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Europe Built a System to Fight Russian Meddling. It’s Struggling

37 points by dankohn1 7y ago

UglyToad 7y ago
I really don't get this whole Russian interference moral panic. Like sure, maybe there are some people paid by foreign governments to target people on social media, but at the point people are susceptible to that they're already so addled by other factors it's basically irrelevant surely? I feel like I must be missing something obvious? For instance here in the UK there's a huge amount of pearl clutching about Russian disinformation leading to the vote to leave the EU (Brexit). But I really don't believe some older folks saw a few adverts on Facebook and that was it. Radicalisation, such as it is, set in decades before through a news media that was overwhelmingly anti EU, incredibly biased to the point of being propaganda and often with no basis in fact. The idea some Russian millenials in a St Petersburg basement lead to Brexit, or Trump, or whatever else they're being blamed for now seems utterly fanciful. Radicalisation for these people set in long before any of this and it was bought in the shop as a newspaper or delivered as part of your cable package.
- mc32 7y ago
  The only reason it’s a panick is because they are contrarians. If they were astroturfing for the mainstream candidates, you wouldn’t hear much. Do we hear about other efforts that likely go on but are in support of non-contrarian candidates? I have not. I doubt it’s because no one is doing it. I mean I’d be surprised. Now, I agree foreigners should not meddle in the elections of others, but some of that stuff is blurry. Would China’s mr. Xi saying he’d wish Bernie would win “interference”? Is a candidate delivering a political speech on foreign soil interference?
  - pochamago 7y ago
    Especially on the internet, which, for all that individual countries may not like, is an international platform. Citizens from every country are encouraged to use every mainstream form of social media. And in every major country people are paid to make certain posts. That it's now political just seems like the natural evolution.
- ardit33 7y ago
  It is real... not just a figment of imagination of politicians... Hang around in forums of countries, where they are trying to actively create chaos and you will see it.... Ways it comes into forums: 1. Asking question: "Is the EU good for Albania, Montenegro, Northern Macedonia, etc", then you see puppet accounts saying the EU is bad and it is being taken over by socialist/nationalist and doesn't want those countries. etc.. etc.. 2. Spreading information about how USA foreign policy is bad... etc.. etc.. and why is NATO needed, (Macedonia is trying to get into NATO. Albania is already in). 3. Soros, somehow is being turned into a Boogeyman, (this was especially championed by the Orban's wanna bees), and a symbol of the 'corrupt west' Russian comments sometimes are obvious, but sometimes are hard to spot. But, they can be spotted as they often speak with a weird language, probably straight out of Google Translate. What are they trying to do? Try to create as much as discontent amount countries of the west, so people are busy and not paying attention on what Putin is doing in the east. Very much Cold War propaganda into the 21st century....
  - ng12 7y ago
    Your evidence that Russian interference is real is that some people on the internet post anti-EU comments? Until I see some credible evidence that Russian trolls are A. state-sponsored and B. any more ubiquitous than the trolls hired by other government agencies (the Hillary campaign hired content farms in 2016) I still think it's pretty alarmist.
    - arwhatever 7y ago
      Or C. Anywhere near spacing the ubiquity of naturally existing trolls...
    - ardit33 7y ago
      Clear russian troll accounts, posting in Albanian forums, on how X Western entity is bad (by X, it is usually EU/NATO/US). It is a monthly pattern. A couple of times, it can be a coincidence, monthly repeated occurrences? It is not. Are they getting paid by the government, or just doing on their own, that I don't know. But it is clear Russian activity. (btw, Albania is not a slavic country, and albania is a mediterranean country and has nothing to do with Russians, and these are not just random folks dropping in asking for the usual tourist info, or just sheer curiosity.... ) If "by clear evidence" you mean a video of the people actually typing these comments, located in some Russian building, with clear "Troll Farm Company sponsored by Putin and the Russian Government" marking, sorry, I don't have that.
- jessedhillon 7y ago
  If you understand that the goal is only to move a small number of people from unlikely voter to likely voter (or vice versa) over the course of several months, given targeting tools that are capable of a high-degree of precision, it doesn't seem implausible at all. An entire industry exists to take people from complete ignorance to paying advocate, and I don't see anyone arguing that the concept of advertising is an "utterly fanciful", "basically irrelevant" proposition. Voting costs nothing but your time, all you need to do is convince someone that their ideas matter.
  - malvosenior 7y ago
    What makes you think "Russian trolls" would be more effective at this than hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign financing from the candidates themselves?
  - mistermann 7y ago
