The Kremlin’s Digital Pirates: How Russian Tracking Pixels Harvest Romanians’ Data to Fund Conspiracies and Extremism
For five months, we tracked over 100,000 ads displayed across 131 websites in Eastern Europe. After decoding the hidden mechanisms behind these ads, we uncovered a network of Russian companies. This investigation reveals what data is harvested from Romanians, who ends up receiving it, and why the ads shown on platforms with conspiratorial and extremist content are among the most valuable to this network.
Unveiling GRU’s Information Operations Troops with OSINT and Medals
We tracked the infrastructure of one of the most secretive units of Russian intelligence by using phaleristics (i.e. the academic study of medals and military decorations) and traditional OSINT techniques.
A collective approach to documenting the supply chain of disinformation
Together with EU DisinfoLab, Viginum, Cassini, the Auswärtiges Amt, the EEAS and the DFRLab, we decided that it was time to organise our shared knowledge for the benefit of the community, using the Viginum-developed Information Manipulation Set (IMS) framework.
CheckFirst and IWF join forces to tackle illegal content
We believe that this partnership will only strengthen our shared commitment towards a safer internet, given IWF’s technology-led mission to combat online child sexual abuse material.
CheckFirst helps Armenian CSOs and journalists to protect election integrity
In partnership with the Folke Bernadotte Academy (FBA), the Swedish agency for peace, security and development, we spent a week in Yerevan, Armenia, helping Armenian civil society organisations and journalists strengthen their defences against foreign manipulation.
#Disinfo2025: our key takeaways from the EU DisinfoLab’s annual conference
While threats against the community fighting against disinformation are on the rise, solidarity prevails. Civil society organisations, policymakers, platforms representatives and regulators gathered in Ljubljana, Slovenia, on October 15 and 16 for two days of discussions centered around many aspects of disinformation.
RADAR 1.8: Identify, assess and address potential DSA infringements
CheckFirst is excited to announce the release of the latest version of RADAR (Regulatory Assessment for Digital Services Act), a practical framework designed to help stakeholders simplify and standardise the Digital Services Act (DSA).
Decoding Secrets Through Symbols: How Military Insignia Revealed Russia’s Hidden SIGINT Network
Sometimes the best intelligence comes from the most unexpected sources. Our latest investigation proves this by using Russian online military insignia stores to map one of the FSB’s most secretive units.
Operation Overload: An AI fuelled escalation of the Kremlin-linked propaganda effort
The Russian propaganda operation targeted at media organisations and fact-checkers is still going strong.
5 years of CheckFirst: looking back at our journey
Today, it’s Check First’s 5th anniversary! To celebrate this big step, it is time to highlight some of our achievements of the past years.