic needs to be driven to these virtual spaces. Social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, and other websites are therefore used as vehicles to disseminate the content. This link between blogs and social media platforms is vital to examine disinformation campaigns. In this research, we examine the role of media orchestration strategies, more specifically, cross-media and mix-media strategies in conducting disinformation campaigns. The paper presents an in-depth examination of the information networks using social network analysis and cyber forensic-based methodology, to identify prominent information actors and leading coordinators of the disinformation campaigns. Using the developed research methodology, the study reveals a massive disinformation coordination campaign pertaining to the Baltic region conducted primarily on blogs but strategically linking to a variety of other social media platforms, e.g., Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, VKontakte, among others.