Robert Mueller's Indictment Could Be a Win for Russia's Trolls

It turns out you don’t need much to meddle in a U.S. election. Some cheap cell phones. An Internet connection. Maybe a few airline tickets and a good grasp of the English language. That was enough for the Russian troll farm to get started on their U.S. operation back in 2015. And they achieved what they set out to do.

Thirteen of them, mostly errand runners for the group known as the Internet Research Agency, have been charged for allegedly trying to skew the U.S. electoral process. The indictment against them, handed down on Friday by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, reads both like a warning and a potboiler. But it could also serve as an instruction manual, one that any determined group could use to replicate the operation. This is clearly not what the Special Counsel intended.

When it comes to catching criminals and deterring copycats, the indictment may yet succeed. It might at least become harder for the Internet Research Agency to recruit new trolls around its home base in St. Petersburg, especially now that some of them are wanted by the FBI and unable to travel outside Russia without fear of arrest and extradition. Their summer holidays may now be limited to the beaches of Sochi and Crimea.

But for the broader aims of the troll factory and its investors, the indictment could serve as a victory in disguise. Apart from providing a blueprint for their methods, it may further diminish public trust in the platforms people use to receive information, share ideas, and to engage in civic discourse. Disseminating those kind of doubts has been the aim of Russian propaganda for years.

Source: Yahoo News