    Has it actually happened though, that's the part that seems a bit fanciful. How have they measured it?
    - lkrubner 7y ago
      If Russia launched a missile at a Western nation, but it turned out the missile was a dud, so when it hits it does almost no damage, would anyone have the slightest doubt that this was an act of war? It doesn’t matter if the missile does damage, the mere effort of launching is an act of war. Likewise, it does not matter if a Russian intelligence operation is successful.
      - mistermann 7y ago
        Ok, so is a single internet troll post by someone from another country sufficient to be considered an act of war? And if so, does this apply to all countries, or only Russia?
        lkrubner 7y ago
- techslave 7y ago
  What you’re missing is that democracies only work with an informed electorate. But it turns out most western countries have passed the point where the average citizen is smart enough to tell fact from fiction. All of these people whose sole source of information about brexit (or US presidential candidates) comes from tv, blogs, and social networks — all 3 designed to sell ads — are easily manipulated. When this manipulation comes from outside sources who have a vested interest in the destruction or degradation of democratic institutions, it’s a problem that needs to be worried about. That you don’t get it, shows short term thinking. These are chickens that are going to come home to roost 50 years later.
  - fit2rule 7y ago
    >What you’re missing is that democracies only work with an informed electorate. You can't have that in a state that priorities protecting its own secrets as a matter of security. "Finally, another important right in any free society is the liberty to contribute to the Public Good. But for this to happen, it must be possible to make the state of affairs in society known to one and all, and everyone must be free to express their thoughts about it. Where this is lacking, liberty is not worth its name." - Peter Forsskål
- tim333 7y ago
  I'm not sure it's a moral panic so much as annoyance at a sketchy foreign power trying to screw with our democracy.
- lkrubner 7y ago
  If Russia launched a missile at a Western nation, but it turned out the missile was a dud, so when it hits it does almost no damage, would anyone have the slightest doubt that this was an act of war? It doesn’t matter if the missile does damage, the mere effort of launching is an act of war. Likewise, it does not matter if a Russian intelligence operation is successful.
- sammorrowdrums 7y ago
  This happened to some degree with WWII, and the accusation is less that people are radicalised and more that they are given a target for their frustration. This TED talk summarises it well. You are correct that certain media in the UK very much laid decades of foundations, and also the government with its austerity measures arguably created much of the environment conducive to radicalisation. https://www.ted.com/talks/carole_cadwalladr_facebook_s_role_in_brexit_and_the_threat_to_democracy https://www.ted.com/talks/carole_cadwalladr_facebook_s_role_... I guess I want to say that the fact the situation is far more nuanced than "the Russians did it" neither excuses it nor does it render those actions irrelevant. They seem to be a fairly clear piece of the puzzle. I'm also sure that all our secret services have been at similar games for years so it's ok to have little sympathy too, but Facebook targeting did get in the way of scrutiny and oversight of these messages which is really problematic for democracy. [edit] fix typo
  - sammorrowdrums 7y ago
    A good parallel is how fad diets slip into the zeitgeist. People were already looking for a magic cure for their weight problems. When that cure falls on their lap many people fall end up with a new (frequently self-destructive) solution. The key is the finding susceptible people and giving them the solution they were already looking for and it'll almost feel obvious.
yorwba 7y ago
> “To be very clear, there is no similar operation going on anywhere in the world,” said Johannes Bahrke, a spokesman for the European Commission. The general idea of spotting and analyzing ongoing disinformation campaigns seems similar to the Taiwanese system that was recently discussed on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20083829 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20083829 That also includes a strategy of responding to detected campaigns before they go viral by issuing counter-statements. The EU might want to do something similar.
- mc32 7y ago
  The weakness of the TW system is that it relies on the actual official version to counter misinformation as well as deemed “misinformation”. So it relies heavily on the official version or official organ to set the record straight. Which you know, can be problematic for obvious reasons.
  - bobthepanda 7y ago
    How else would you present a counter argument to false information? Without appeal to authority nothing makes a source inherently more or less trustworthy.
buboard 7y ago
I dont know, the idea that people even cared for EU elections sounds ludicrous. I mean they completely ignored the result in the selection of the new EU leading person and nobody cares.
- Barrin92 7y ago
