![]() ![]() I mean, are you feeling just torn up about what Russia and Russian people are seeing and not being told about all this? MARTÍNEZ: Julia, you're Russian American. ![]() And again, that means that most Russians will continue to support the war. So it's just made real information that much harder to find. And either you're there working as basically the Ministry of Defense's press office or you're underground and trying to tiptoe around these issues. There is that much less information available to Russians, and that means basically the entire informational space inside Russia is now fully dominated by the Kremlin. It makes it that much harder to find real and true information about what the Russian army is doing in Ukraine. So, Julia, what are the implications for that? MARTÍNEZ: And to add an extra layer here, a result of this new law criminalizing what Russia deems to be false information about the war - several foreign media companies have left Russia, and Russian independent media sites have been silent. But the war they're supporting is not the war that exists on the ground in Ukraine. And if they trust those sources of information, then they believe, for the most part, what the Kremlin is telling them, and for the most part, they support this war. People who are not looking for this information are generally people who don't care or people who trust Kremlin sources of information - for example, Kremlin TV, which is still the biggest source of information for most Russians. They already know that they're not - that Russian soldiers are not being greeted as liberators. They know that this is a war against Ukrainian civilians. But you have to understand that to go and do this, you already have to be looking, right? It's people who already don't believe what the Kremlin information sources are telling them and what the Kremlin is telling them. They can use VPNs, which is a technology which masks your location and allows people to access the things that are blocked, like Facebook, Instagram, which is now blocked, Twitter, media outlets that are blocked. MARTÍNEZ: And Julia, for people that are trying to find an alternative source for news, are they finding ways around the blocks on social media sites? And we've seen the Russian government this time around as well, recruiting people to work on the social media platforms, to push disinformation and to drag people into fights over what's happening in Ukraine. But, you know, especially as the Kremlin has weaponized these platforms, it has hired, you know, troll armies to counter information it doesn't like and to spread information that it finds helpful. IOFFE: I mean, that's always been a concern. Julia, how much of the disinformation is being spread on social media in Russia? ![]() Russia has blocked Facebook and Instagram and limited access to TikTok and Twitter. MARTÍNEZ: Much of the disinformation from Russia comes from state-owned media. They're being told that Russian soldiers are extremely decorous and careful about preserving Ukrainian civilian life, that they're being greeted as liberators, that everybody wants to live under Russian rule, and that there are no civilian casualties on the Ukrainian side. According to Russian state media, the war is limited to the east, to the Donbas, you know, where the separatist regions are, and they don't know that the Russians are bombing Kyiv, for example, or even areas outside of Lviv in the far west of the country. What they're seeing is a very sanitized version of what's happening in Ukraine and one that doesn't really overlap with the reality. Julia, you wrote that people in Russia are not seeing the same war we in the West are seeing. With us on the line is Julia Ioffe, founding partner and Washington correspondent at the media company Puck. ![]() This crackdown on free speech has led many media outlets to leave the country or go underground. And there are serious penalties if this is done - up to 15 years in jail. Moscow recently made it a crime to spread what it calls false information about Russia's armed forces or to denigrate Russian soldiers in any way. As the brutal war in Ukraine continues, many people inside Russia are hearing and seeing a very different narrative, one where words such as war or invasion do not exist. According to city officials, people will only be allowed to go outside to head to bomb shelters. A new curfew is set to take effect for residents in Ukraine's capital, Kyiv, starting tonight and lasting until Thursday morning at 7 o'clock. ![]()
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