AI incident #972 ·
Russian Influence Operation Allegedly Uses AI to Create Fake Kamala Harris Campaign Website and Rhino-Hunting Hoax
What happened
A Russian disinformation campaign, linked to Storm-1516 and Kremlin propagandist John Mark Dougan, allegedly used AI-generated content to target Kamala Harris’s election bid. The operation included a fake campaign website promoting extreme policies and an AI-enhanced deepfake video falsely claiming Harris killed an endangered rhino in Zambia. The hoaxes were spread via Telegram, X, VK, and pro-Kremlin media outlets.
Only the incident metadata is stored here. The underlying news reports are on the AI Incident Database (CC BY-SA 4.0); use the links above to read them.
News reports (2)
Coverage catalogued by the AI Incident Database. Titles link to the original publisher; the text is not reproduced here.
Who was involved
- Alleged deployer
- Storm 1516, John Mark Dougan, Russian State Media, Sputnik, Rt (Russia Today), Pravda Network
- Alleged harmed party
- Kamala Harris, American Voters, Democratic Integrity
Classification (MIT AI Risk Repository taxonomy)
- Risk domain
- Malicious Actors & Misuse
- Risk subdomain
- 4.1 Disinformation, surveillance, and influence at scale
- Causal entity
- Human
- Intent
- Intentional
- Timing
- Post-deployment
- Harm level
- —
- Sectors
- —
- Countries
- —
Risk entries describing this failure mode
Entries from the MIT AI Risk Repository coded to subdomain 4.1.
- Coercion/manipulation
"Coercion/manipulation - Use of a technology system to covertly alter user beliefs and behaviour using nudging, dark patterns and/or other opaque techniques, resulting in potential erosion of privacy, addiction, anxiety/...
- Electoral interference
"Electoral interference - Generation of false or misleading information that can interrupt or mislead voters and/or undermine trust in electoral processes."
- Political manipulation
"Political manipulation - Use or misuse of personal data to target individuals’ interests, personalities and vulnerabilities with tailored political messages via micro-advertising or deepfakes/synthetic media."
- Political and Economic
"Political and Economic - Manipulation of political beliefs, damage to political institutions and the effective delivery of government services."
- Biased influence through citizen screening and tailored propaganda
"AI-powered chatbots tailor their communication approach to influence individual users' decisions. In the UK, a form of initial computational propaganda has already happened during the Brexit referendum. In future, there...
- Political
"In the UK, a form of initial computational propaganda has already happened during the Brexit referendum1 . In future, there are concerns that oppressive governments could use AI to shape citizens’ opinions"
- Surveillance and Censorship
"Content moderation has emerged as one of the key use-cases of LLMs (Weng et al., 2023), indicating the potential of LLMs for surveillance and censorship as well (Edwards, 2023). Surveillance and censorship are one of th...
- Disinformation and manipulation of public opinion
"AI, particularly general- purpose AI, can be maliciously used for disinformation (351), which for the purpose of this report refers to false information that was generated or spread with the deliberate intent to mislead...
Incidents in the same risk subdomain
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- Purported AI-Generated War Footage Reportedly Circulated Widely Online During the Opening Phase of the War in Iran
- Purportedly AI-Manipulated Satellite Image Reportedly Claimed Iranian Strike Destroyed U.S. Radar in Qatar
- Network of Allegedly Fake Facebook Profiles with Purportedly AI-Generated Images Amplified Posts by Bulgaria's 'There Is Such a People' (ITN) Party
- Purportedly AI-Generated Image Reportedly Circulated Ahead of Thai Election Depicting PM Anutin Charnvirakul Dining with Benjamin Mauerberger
- Purportedly AI-Altered Images Reportedly Distort Evidence After Minneapolis Shooting of ICU Nurse Alex Pretti