Suspicious Twitter accounts allegedly run by journalists in Ukraine

The suspicious accounts have been initially noticed by Conspirador Norteño, an account that makes a speciality of finding out misinformation on social media. However earlier than that, it was believed to be authentic – one among them even appeared in an article in a British newspaper. We discovered many clues elevating considerations about whether or not there have been three folks.

A Twitter account that claims to be run by a Ukrainian journalism scholar “hi there world. I’ve this account for a very long time however I am solely posting on it now as a result of I feel it is essential. I am a Kyiv citizen. I am finding out to be a journalist. I am now serving to my youthful siblings to Poland to security, however I After that I am going again to battle in Kyiv with my two brothers [sic]This Twitter consumer tweeted underneath the title “Luba Dovzhenko”.

She started tweeting recurrently in English and Ukrainian in regards to the conflict in Ukraine, gaining greater than 500 followers earlier than her Twitter account was suspended on March 31.

It is a screenshot of a tweet by Luba Dovjenko on March 2, 2022, taken by Conspirador Norteño. The English, and generally Ukrainian, author Luba Dovzhenko tweeted about her every day life in Kyiv.

smoked [sic] At this time, in a single day air strikes. I wrote on March 16 that persons are making an attempt to not exit.”

On March 18, she stated, “My little sister simply joined faculty in Poland, faculty will begin tomorrow! She has plenty of anxiousness however she’s very sensible, I am positive she’s having enjoyable. Blissful information!” [sic]”

Plenty of folks have been taken by the account. On March 17, the British newspaper The Occasions printed an article elsewhere, wherein Luba Dovzhenko, citing the author, recounts her work as a volunteer serving to to offer Ukrainian troopers with the required provides. And a notice on the finish of the article reads: “Luba Dovzhenko, 18, was a journalism scholar in Kyiv earlier than the conflict.”

Screenshot of an article from The Occasions of March 17, supposedly written by Luba Dovzhenko. © The Occasions Nevertheless, on March 31, the account of Conspirador Norteño, recognized for investigating misinformation on-line, posted a thread on Twitter, crammed with proof that they’d collected suspicions about Luba’s existence.

Utilizing the Twitter IP Handle Finder, Conspirador Norteño traced the unique title of the account and found that earlier than the outbreak of conflict in Ukraine, the account used the camplostkids deal with. The consumer additionally deleted all of his tweets previous to February 2022.

Screenshot of a tweet by Conspirador Norteño exhibiting how the consumer deal with was modified and all tweets have been deleted from the account earlier than the conflict in Ukraine. © Conspirador Norteño In her Twitter bio, Luba Dovzhenko apologizes for errors within the English language, nevertheless, earlier than adopting Luba Dovzhenko’s title and altering its tackle, the account was tweeting and commenting in fluent English, typically utilizing slang.

Screenshot of a tweet by Conspirador Norteño exhibiting that earlier than the profile was cleared, the consumer behind the account tweeted utilizing fluent English. © Conspirador Norteño Conspirador Norteño additionally defined that the profile image was possible created utilizing synthetic intelligence.

In the event you run the picture by a reverse picture search on Google or Yandex, there isn’t a indication that the picture has appeared anyplace on-line earlier than. Furthermore, Luba picture additionally comprises the telltale tags of a picture generated by synthetic intelligence utilizing GAN know-how. Once you superimpose the Luba picture on different AI-generated pictures, you’ll be able to see that the bodily options within the two pictures align.

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Luba has additionally posted a number of photographs that she claims are from her every day life, however a few of them have already been shared for the primary time by different accounts.

In March 2022, the author posted a photograph of a bag that she stated belonged to her little sister. However Conspirador Norteño found that the identical picture was posted in April 2020 by one other Twitter account. “Luba Dovzhenko” simply turned the image.

The account Luba Dovzhenko shared this picture of a bag that she claimed belonged to her little sister. Seems this picture was really posted in April 2020 by one other Twitter account. © Conspirador Norteño There’s additionally a TikTok account underneath the deal with lubadovzhenko. The outline says “18 years previous citizen of Kyiv”. The Tiktok account, which was nonetheless on-line when this text was printed on April 11, shared a video on March 1 of a gaggle of Ukrainians ready for a practice with the caption, “My little siblings are with me chilly and scared.”

