俄羅斯——散布假消息的高手

For Europeans, today’s America serves a useful function: a model for how not to run your society. The US has already demonstrated how easy it is to lurch into plutocracy, or to split a country into two hostile tribes. Now it is offering another cautionary lesson: how to let Russian interference succeed by turning it into a partisan issue. Most Republicans are acting as if the problem isn’t Russian meddling in the 2016 election but the FBI’s handling of it.

對(duì)于歐洲人而言，如今的美國(guó)發(fā)揮著某種有用的功能：作為反面教材，告訴你哪些運(yùn)行社會(huì)的方式是不可取的。美國(guó)已經(jīng)表明它多么容易陷入富豪統(tǒng)治，或讓國(guó)家分裂成兩個(gè)敵對(duì)的部落。現(xiàn)在，它提供了又一個(gè)警示：如何通過(guò)把問(wèn)題黨派化而讓俄羅斯的干涉得手。從大多數(shù)共和黨人的表現(xiàn)看，問(wèn)題好像不是俄羅斯插手了2016年選舉，而在于聯(lián)邦調(diào)查局(FBI)對(duì)這件事的處理。

Russia now has big ambitions for Europe. In the Italian elections on March 4, if you add up the predicted votes of the pro-Kremlin Five Star Movement and the Northern League, plus Vladimir Putin’s chum Silvio Berlusconi, you get to about 58 per cent. Possibly too late, officials around Europe are frantically building defences against Kremlin meddling.

如今俄羅斯對(duì)歐洲有很大的野心。在意大利3月4日的選舉中，如果你把親克里姆林宮的“五星運(yùn)動(dòng)”(Five Star Movement)和北方聯(lián)盟(Northern League)的預(yù)測(cè)選票加在一起，然后再加上弗拉基米爾•普京(Vladimir Putin)的密友西爾維奧•貝盧斯科尼(Silvio Berlusconi)，你會(huì)得到58%左右的得票率?？赡転闀r(shí)已晚，但歐洲各國(guó)的官員正瘋狂建立防范措施來(lái)抵御克里姆林宮的干預(yù)。

People who warn about Russian disinformation are often accused of hysteria, so I’ll start with some caveats. True, Russia wasn’t the biggest factor in the US election. True, the US (like the UK) has an oversupply of homegrown fake news that dwarfs the quantity made in Russia. True, Hillary Clinton was a bad candidate. True, liberals need to understand the popular anger that Donald Trump embodies.

對(duì)俄羅斯造謠發(fā)出警告的人往往被指責(zé)為歇斯底里，因此我先作一些說(shuō)明。沒(méi)錯(cuò)，俄羅斯并不是影響美國(guó)大選的最大因素。沒(méi)錯(cuò)，美國(guó)(就像英國(guó)一樣)國(guó)內(nèi)自生的假新聞泛濫，使得俄羅斯假新聞在數(shù)量上相形見(jiàn)絀。沒(méi)錯(cuò)，希拉里•克林頓(Hillary Clinton)是個(gè)不理想的候選人。沒(méi)錯(cuò)，自由派人士需要理解唐納德•特朗普(Donald Trump)所代表的民眾憤怒。

Still, given that Trump’s winning margin was 77,744 votes spread over three states, it’s plausible that Russia’s hack of Democratic emails — broadcast by the useful idiots of WikiLeaks and mainstream journalists — made the difference. Even if it didn’t, any election-meddling by a hostile power is a serious matter.

盡管如此，鑒于特朗普憑借三個(gè)州總共77744票的微弱優(yōu)勢(shì)勝出，俄羅斯對(duì)民主黨電子郵件發(fā)起的黑客攻擊——被維基解密(WikiLeaks)的有用傻瓜和主流媒體新聞從業(yè)人員廣為宣傳——有可能起到了關(guān)鍵作用。即使這些攻擊沒(méi)有帶來(lái)任何差別，一個(gè)敵對(duì)大國(guó)干預(yù)選舉的任何行為都是嚴(yán)重問(wèn)題。

Putin’s Kremlin began focusing on disinformation in 2008, after losing the international “information war” over its invasion of Georgia. It scaled up disinformation in 2014, during its proxy war in Ukraine. In 2016, it increased its targeting of western countries. A regime that once feared social media has now mastered it. Russia has found disinformation a cheaper and arguably more effective route to influence than sending in tanks or making foreign investments.

