Recent analysis

Programs

The Atlantic Council Technology Programs comprises five existing efforts—the Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab), the GeoTech Center, the Cyber Statecraft Initiative, the Democracy + Tech Initiative, and the Capacity Building Initiative. These operations work together to address the geopolitical implications of technology and provide policymakers and global stakeholders necessary research, insights, and convenings to address challenges around global technology and ensure its responsible advancement.

Content

Issue Brief

Feb 29, 2024

After Prigozhin, Russia clamps down online

By the Digital Forensic Research Lab

Russia rolled out a new internet surveillance system in 2023 to crack down domestically on anti-war content, while pushing false narratives to undermine Ukraine at home and abroad.

Civil Society
Disinformation

Issue Brief

Feb 29, 2024

Complicated history helps Russian narratives about Ukraine find a foothold in the Middle East

By the Digital Forensic Research Lab

Across the Arabic-speaking world, the narratives amplified by Russian state media and local media partners are framed in a way that appeals to audiences in the region and their complicated history with the West.

Democratic Transitions
Disinformation

Report

Feb 29, 2024

Undermining Ukraine: How Russia widened its global information war in 2023

By the Digital Forensic Research Lab

On the battlefield, Russia has made strategic gains. In the information sphere, it has the resources and will to outlast the West.

Disinformation
Eastern Europe

Issue Brief

Feb 29, 2024

In Latin America, Russia’s ambassadors and state media tailor anti-Ukraine content to the local context

By the Digital Forensic Research Lab

In the second year of Russia's war on Ukraine, Moscow tried to sell a wider global audience on its version of events. In Latin America, Kremlin media outlets RT en Español and Sputnik Mundo were key players in this effort.

Disinformation
Internet

UkraineAlert

Feb 27, 2024

No opposition candidates allowed in Belarus dictator’s “sham” elections

By Hanna Liubakova

Sunday’s parliamentary and local elections in Belarus were among the most flawed in the thirty-year reign of the country’s authoritarian ruler, Alyaksandr Lukashenka, writes Hanna Liubakova.

Belarus
Civil Society

UkraineAlert

Feb 22, 2024

Putin’s unpunished Crimean crime set the stage for Russia’s 2022 invasion

By Mercedes Sapuppo

The West's inadequate response to Russia’s 2014 invasion of Crimea was a major blunder that emboldened Putin and set the stage for the biggest European invasion since World War II, writes Mercedes Sapuppo.

Conflict
Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Feb 12, 2024

Putin’s history lecture reveals his dreams of a new Russian Empire

By Peter Dickinson

Vladimir Putin turned his hotly anticipated interview with Tucker Carlson into a history lecture that laid bare the dangerous delusions and imperial ambitions driving the invasion of Ukraine, writes Peter Dickinson.

Conflict
Disinformation

UkraineAlert

Feb 6, 2024

Russia’s Bashkortostan protests: Separatism isn’t the real threat facing Putin

By Dylan Myles-Primakoff, Lillian Posner

The main risk to the Putin regime is unity and solidarity across regions between Russians protesting shared forms of mistreatment at the hands of the state, write Dylan Myles-Primakoff and Lillian Posner.

Civil Society
Conflict

UkraineAlert

Feb 1, 2024

Zelenskyy gives Putin a long overdue history lesson

By Taras Kuzio

Russian dictator Vladimir Putin’s weaponization of bad history has helped fuel the bloodiest European conflict since World War II, writes Taras Kuzio.

Civil Society
Conflict

UkraineAlert

Jan 30, 2024

Big Tech must listen to the concerns of Russia’s pro-democracy voices

By Joanna Nowakowska, Anna Kuznetsova, Marta Bilska

Big Tech companies offer a variety of opportunities for free expression in Putin's Russia, write Joanna Nowakowska, Anna Kuznetsova, and Marta Bilska.

Civil Society
Conflict

Experts