The Hub conducts investigations examining digital influence campaigns. These are done for the purpose of building an understanding of the tactics, techniques, and procedures used to manipulate public discourse. Research findings are detailed in the reports below.
Every semester, the Hub runs the Media Forensics Open-Source Investigation CI. As a team, students will publicly report on their findings, to be disseminated to the CU Hub community and media partners to deepen how the public interprets these media artifacts.
The People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) campaign known as Spamouflage Dragon has targeted sitting U.S. Senator Maroc Rubio with an ongoing disinformation campaign. Attacks on Senator Rubio began in 2022 during his reelection campaign, apparently paused for nearly two years, but began again in September 2024 though at a much lower rate. This report will briefly outline the changing tactics Spamouflage has employed in their work against Senator Rubio.
This report details an ongoing social media influence campaign employing AI powered bots to influence political conversations in U.S. federal elections. This inauthentic network includes at least 686 accounts, and likely more. The campaign uses large language models to create organic seeming content in the replies of real users’ posts. Taking on conservative persona and perspectives, this campaign has targeted both Republican candidates (in primaries) and Democrats (in generals) in addition to advocating for specific issues. This report explores the network’s messaging, operations, and implications.
The Islamic Republic of Iran is known to engage in digital information operations targeting both their regional neighbors and Western adversaries. While several campaigns have been identified in recent months, specifics about the tactics and messaging Iran have employed are limited. This report offers a robust understanding of one ongoing campaign the Clemson Media Forensics Hub has attributed to Iran. We include analysis of the campaign’s scope and impacts as well as a deep look at its messaging, including specific visual examples.
Under President Paul Kagame actors aligned with the ruling Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF) have routinely used digital platforms to harass and intimidate critics. Prior reporting on the behavior of these actors has primarily focused on specific attacks, accounts, or targets due to their potential for harm. In this report we identify a large coordinated RPF - aligned influence campaign and conduct a thorough analysis of its scale, scope, and techniques.
In this case study, we demonstrate a unique combined approach to detecting coordinated activity on social media to a degree of accuracy and sensitivity that is not yet seen anywhere in the market. This detailed intelligence can have enormous strategic value in understanding where adversaries are allocating their efforts, for understanding the strengths and weaknesses of their approaches to influence, and for planning countermeasures.
This report describes the details of a current Russia-linked narrative laundering campaign combining traditional KGB laundering tactics observed as part of Operation Denver with modern digital technologies, including social media, digital publishing, and artificial intelligence.