在輸?shù)袅藝@俄羅斯入侵格魯吉亞的國(guó)際“信息戰(zhàn)”后，普京領(lǐng)導(dǎo)的克里姆林宮從2008年開(kāi)始關(guān)注造謠。2014年，在其發(fā)動(dòng)烏克蘭代理戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)期間，俄羅斯擴(kuò)大了造謠規(guī)模。2016年，俄羅斯開(kāi)始更多地針對(duì)西方國(guó)家。一個(gè)曾經(jīng)害怕社交媒體的政權(quán)如今成為操弄社交媒體的高手。俄羅斯發(fā)現(xiàn)，相比出動(dòng)坦克或進(jìn)行對(duì)外投資，造謠可以更便宜地施加影響力，可以說(shuō)也更有效。

Broadly, the Kremlin aims to split the EU and Nato. A quick way to do this is to bolster populist movements such as Brexit or Five Star. So every time there’s a terrorist attack in Europe, pro-Kremlin media, Russian diplomats and trolls spread conspiracy theories that it was an inside job by the host government. Some other favoured storylines: George Soros masterminded the refugee influx; Nato is scheming to invade Russia; the west is lying about Russian doping and wars, and is blaming all its problems on Russia.

總的來(lái)說(shuō)，克里姆林宮的目標(biāo)是分裂歐盟(EU)和北約(Nato)。捷徑之一是支持英國(guó)退歐或“五星運(yùn)動(dòng)”等民粹主義運(yùn)動(dòng)。因此，每當(dāng)歐洲發(fā)生恐怖襲擊后，親克里姆林宮的媒體、俄羅斯外交官和噴子就會(huì)散布陰謀論，稱(chēng)這是所在國(guó)政府賊喊捉賊。他們偏愛(ài)的其他情節(jié)包括：?jiǎn)讨?bull;索羅斯(George Soros)一手策劃了難民涌入;北約密謀入侵俄羅斯;西方在俄羅斯參與戰(zhàn)爭(zhēng)和俄羅斯運(yùn)動(dòng)員使用興奮劑的問(wèn)題上撒謊，并把自己的所有問(wèn)題都賴(lài)在俄羅斯頭上。

The Russians constantly adapt their disinformation, depending on what works where. In Nordic countries, the Kremlin-controlled Sputnik media flopped and soon closed, but trolls on social media had success in intimidating Nordics, who weren’t used to their brand of verbal aggression. Georgians are told that the EU wants to turn them into gay people or paedophiles. But targeting can be micro too: Nato soldiers in Lithuania and their spouses get text messages from Russia, as do Ukrainian soldiers fighting Russian separatists.

取決于實(shí)際效果，俄羅斯人不斷因地制宜，變著花樣造謠。在北歐國(guó)家，克里姆林宮控制的“俄羅斯衛(wèi)星網(wǎng)”(Sputnik)媒體遭遇慘敗，很快關(guān)閉，但社交媒體上的噴子成功地嚇住了北歐人，后者不習(xí)慣他們那種言語(yǔ)攻擊。格魯吉亞人被告知，歐盟想把他們變成同性戀或戀童癖。但目標(biāo)也可能是個(gè)體：駐立陶宛的北約官兵及其配偶收到了來(lái)自俄羅斯的短信息，同俄羅斯支持的分離主義者作戰(zhàn)的烏克蘭軍人也是如此。

Angela Merkel has displaced Hillary Clinton as the chief target of Russian disinformation, especially in central Europe, where suspicion of Germany is easy to arouse. Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic each host dozens of pro-Kremlin media outlets. Many Balts get their news from Russian-language media, and the two million or so Russian speakers in Germany are also deluged with Kremlin propaganda. In Greece, Kremlin-linked oligarchs own stakes in local media.

安格拉•默克爾(Angela Merkel)已取代希拉里•克林頓，成為俄羅斯造謠的主要目標(biāo)，尤其是在很容易引發(fā)對(duì)德國(guó)疑慮的中歐。匈牙利、波蘭和捷克都有數(shù)十家親克里姆林宮的媒體。許多波羅的海地區(qū)的居民從俄語(yǔ)媒體獲取信息，而德國(guó)200萬(wàn)左右使用俄語(yǔ)的人士也面對(duì)克里姆林宮的宣傳洪流。在希臘，與克里姆林宮有關(guān)聯(lián)的寡頭們持有當(dāng)?shù)孛襟w的股份。

Pro-Kremlin public figures across Europe (and Russia keeps lists) can amplify Russian messages. Take France’s Front National, which borrowed €9.4m from the Kremlin-linked First Czech Russian Bank in 2014 while Russia was annexing Crimea. During last spring’s French elections, pro-Front National Twitter accounts that spread certain rumours — such as Emmanuel Macron being gay — were also the most likely to spread Russian disinformation, says Alexandre Alaphilippe of EU Disinfolab, an NGO. Similarly, Five Star’s network of websites and social-media accounts takes many items from “Kremlin-controlled media”, reports the Atlantic Council.

