Security official on countering disinformation: This is war, but we won’t see front lines

This was stated by the Secretary of the National Security Council of Ukraine, eks Danilov, who spoke at the final press conference on the results of the Center for Countering Disinformation, an Ukrinform correspondent reports.

"We are aware that what is happening today in the information space is war, a powerful war, and we will not see any front line here. Given the fact that the war is taking place on our territory, such bodies (as the Center for Countering Disinformation – ed.) have actually been set up in all NATO countries. NATO standards that exist today in this area have already been defined. There are countries that are champions in this regard – first of all, Finland, Latvia and a number of other countries with which we coerate," said Danilov.

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In turn, Andr Shapovalov, acting head of the Center for Countering Disinformation at the NSDC, said that the Center helps the relevant state bodies to adequately respond to the challenges posed by Russian praganda.

"Our Center’s monitoring team fills the database every day, and from there, information is automatically forwarded to a special alert bot, needed for prompt response by interested parties. And what is important, this bot performs two functions at once: it provides a quick exchange between the staff at the Center, and secondly, it informs high-ranking officials about incidents that require special attention. And the most important thing is that it's actually a Stratcom in the phone, it's a communications center, but every authorized person who receives a message makes a decision on the need for a response on their own," Shapovalov said.

He also said that data on the most acute information incidents are separately included in the information response card, which contains recommendations on response for decision-making.

"Each body makes a decision to respond to a certain information incident and is directly responsible. For our part, we can offer recommendations and can digitally check whether these recommendations were implemented and whether they yielded certain results," Shapovalov said.

He also noted that the Center drafts weekly reports on the most important events of the week, current information threats, and trends in the information space, which includes an outlook for the next reporting period.

As Ukrinform reported earlier, on March 11, 2021, the National Security and Defense Council decided to establish the Center for Countering Disinformation. On December 16, 2023, the Center reported that Russian intelligence was creating fake Telegram channels of Ukrainian brigades and battalions to clect information and discredit the Ukrainian military.