Kyiv says Russian operatives dominating on TikTok

Ukraine has warned the Kremlin is expanding its use of TikTok to question the legitimacy of Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s presidency and undermine the nation’s morale as Russia presses its advantage in cyberspace as well as on the battlefield.

- VOLODYMYR VERBIANYI

Ukrainian TikTok user Valeria Shashenok documented the war’s damage in 2022.

Russia’s legions of influencers and bots are behind a series of viral TikTok videos that zero in on May 20 — the date that Zelenskiy’s first term would have ended if the country’s election cycle hadn’t been disrupted because of martial law, according to Andriy Kovalenko, a senior official focused on Russia’s wartime dissemination of false information.

“Russia is dominating us on TikTok due to the scale” of its operation, Kovalenko, who leads a department under the National Security and Defence Council, said in an interview in Kyiv. “The Russians have begun working systematically on TikTok and are utilizing this platform successfully.”