  several things: the head of the European comission isn't elected in a popular election, but chosen by representatives of the respective countries, and then affirmed by parliament. So that has little relevance to the actual elections of the parliament itself. Furthermore cooperation between European countries on election security isn't just relevant when it comes to EU elections, but also when national elections are at stake.
  - buboard 7y ago
    > the head of the European comission isn't elected in a popular election, but chosen by representatives of the respective countries, and then affirmed by parliament. Exactly. All the more reason why people don't care. Having a parliament for decoration is not something to boast about.
    - Barrin92 7y ago
      the parliament is not for decoration simply because it does not elect the head of the commission by direct vote. The EU is a supranational collection of countries, not a nation state.
      - buboard 7y ago
        Right, there are many other reasons too. I actually agree, and i would wish EU would stop trying more and more to become a state, and return to being an economic union that encourages each member to use its competitive advantages to prosper.
  - gdhbcc 7y ago
    The eu is the biggest meddler in national elections
malvosenior 7y ago
It's incredible that The New York Times continues to chase the Russian troll story about election interference but not once mention that Google executives were recently caught saying that they will not allow another Trump "situation" and they plan to actively manipulate search and news results to make that happen. Google has so much more leverage than any "troll" yet doesn't even get a passing mention because The New York Times and Google agree on which political party they'd like to see win the 2020 election.
- Consultant32452 7y ago
  Google is in an unfortunate catch 22. If they choose to act, that impacts the election. If they choose not to act, that also impacts the election. The most obvious thing I've seen is they appear to be killing off independent news in favor of the old guard. We'll see what happens as this continues to unfold.
  - malvosenior 7y ago
    The ethical choice would be to not make any partisan or skewed editorial decisions. As it stands, they're using their immense leverage to advocate for left wing politics. A story that dearly needs to be told but isn't by the same mainstream media sources you correctly identify as Google's chosen sources.
    - Consultant32452 7y ago
      Left wing independent sources are getting cut too. David Pakman and others have opened up about how the changes are really hurting then.
  - deleted 7y ago
    [deleted]
- tim333 7y ago
  The reporting on that was kind of dubious. I'm not surprised that mainstream media didn't cover it https://www.theverge.com/interface/2019/6/27/18760463/project-veritas-youtube-sting-james-okeefe https://www.theverge.com/interface/2019/6/27/18760463/projec...
akshayB 7y ago
One of the biggest issues with any system is to stop spread of false information. All social networking platforms are designed to give importance to viral content so they can get opportunity to monetizing these things. Most likely by the time they figured out that there is something wrong with the content its already been exposed to the people.
VK538FY 7y ago
In the country in which I live, what I fear the most is Brussels meddling in the democractic process. Although an immigrant, I have become very attached to the institutions and culture of my host country. Every move closer to the EU, of which we are not a member, menaces those institutions. Yet Brussels has no problem financing NGOs, articles, 'economic research' etc. that want just that. Some are known, yet for others, the source is quite opaque.
- VK538FY 7y ago
  Responding to myself since I first wanted to note the irony of the submitted article. Now I'll talk about this. First, the US has many times interferred in Russian elections. I will not mention the interference in those of Russia's neighbours, Russia's allies, or others. So understand me when I find it absolutely impossible to be shocked by the allegations of Russian interference in the US since at least 2016. Brussels is an ally of the US, submitted to the NATO and therefore the US by treaty, and has done similar. Second, no concrete evidence has been produced that this Russian interference in the US elections went beyond some tens of thousands of dollars of adverts in social media. The fingerprints of Russian troll farms are speculation. To believe some of the commentors here, if someone writes in an online forum that the EU is bad or we need to improve relations with Russia, then it's a Russian troll farm. Well I'm not from a Russian troll farm and I'll say (a) that the economic and political model of the EU has brought suffering and servitude to many of its members and (b) that it is imperative that western countries improve their relations with Russia rather than blindly following the irrational and bellicose positions of the US and NATO.
fmajid 7y ago
The first thing the EU should do is ban political contributions from non-Europeans, the way the US does for non-US-persons. Unfortunately this is not within the remit of the EU, however, and can only be undertaken by member states.
- tim333 7y ago
  The UK banned non UK political contributions but it seems quite likely that much of the brexit funding came from such sources. Not proven yet. I guess it may be a grey area - if Arron Banks UK insurance business is going bust, then is bailed out by a Russian investor and then he gives money to the leave campaign is that Russian money in the election or not?

