00:00Are Hollywood stars campaigning against Zelenskiy?
00:07A Kremlin-backed Russian bot network is at it again, this time targeting Hollywood.
00:12Several videos circulating on X and TikTok claim to show American actors delivering
00:17messages critical of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy.
00:20In one of these clips, American actress and singer Gabriela Pizzolo,
00:24known for her role in Stranger Things, accuses Zelenskiy of stealing money.
00:28The edited clip also includes images from the war in Ukraine,
00:31overlaid with manipulated voiceovers.
00:34The original video of Pizzolo was initially posted on Cameo,
00:38a platform that offers personalized video messages from celebrities.
00:41In total, more than a dozen similar videos have appeared under the hashtag
00:45Hollywood against Zelenskiy.
00:47They were published within a short time frame and shared by accounts with no followers,
00:51no biography and generate usernames.
00:54All the videos promoted a website called Hollywood against Zelenskiy.org,
00:58a site that does not exist and has no valid domain registration.
01:02A research collective that studies bot network called Antibot for Navalny,
01:06says this campaign shows signs of belonging to the Kremlin-ling Matryoshka network.
01:11Their approach involves scrapping videos online and adding synthetic audio with political messaging.
01:16The posts are then usually amplified by bot accounts,
01:19automated social media profiles designed to spread posts at speed.
01:23The campaign's ultimate goal is to turn people against European leaders and Zelenskiy.
01:28It aims to give people the impression that public figures are against Ukraine,
01:32asking them to take action to support Russia in ongoing peace talks.
01:36But the videos are ultimately fake and no celebrity has made these comments.
01:40In the meantime, X has suspended most of the accounts that were spreading this campaign.
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