歐洲各地親克里姆林宮的公眾人物(俄羅斯保持著名單)可以放大俄羅斯發(fā)出的各類(lèi)消息。例如，2014年法國(guó)國(guó)民陣線(Front National)從第一捷克俄羅斯銀行(First Czech-Russian Bank)——該行與克里姆林宮有關(guān)聯(lián)——借得940萬(wàn)歐元，而當(dāng)時(shí)俄羅斯正在吞并克里米亞。非政府組織EU Disinfolab的亞歷山大•阿拉菲利普(Alexandre Alaphilippe)表示，去年春天法國(guó)大選期間，散布某些謠言(如埃馬紐埃爾•馬克龍(Emmanuel Macron)是同性戀)的親國(guó)民陣線的Twitter賬號(hào)也極有可能在散播俄羅斯的造謠。另?yè)?jù)大西洋理事會(huì)(Atlantic Council)報(bào)告，“五星運(yùn)動(dòng)”掌控的網(wǎng)站和社交媒體賬戶(hù)網(wǎng)絡(luò)有很多消息取自“克里姆林宮控制的媒體”。

All this activity creates the psychologically important belief that pro-Kremlin views are more widely shared by the general public than they are. And fake-news items create distrust of all media. This damages a European information ecosphere that, for now, remains healthier than the US’s: most people in most of western Europe still trust public broadcasters. (That’s why the Kremlin aims to persuade Britons that the BBC lies.)

所有這些活動(dòng)產(chǎn)生了重要的心理認(rèn)同，即親克里姆林宮的觀點(diǎn)被更廣泛的公眾所接受，而實(shí)際并非如此。同時(shí)虛假新聞報(bào)道使人們對(duì)所有媒體都產(chǎn)生了不信任。這損害了眼下仍比美國(guó)健康的歐洲信息生態(tài)圈：多數(shù)西歐國(guó)家的大部分人仍信任公共廣播機(jī)構(gòu)。(這就是為什么克里姆林宮力求說(shuō)服英國(guó)人相信BBC說(shuō)謊。)

What can European governments do? Warn people to be sceptical of what they read on social media or certain websites, recommends Stephan Lewandowsky, psychologist at Bristol University. Use big data to track which groups of people are susceptible to pro-Kremlin messaging, and reach them first, advises Michel Rademaker of the Hague Centre for Strategic Studies. And he urges mainstream media not to repeat Kremlin narratives, not even to refute them.

歐洲各國(guó)政府能做些什么呢?布里斯托大學(xué)(Bristol University)心理學(xué)家斯蒂芬•萊萬(wàn)多夫斯基(Stephan Lewandowsky)建議，要提醒人們對(duì)社交媒體或某些網(wǎng)站上的內(nèi)容保持懷疑態(tài)度。海牙戰(zhàn)略研究中心(Hague Centre for Strategic Studies)的米歇爾•拉德馬克(Michel Rademaker)建議，利用大數(shù)據(jù)來(lái)追蹤哪些人群易受親克里姆林宮信息的影響，然后搶先接觸他們。他還敦促主流媒體不要重復(fù)克里姆林宮的敘事，甚至不去反駁它們。

The European Commission’s East StratCom task force has about six staffers (three of them full-timers) countering Russian disinformation. That’s not many. The Kremlin-linked Internet Research Agency in St Petersburg — a “troll factory” where paid trolls dream up constant news stories — just trebled its workspace to 12,000 square metres.

歐盟委員會(huì)(European Commission)的東方戰(zhàn)略通信司令部工作組(East StratCom Task Force)有大概6名工作人員(其中三人是全職)負(fù)責(zé)反擊俄羅斯的造謠。這實(shí)在太少了。在圣彼得堡，與克里姆林宮有關(guān)聯(lián)的“互聯(lián)網(wǎng)研究機(jī)構(gòu)”(Internet Research Agency)——一家由職業(yè)噴子不斷編造新聞的“噴子工場(chǎng)”——剛剛將其辦公空間擴(kuò)大了兩倍，至1.2萬(wàn)平方米。