37 points by dankohn1 7y ago

I really don't get this whole Russian interference moral panic. Like sure, maybe there are some people paid by foreign governments to target people on social media, but at the point people are susceptible to that they're already so addled by other factors it's basically irrelevant surely? I feel like I must be missing something obvious? For instance here in the UK there's a huge amount of pearl clutching about Russian disinformation leading to the vote to leave the EU (Brexit). But I really don't believe some older folks saw a few adverts on Facebook and that was it. Radicalisation, such as it is, set in decades before through a news media that was overwhelmingly anti EU, incredibly biased to the point of being propaganda and often with no basis in fact. The idea some Russian millenials in a St Petersburg basement lead to Brexit, or Trump, or whatever else they're being blamed for now seems utterly fanciful. Radicalisation for these people set in long before any of this and it was bought in the shop as a newspaper or delivered as part of your cable package.

mc32 7y ago
The only reason it’s a panick is because they are contrarians. If they were astroturfing for the mainstream candidates, you wouldn’t hear much. Do we hear about other efforts that likely go on but are in support of non-contrarian candidates? I have not. I doubt it’s because no one is doing it. I mean I’d be surprised. Now, I agree foreigners should not meddle in the elections of others, but some of that stuff is blurry. Would China’s mr. Xi saying he’d wish Bernie would win “interference”? Is a candidate delivering a political speech on foreign soil interference?
- pochamago 7y ago
  Especially on the internet, which, for all that individual countries may not like, is an international platform. Citizens from every country are encouraged to use every mainstream form of social media. And in every major country people are paid to make certain posts. That it's now political just seems like the natural evolution.
ardit33 7y ago
It is real... not just a figment of imagination of politicians... Hang around in forums of countries, where they are trying to actively create chaos and you will see it.... Ways it comes into forums: 1. Asking question: "Is the EU good for Albania, Montenegro, Northern Macedonia, etc", then you see puppet accounts saying the EU is bad and it is being taken over by socialist/nationalist and doesn't want those countries. etc.. etc.. 2. Spreading information about how USA foreign policy is bad... etc.. etc.. and why is NATO needed, (Macedonia is trying to get into NATO. Albania is already in). 3. Soros, somehow is being turned into a Boogeyman, (this was especially championed by the Orban's wanna bees), and a symbol of the 'corrupt west' Russian comments sometimes are obvious, but sometimes are hard to spot. But, they can be spotted as they often speak with a weird language, probably straight out of Google Translate. What are they trying to do? Try to create as much as discontent amount countries of the west, so people are busy and not paying attention on what Putin is doing in the east. Very much Cold War propaganda into the 21st century....
- ng12 7y ago
  Your evidence that Russian interference is real is that some people on the internet post anti-EU comments? Until I see some credible evidence that Russian trolls are A. state-sponsored and B. any more ubiquitous than the trolls hired by other government agencies (the Hillary campaign hired content farms in 2016) I still think it's pretty alarmist.
  - arwhatever 7y ago
    Or C. Anywhere near spacing the ubiquity of naturally existing trolls...
  - ardit33 7y ago
    Clear russian troll accounts, posting in Albanian forums, on how X Western entity is bad (by X, it is usually EU/NATO/US). It is a monthly pattern. A couple of times, it can be a coincidence, monthly repeated occurrences? It is not. Are they getting paid by the government, or just doing on their own, that I don't know. But it is clear Russian activity. (btw, Albania is not a slavic country, and albania is a mediterranean country and has nothing to do with Russians, and these are not just random folks dropping in asking for the usual tourist info, or just sheer curiosity.... ) If "by clear evidence" you mean a video of the people actually typing these comments, located in some Russian building, with clear "Troll Farm Company sponsored by Putin and the Russian Government" marking, sorry, I don't have that.
jessedhillon 7y ago