Nevertheless, the identical video was printed in an article within the British every day Each day Mail on February 27, two days earlier than, with out mentioning Luba Dovzhenko or her siblings.

Screenshot from April 7 of Luba Dovzhenko’s TikTok account. © Observers Furthermore, there are some primary errors within the Ukrainian language used within the calculations. Luba’s surname is written in a different way in Cyrillic for Twitter (Довженко, or Dovzhenko) and TikTok (Довшенко, or Dovchenko).

Luba’s nickname is just not written the identical approach in Cyrillic on the 2 accounts underneath her title (the picture on the left reveals the TikTok account, the account on the best reveals Twitter). © Observers A staff of Jowharobservers contacted The Occasions concerning their article by Luba. They responded on April 6, saying, “We’re investigating this matter and can reply absolutely when our investigation is completed.” The article has since been faraway from their website.

One other account pretending to be a journalist in Ukraine Twitter consumer Conspirador Nortino has recognized one other suspicious Twitter account, this account is known as “Beth Boykins”. The account biography claims that Beth is a journalist based mostly in Ukraine. Earlier than the account was faraway from Twitter on March 3, it had over 4,800 followers.

It’s attainable that this account was created utilizing the identical strategies as Luba Dovzhenko’s account. The profile image was possible generated by AI, which Conspirador Norteño demonstrated by overlaying different AI-generated pictures — once more, the options match.

Furthermore, the account with the title “Beth Boykins” has now modified its tackle and site and deleted the earlier tweets after the outbreak of the conflict. Archives posted on March 1 by Conspirador Norteño present that the account was referred to as “Kiwii Writer” previous to March 21 and the individual claimed to reside in Arkansas within the southern United States.

Beth Boykins recurrently posts photographs discovered elsewhere on social media, even taking their captions actually. On March 1, the account posted a photograph of a constructing in Ukraine with the caption, “11:02 a.m. someplace in Kyiv. This was the final view from my window. My damaged coronary heart is crying. I want there have been updates. We’re operating away.”

Screenshot of a tweet from Beth Boykins from March 1 exhibiting a Ukrainian constructing by a window. The caption reads: “It is 11:02 am someplace in Kyiv. It was the final view from my window. My damaged coronary heart is crying.” © Observers Nevertheless, the picture was first posted on one other Twitter account, shared on the identical day with the very same caption.

A 3rd account operated by Ukrainian “journalist” Conbrador Nortino additionally investigated the Twitter account underneath the title Bohuslav Aleksander. The biography of the account says that Alexander is a “journalist from Ukraine with kyivindependent”. Kyiv Unbiased newspaper is a Ukrainian newspaper printed in English.

Conspirador Norteño took this screenshot of the “Bohuslav Aleksander” Twitter account. © Conspirador Norteño As described by Conspirador Norteño, there are not any articles on the Kyiv Unbiased web site written by a journalist with this title. France 24’s staff of observers didn’t discover any outcomes throughout our search within the newspaper’s archives. We additionally didn’t discover any articles on-line in English or Russian underneath this title.

The France 24 staff of observers requested Conspirador Nortino why these accounts have been created:

I have been checking viral tweets about Ukraine (a minimum of 100 retweets) day-after-day or two because the conflict began, on the lookout for accounts with AI-generated pictures, that is what I observed from @lubadovzhenko1 and @BethBoykins22.

BohuslavAleksan and others on this thread have been the results of extra analysis into pretend follower bots that have been following a number of US Congress candidates.

Spreading misinformation or simply constructing an viewers by pretending to be in the midst of an enormous information story are two prospects (like different issues).

Even when the profiles aren’t run by who they are saying they’re, these three accounts do not share misinformation in regards to the conflict in Ukraine. There is no such thing as a indication that these accounts have interaction in pro-Ukrainian or pro-Russian propaganda both.

These profiles don’t accumulate donations for Ukrainians utilizing suspicious platforms, as another pretend accounts have carried out.

Some social media customers might need to get plenty of followers on Twitter or TikTok to promote their account afterwards. The brand new proprietor will then change the account title and share any content material they like with their followers.

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