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BBC Says Russian Troll Factory Faked a Video Showing a US Soldier Shooting at a Koran

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Holy shit, they were literally trying to incite jihad against U.S.
Also holy shit at how miserably bad they are at this...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OhKcqJPsLd0

The video seems to show a man dressed as a US soldier firing three shots into a copy of the Koran. It appeared online in September 2015, generating unusual interest in Russia, prompting strong criticism from the country’s Muslim community. According to an investigative report by the BBC’s Russian-language service, the footage was actually staged by St. Petersburg’s infamous “troll factory,” the Agency for Internet Studies.
In the controversial video, a dark-skinned man wearing a US military uniform tests a Russian-made Saiga 401K semi-automatic rifle by firing ten shots at a blue book written in Arabic, resembling the Koran. When only three bullets hit the target, the man behind the camera, using highly obscene language and speaking with an accent that does not sound American, says the weapon is inaccurate. The video, which is interspersed with grammatically incorrect captions, concludes with the statement, “This is one more prove that only American weapons are the best ever [sic].”

The same day that the video appeared on YouTube, it was also shared on the National Gun Forum, which hosts “discussion for proud gun owners.” There, a user named “Derr86” claimed that his friend was trying to dissuade him from buying a Saiga 410K because the weapon is “just a piece of crap.” Derr86 said his friend, “who’s a marine btw, Oorah!” also sent him the YouTube video featuring the man dressed as a US soldier testing the rifle on the Arabic book. Derr86 registered on the forum just ten days before this post, and he hasn’t been active since.

No one on the forum seemed to notice (or care) that the man in the video was dressed in US desert camouflage, which is widely available at specialty stores. The BBC also notes that the man wears an Ops-Core FAST Base Jump helmet, instead of a US military helmet. (The helmet, moreover, bears a patch reading, “INFIDEL STRONG.”) The YouTube account that posted the video is registered under the unusual name “Mayaese Johnson,” who on Google Plus claims to be employed at a high school in Moscow.

Elsewhere on Google Plus, the BBC reports, there are roughly another 50 accounts with the first name “Mayaese,” and many of those individuals also say they work at high schools in Moscow. Their Google Plus accounts are blank, created (it seems) to add “likes” to videos on YouTube, the BBC speculates.

On September 11, 2015, several still images from the video appeared on the anonymous Twitter account @ComradZampolit (which has more than 33,000 followers), and then on another even more popular account, @NovostiSPb (which has more than 81,000 followers). Both these accounts claimed that the soldier was shooting at the Koran, though the video never states this explicitly.

...

The first media outlet to draw attention to the video, the BBC says, was a website called People’s News, which is registered at 55 Savushkina Street in St. Petersburg—the same address as the Agency for Internet Studies, Russia’s infamous “troll factory.” According to the BBC’s sources, the agency rents several virtual servers in order to mask its online behavior. The BBC says it has a list of some of the IP addresses the agency uses, and the first IP address on the list, it so happens, was used to promote the Koran-shooter video on a forum based in Saratov.

The BBC even says it’s found a man who resembles the gunman in the video, having discovered his photograph by searching on Instagram for photos geotagged near 55 Savushkina Street. British journalists say the man, who works as a bartender in St. Petersburg, is friends with a woman who’s known to be employed by the “troll factory.”

He—and everyone else thought to work for the trolls—refused to speak to the BBC.

Source

Props to BBC. That's some great investigate journalism right there.



To put this into context:

Previously this year, after the events on NY eve in Köln, Russia tried to incite strife in Germany with an invented rape of a 13yo by refugees / immigrants: Teenage girl admits making up migrant rape claim that outraged Germany | World news | The Guardian

And now these attempts are under investigation by the German internal & foreign intelligence:

Putin is trying to destabilize Germany, spy chiefs warn - The Local

The meeting, which took place in February with members of the Bundestag control committee, was attended by Hans-Georg Maaßen, head of the Verfassungsschutz (internal intelligence) and Guido Müller, deputy head of the Bundesnachrichtendienst (foreign intelligence).

The top spies warned there was a particular danger that Moscow would exploit the "high mobilisation potential" of Germany’s Russian community, which numbers at around 2 million.

Evidence suggests this section of the population is easily influenced by Russia into demonstrating on German streets, the spy chiefs claimed.

In January, thousands of Germans of Russian descent went onto the streets - including demonstrating in front of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office, the Kanzleramt - after Russian state media reported that immigrants had kidnapped and raped a 13-year-old Russian girl.

The amount of bullshit forced the EU to to launch a myth buster digest to keep people informed about Russian fakes:
The Disinformation Review collects examples of pro-Kremlin disinformation all around Europe and beyond. Every week, it exposes the breadth of this campaign, showing the countries and languages targeted. We're always looking for new partners to cooperate with us for that. The Disinformation Review is a collection of disinformation examples sent to the EEAS East StratCom Task Force from a network of over 450 journalists, civil society organisations, academics and public authorities in over 30 countries. The East Stratcom Task Force provides an analysis of the trends emerging from the reports received. Opinions and judgements expressed here do not represent official EU positions.
http://eeas.europa.eu/euvsdisinfo/ https://twitter.com/euvsdisinfo
 
It doesn't matter what anyone does.
Once a hoax is out there it is going to recirculate till the end of time and a lot of people will fall for it.
 
It doesn't matter what anyone does.
Once a hoax is out there it is going to recirculate till the end of time and a lot of people will fall for it.

For sure, similar to how the Muhammad caricatures were exaggerated through this fake by Danish Imams:

RmgvUFu.jpg
 
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