If you understand that the goal is only to move a small number of people from unlikely voter to likely voter (or vice versa) over the course of several months, given targeting tools that are capable of a high-degree of precision, it doesn't seem implausible at all. An entire industry exists to take people from complete ignorance to paying advocate, and I don't see anyone arguing that the concept of advertising is an "utterly fanciful", "basically irrelevant" proposition. Voting costs nothing but your time, all you need to do is convince someone that their ideas matter.
- malvosenior 7y ago
  What makes you think "Russian trolls" would be more effective at this than hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign financing from the candidates themselves?
- mistermann 7y ago
  Has it actually happened though, that's the part that seems a bit fanciful. How have they measured it?
  - lkrubner 7y ago
    If Russia launched a missile at a Western nation, but it turned out the missile was a dud, so when it hits it does almost no damage, would anyone have the slightest doubt that this was an act of war? It doesn’t matter if the missile does damage, the mere effort of launching is an act of war. Likewise, it does not matter if a Russian intelligence operation is successful.
    - mistermann 7y ago
      Ok, so is a single internet troll post by someone from another country sufficient to be considered an act of war? And if so, does this apply to all countries, or only Russia?
      - lkrubner 7y ago
techslave 7y ago
What you’re missing is that democracies only work with an informed electorate. But it turns out most western countries have passed the point where the average citizen is smart enough to tell fact from fiction. All of these people whose sole source of information about brexit (or US presidential candidates) comes from tv, blogs, and social networks — all 3 designed to sell ads — are easily manipulated. When this manipulation comes from outside sources who have a vested interest in the destruction or degradation of democratic institutions, it’s a problem that needs to be worried about. That you don’t get it, shows short term thinking. These are chickens that are going to come home to roost 50 years later.
- fit2rule 7y ago
  >What you’re missing is that democracies only work with an informed electorate. You can't have that in a state that priorities protecting its own secrets as a matter of security. "Finally, another important right in any free society is the liberty to contribute to the Public Good. But for this to happen, it must be possible to make the state of affairs in society known to one and all, and everyone must be free to express their thoughts about it. Where this is lacking, liberty is not worth its name." - Peter Forsskål
tim333 7y ago
I'm not sure it's a moral panic so much as annoyance at a sketchy foreign power trying to screw with our democracy.
lkrubner 7y ago
If Russia launched a missile at a Western nation, but it turned out the missile was a dud, so when it hits it does almost no damage, would anyone have the slightest doubt that this was an act of war? It doesn’t matter if the missile does damage, the mere effort of launching is an act of war. Likewise, it does not matter if a Russian intelligence operation is successful.
sammorrowdrums 7y ago
This happened to some degree with WWII, and the accusation is less that people are radicalised and more that they are given a target for their frustration. This TED talk summarises it well. You are correct that certain media in the UK very much laid decades of foundations, and also the government with its austerity measures arguably created much of the environment conducive to radicalisation. https://www.ted.com/talks/carole_cadwalladr_facebook_s_role_in_brexit_and_the_threat_to_democracy https://www.ted.com/talks/carole_cadwalladr_facebook_s_role_... I guess I want to say that the fact the situation is far more nuanced than "the Russians did it" neither excuses it nor does it render those actions irrelevant. They seem to be a fairly clear piece of the puzzle. I'm also sure that all our secret services have been at similar games for years so it's ok to have little sympathy too, but Facebook targeting did get in the way of scrutiny and oversight of these messages which is really problematic for democracy. [edit] fix typo
- sammorrowdrums 7y ago
  A good parallel is how fad diets slip into the zeitgeist. People were already looking for a magic cure for their weight problems. When that cure falls on their lap many people fall end up with a new (frequently self-destructive) solution. The key is the finding susceptible people and giving them the solution they were already looking for and it'll almost feel obvious.

