In Latin America alone, RT channels operate 24/7, and reported 18 million viewers in 2018. African Stream, which was also named by the State Department as part of the influence of the Russian state media structure and later removed by YouTube and Meta, has gained 460,000 followers. on YouTube in two years it was working again. And Woolley notes that in these markets, there is probably less competition for viewers than in the US media landscape.
“[Russian media] “It has thrived in limited media systems, where its efforts to control public opinion are most effective,” he said. The Russian media in particular hones in on anti-colonial, anti-Western narratives that may sound more relevant in markets deeply influenced by Western imperialism. The US also has government-sponsored news outlets operating abroad, such as Voice of America, although according to the organization’s website, the US International Broadcasting Act of 1994 “prohibits interference by any official of the US government in objective, independent news reporting.”
Ruby Bledsoe, a researcher at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says that even if the Russian state media has been removed from other social media, its messages are still likely to spread in subtle ways, through influencers and small publications that have developed relationships with them. .
“Not only were the Russian media able to hide that they were an arm of the Russian government, on the side they would send some of their news to local newspapers and local media throughout the region,” he said, noting that South America’s largest broadcasting organization TeleSur. sometimes it will interact with RT. (Sometimes, Russia will sponsor local outlets like Cameroon’s Afrique Média). “All these high-end and high-end news outlets are very small, but they can speak to half of the local population,” he said.
Russian media have also helped to foster local influencers who often resonate with their messages. Bledsoe points to Inna Afinogenova, a Spanish-speaking Russian broadcaster who once worked for RT but now has her own independent YouTube channel where she has more than 480,000 followers. (Afinogenova left RT after saying she disagreed with the war in Ukraine).
And Bledsoe says the ban from the US could be a boon for Russian media in parts of the world where it is trying to cultivate its image as a credible news brand. “The stories shared by RT and other Russian media and Iranian media, it’s a kind of imperialist dig in the West, and in the US,” he said. “To say that the US is the driving force behind this international system and they are plotting, and they are determined to find it, to impose the sovereignty of other countries.”
Although Meta has been the main means of distributing content for Russian regional media, it still has a home on other platforms. RT does not appear to have a verified TikTok account, but accounts that only post RT content, such as @russian_news_ and @russiatodayfrance have tens of thousands of followers on the app. TikTok African Stream is still live with almost 1 million followers. TikTok spokesperson Jamie Favazza referred WIRED to the company’s policies regarding election-related errors and misinformation.
X posted on RT’s account on September 18, a day after the ban linked to its accounts on platforms such as the right-wing video sharing platform Rumble, X, and Russia’s YouTube channel VK. (RT has 3.2 million followers on X and 125,000 on Rumble). “Meta can ban us all they want,” the post read. “But you can always find us here.” UX did not respond to a request for comment.
