VSQUARE - Telegram Channel

posts on the Russian-speaking H&L TG channel

reposts and mentions by other TG channels

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Hack-and-leak amplification in belarusian telegram infosphere

On 16 July Telegram restricts access to the hack-and-leak channels for Polish users, allegedly after the intervention of the Polish government. The post is widely forwarded as proof of censorship by the "Polish regime".

On 6 July, a media push based on the leaked documents begins in Belarusian state media. The first media used to report on the released documents are the ATH news agency and SB.by. The latter misleadingly suggests it was Wikileaks that published the leaked emails. The next publishers do not disclose the source of the leaked correspondence, referring to it that these simply "appeared on the web." After being published in few independent sources, the leak becomes news in the state TV channel "Belarus 1". On 7 July, the authors of the channel write: "Our yesterday's publication was noticed by the Belarusian brothers !!! It's nice to know that we managed to help the Brothers." Also on 7 July, the OHT TV channel begins daily follow-up on the leak in their evening program. The authors of the channel seem to monitor Polish media publications around the leak and they react by publishing comments and overviews. . The Polish debate around the leak is used as additional fuel to produce more coverage in Belarus. For few days, the leak is debated by Belarusian politicians and publicists, every comment is reported by the BELTA agency. When the momentum descends, the channel publishes some follow up emails, but the interest weakens. In total, Belarusian state media are covering the leak for two weeks, framing the correspondence as evidence of "a direct attempt to influence the Belarusian Maidan".

The hack-and-leak channel releases the list of Belarusian oppositionists, stating the source is the Polish Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The channel notes the first spike in reach thanks to influential pro-Kremlin account, "Major and General" / "Майор и Генерал" (@mig41). The followers' interpretation of the document is limited to the statement that the Belarusian opposition manages their supporters from abroad.

The post, with a comment from БелВПО/BelVPO (@Belarus_VPO, a channel of belvpo.com - Belarusian military portal with a pro-Lukashenka bias) that directly accuses Polish government of organization of protests, is forwarded by next SB.by journalist, Lyudmila Gladkaya, and other Belarusian channels.

On 29 April, social media accounts of two Polish public persons are hacked and filled with fabricated criticism of alleged spendings on the Belarusian opposition made by the Polish government (anatomy of this attack is discussed further in our article). The screenshots are used to create a memo that is later posted on the hack-and-leak channel. The article itself is distributed more broadly: It's disseminated by, among others, the admin of the channel @cuisine_by, involved with the hack-and-leak channel from its very beginning. A few hours later, another channel associated with SB.by, Жёлтые СЛИВЫ / Yellow Plums (@zheltyeslivy; in Russian 'slivy' is a colloquial term for 'leaks'), turns the fake memo into an article on his blog, giving it additional coverage.

Noticeably, the posts about military gain some extra audience thanks to the influential pro-Kremlin account: this time the posts are forwarded by Контора Пишет / Office Writes (@Contora_Pishet).

Another TG channel - this time posting leaked documents in Polish - is set up on 4 June and goes public in Poland on 8 June. Hackers use stolen account of Dworczyk's wife to promote the link to the channel and suggest the interpretation of the leak. At the same time, Secret Europe begins to publish the first emails coming from the inbox of Michał Dworczyk, chief of Chancellery of PM in Poland (in case of previous documents, the source was not disclosed). Most of the documents are reports from the official program of support for Belarus led by Solidarity Fund PL, an NGO responsible for Eastern Partnership projects. One of the documents is upgraded - the report was copy-pasted to ministerial stationery and falsely attributed to the Dep of Foreign Affairs at the PM office. On 4 June - few days before the publication and on the day the Polish channel was set off - Belarusian state TV ONT/OHT airs an interview with Roman Protasevich, oppositionist and co-author of Nexta channel (kidnapped and arrested after forced landing in Minsk). In the interview, Protasevich states several times that the Belarusian opposition "is financed by Western, including Polish and Lithuanian, secret services". Critics believe the interview was coerced and staged.

The channel "Secrets of Europe" is kicked off on 6 February. Initially (beginning 10 February) only two channels engage with the posts. One of them - PMC Media/ЧВК Медиа (@chvkmedia - ChVK the Russian abbreviation for Private Military Company) - will be crucial in the dissemination of information from the channel. The channel calls itself "Military - political aggregator", the author remains anonymous. PMC Media will forward about half of all posts published on the channel. Interestingly, the "Editorial board of the Telegram channel PMC Media" has its own author's news colum on Russian RIA's Federal News Agency outlet, where they focus mostly on cyber warfare. Independently of the leak channel, on 8 February, Людажор (@Ludazhor) - TG blog of SB.by publicist Yuri Terekh - publishes one of the leaked documents, misleading the public about its origins. The post is based on the unverifiable document and the dubious legend behind its acquisition. Yet, it reaches 20k views in 48h and is replicated by АТН / ATN News (news agency of Belarusian state broadcaster Beltelradio), among others.

Another social media accounts of Polish politicians are hacked and used to create manufactured discussion. The screenshot is used as source material for an article on another Belarusian channel, ЯК МАЕ БЫЦЬ / AS IT SHOULD BE (@kak_polozeno). It suggests that the alleged financial support to Belarusian opposition causes cross-party stir both in Poland and Lithuania. The fake memo goes viral - it's immediately forwarded by the Telegram channels of Belarusian state media, such as ONT NEWS (ОНТ - the TV channel that interviewed detained Roman Protasevich), Belarusian Telegraph Agency BELTA (the state-owned national news agency of the Republic of Belarus), and main channel of SB.by (Sovetskaya Belorussiya - Belarus Segodnya, a daily newspaper in Belarus). It's also forwarded by Lyudmila Gladkaya from SB.by and Grigoriy Azarenok, TV host of СТВ (one of the three national TV channels broadcasting to the entire territory of Belarus).

This data was gathered using Pulsar with the support of IRI's Beacon Project.

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