yorwba 7y ago

> “To be very clear, there is no similar operation going on anywhere in the world,” said Johannes Bahrke, a spokesman for the European Commission. The general idea of spotting and analyzing ongoing disinformation campaigns seems similar to the Taiwanese system that was recently discussed on HN: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20083829 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20083829 That also includes a strategy of responding to detected campaigns before they go viral by issuing counter-statements. The EU might want to do something similar.

mc32 7y ago
The weakness of the TW system is that it relies on the actual official version to counter misinformation as well as deemed “misinformation”. So it relies heavily on the official version or official organ to set the record straight. Which you know, can be problematic for obvious reasons.
- bobthepanda 7y ago
  How else would you present a counter argument to false information? Without appeal to authority nothing makes a source inherently more or less trustworthy.

buboard 7y ago

I dont know, the idea that people even cared for EU elections sounds ludicrous. I mean they completely ignored the result in the selection of the new EU leading person and nobody cares.

Barrin92 7y ago
several things: the head of the European comission isn't elected in a popular election, but chosen by representatives of the respective countries, and then affirmed by parliament. So that has little relevance to the actual elections of the parliament itself. Furthermore cooperation between European countries on election security isn't just relevant when it comes to EU elections, but also when national elections are at stake.
- buboard 7y ago
  > the head of the European comission isn't elected in a popular election, but chosen by representatives of the respective countries, and then affirmed by parliament. Exactly. All the more reason why people don't care. Having a parliament for decoration is not something to boast about.
  - Barrin92 7y ago
    the parliament is not for decoration simply because it does not elect the head of the commission by direct vote. The EU is a supranational collection of countries, not a nation state.
    - buboard 7y ago
      Right, there are many other reasons too. I actually agree, and i would wish EU would stop trying more and more to become a state, and return to being an economic union that encourages each member to use its competitive advantages to prosper.
- gdhbcc 7y ago
  The eu is the biggest meddler in national elections

malvosenior 7y ago

It's incredible that The New York Times continues to chase the Russian troll story about election interference but not once mention that Google executives were recently caught saying that they will not allow another Trump "situation" and they plan to actively manipulate search and news results to make that happen. Google has so much more leverage than any "troll" yet doesn't even get a passing mention because The New York Times and Google agree on which political party they'd like to see win the 2020 election.

Consultant32452 7y ago
Google is in an unfortunate catch 22. If they choose to act, that impacts the election. If they choose not to act, that also impacts the election. The most obvious thing I've seen is they appear to be killing off independent news in favor of the old guard. We'll see what happens as this continues to unfold.
- malvosenior 7y ago
  The ethical choice would be to not make any partisan or skewed editorial decisions. As it stands, they're using their immense leverage to advocate for left wing politics. A story that dearly needs to be told but isn't by the same mainstream media sources you correctly identify as Google's chosen sources.
  - Consultant32452 7y ago
    Left wing independent sources are getting cut too. David Pakman and others have opened up about how the changes are really hurting then.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
tim333 7y ago
The reporting on that was kind of dubious. I'm not surprised that mainstream media didn't cover it https://www.theverge.com/interface/2019/6/27/18760463/project-veritas-youtube-sting-james-okeefe https://www.theverge.com/interface/2019/6/27/18760463/projec...

akshayB 7y ago

One of the biggest issues with any system is to stop spread of false information. All social networking platforms are designed to give importance to viral content so they can get opportunity to monetizing these things. Most likely by the time they figured out that there is something wrong with the content its already been exposed to the people.

VK538FY 7y ago

In the country in which I live, what I fear the most is Brussels meddling in the democractic process. Although an immigrant, I have become very attached to the institutions and culture of my host country. Every move closer to the EU, of which we are not a member, menaces those institutions. Yet Brussels has no problem financing NGOs, articles, 'economic research' etc. that want just that. Some are known, yet for others, the source is quite opaque.

VK538FY 7y ago
Responding to myself since I first wanted to note the irony of the submitted article. Now I'll talk about this. First, the US has many times interferred in Russian elections. I will not mention the interference in those of Russia's neighbours, Russia's allies, or others. So understand me when I find it absolutely impossible to be shocked by the allegations of Russian interference in the US since at least 2016. Brussels is an ally of the US, submitted to the NATO and therefore the US by treaty, and has done similar. Second, no concrete evidence has been produced that this Russian interference in the US elections went beyond some tens of thousands of dollars of adverts in social media. The fingerprints of Russian troll farms are speculation. To believe some of the commentors here, if someone writes in an online forum that the EU is bad or we need to improve relations with Russia, then it's a Russian troll farm. Well I'm not from a Russian troll farm and I'll say (a) that the economic and political model of the EU has brought suffering and servitude to many of its members and (b) that it is imperative that western countries improve their relations with Russia rather than blindly following the irrational and bellicose positions of the US and NATO.

fmajid 7y ago

The first thing the EU should do is ban political contributions from non-Europeans, the way the US does for non-US-persons. Unfortunately this is not within the remit of the EU, however, and can only be undertaken by member states.

tim333 7y ago
The UK banned non UK political contributions but it seems quite likely that much of the brexit funding came from such sources. Not proven yet. I guess it may be a grey area - if Arron Banks UK insurance business is going bust, then is bailed out by a Russian investor and then he gives money to the leave campaign is that Russian money in the election or not?