France’s presidential election is set for the spring of 2027, and it is already attracting instances of misinformation and alleged foreign interference that have since sparked criminal proceedings.
ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT
Researchers from the bot-tracking network AntiBot4Navalny have detected a campaign linked to Matryoshka, a covert influence and disinformation operation aligned with Russia.
At first, these posts focused on Gabriel Attal, the former prime minister of France who is running to succeed current president Emmanuel Macron.
Attal filed a criminal complaint with French authorities “alleging foreign interference originating from Russian networks”, after fabricated videos impersonating French news outlets targeted him online.
Fake videos bearing the logos and visual identity of well-known French news outlets such as Le Figaro and Libération circulated online, attempting to smear Attal by linking him to political scandals.
Some attempted to throw Attal’s health into question, with one false headline claiming he’d been hospitalised, and another claiming he had Parkinson’s disease.
Somewhat paradoxically, various false posts even alleged that Attal had launched a campaign against “nonexistent” Russian disinformation to try and block social media platform X.
Others said that he had paid news outlets to spread disinformation about him, and that he had considered fabricating an assassination plot against himself to try and blame Russia.
News agency AFP, which reports having seen Attal’s complaint, said that the former prime minister’s lawyers said the fake content could undermine the integrity of the upcoming election.
They added that France’s Secretariat-General for Defence and National Security (SGDSN) and Viginum, its foreign interference watchdog, had warned Attal about the disinformation campaign targeting him.
Attal’s office did not respond to a request for comment at the time of publication.
Following the disinformation campaign against Attal, researchers noted that the Matryoshka network shifted its focus to Édouard Philippe, another former prime minister and a contender in the presidential election.
Posts against him follow a similar pattern to those against Attal, mimicking respected media outlets such as Le Monde and AFP to mix real-life circumstances with distorted claims.
For example, one of the posts falsely claims a politician admitted Phillippe orchestrated corruption in an investigation involving the association LH French Tech.
Philippe is currently under investigation over alleged financial wrongdoing, but there is no evidence that Stéphanie de Bazelaire, who is also implicated in the investigation, made these claims, despite what the post suggests.
The probe centres on a four-year agreement worth €2.154 million between the Le Havre metropolitan authority and LH French Tech to run the city’s digital innovation hub while Philippe was mayor of Le Havre.
Financial prosecutors are investigating him for the alleged embezzlement of public funds, favouritism, illegal conflict of interest and financial misconduct by a public official.
He has consistently denied wrongdoing and says he is cooperating fully with the investigation.
Other posts claim that Philippe had apologised for referring to the inhabitants of France’s former colonies as “scum”, and that a company owned by his wife had supplied toxic components for the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine.
However, there is no credible evidence to support either claim, nor any record of the news outlets impersonated in the posts having published these reports.
It’s not the first time the Matryoshka network has targeted elections. A parallel campaign using the same methods has also aimed at candidates in Germany’s upcoming September state elections.
Here, the campaign has sought to exploit historical tensions between Germany’s East and West,an effort researchers say seeks to aggravate existing grievances and ultimately deepen political polarisation.