Russia Is Having Less Success at Spreading Social Media Disinformation

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March 08, 2022

Dear Reader, In the first week of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, social media platforms reported that they were taking action against networks of false or stolen accounts, linked to Russia and Belarus, that were deliberately spreading misinformation. This prompt action contrasts with the relative passivity of these tech companies against the same type of Russian disinformation campaigns back in 2016. In this week's lead story, I spoke with misinformation researcher Laura Edelson about what changed, and how an information war is currently playing out alongside the physical one.

Sophie Bushwick, Associate Editor, Technology

Policy Russia Is Having Less Success at Spreading Social Media Disinformation But that could change if people tire of defending against an onslaught of misinformation By Sophie Bushwick

History How Much Medieval Literature Has Been Lost? An ecological model suggests islands are better at preserving literature as well as species By Sophie Bushwick

Energy The Risks of Russian Attacks near Ukraine's Nuclear Power Plants Commercial plants have built-in safety systems but aren't designed with warfare in mind By Andrea Thompson

Computing The Staggering Ecological Impacts of Computation and the Cloud The cloud is not only material but also an ecological force By Steven Gonzalez Monserrate,The MIT Press Reader

Medicine Messenger RNA Therapies Are Finally Fulfilling Their Promise Instructing our cells to make specific proteins could control influenza, autoimmune diseases, even cancer By Drew Weissman

Biotech Artificial Neuron Snaps a Venus Flytrap Shut Researchers say that such bio-integrated systems could be the future of prosthetics By Joanna Thompson

Fossil Fuels Amid War, Biden Reluctant to Unleash Clean Energy Rhetoric The U.S. president has not followed Europe's calls to produce more renewable energy to weaken Russia's global influence By Adam Aton,E&E News

Space Exploration Russia's Invasion of Ukraine May Delay Europe's ExoMars Rover Launch The Rosalind Franklin rover was set to embark for Mars later this year, but the deteriorating relationship between Europe and Russia now makes that very unlikely By Tereza Pultarova,SPACE.com

FROM THE STORE Trailblazers: Women in Science Sally Ride, the first American woman to go to space, once said that she didn't set out to be a role model, but after her first flight, she realized that she was one. Like her, the 12 women scientists in this collection became unintentional heroes through perseverance and hard work, making great discoveries in all areas of science. From Vera Rubin's examination of the internal dynamics of galaxies to Nobel Prize winner May-Britt Moser's study of the brain's GPS-like navigating system, read up on the achievements of women who became role models for us all.

QUOTE OF THE DAY "Within three hours, Microsoft threw itself into the middle of a ground war in Europe--from 5,500 miles away." David E. Sanger, Julian E. Barnes and Kate Conger, The New York Times

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FROM THE ARCHIVE How the U.S. Could Retaliate against Russia's Information War Obama promised a response to hacking and other election interference, but what are his options? By Larry Greenemeier | December 2016

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