What Is Disinformation?

What Is Disinformation?

Disinformation is false information that is deliberately created and disseminated with the intent to deceive. The defining feature is intentionality. The person or organization creating disinformation knows the information is false and chooses to spread it anyway to achieve a specific goal — whether that goal is political influence, financial gain, reputational damage to an opponent, or simply sowing chaos.

This sets disinformation apart from misinformation, which is false information shared without the intent to deceive. If a government agency creates a fake social media account to spread fabricated stories about a political rival, that is disinformation. When ordinary citizens share those stories believing them to be true, they are spreading misinformation. The same false claim can function as both, depending on who is spreading it and why.

Disinformation can take many forms. It can be entirely fabricated content, like a made-up news article about an event that never happened. It can be manipulated content, where a real image or video is altered to mislead. It can be misleading context, where a real photograph from one event is presented as being from another. It can also be impersonation, where someone creates a fake account pretending to be a legitimate source.

It is important to recognize that disinformation does not always involve outright falsehoods. Sometimes the most effective disinformation uses true information, selectively presented and stripped of context, to create a misleading impression. A real quote taken out of context, a genuine photograph from a different event, or an accurate statistic presented without crucial caveats can all serve disinformation purposes. This makes detection more difficult, because the individual pieces may be technically true even as the overall message is deceptive.

Historical Background

Disinformation is as old as politics itself. Rulers have always used deception to maintain power, undermine enemies, and shape public opinion. The term itself comes from the Russian word dezinformatsiya, which was adopted into English during the Cold War. The Soviet Union maintained an active disinformation apparatus, including a department within the KGB specifically tasked with creating and planting false stories in foreign media.

One of the most famous Cold War disinformation operations was "Operation INFEKTION," a Soviet campaign in the 1980s to spread the false claim that HIV/AIDS was created by the United States as a biological weapon. The story was planted in an Indian newspaper and then amplified through a network of sympathetic media outlets around the world. The campaign was remarkably successful — the claim persisted for decades and is still believed by some people today.

But disinformation predates the Cold War. During World War II, both Allied and Axis powers used propaganda and disinformation extensively. The British intelligence operation to deceive Nazi Germany about the location of the 1943 Allied invasion of Sicily — the famous "Man Who Never Was" operation — involved planting false documents on a corpse dressed as a British officer. The deception worked, contributing to the success of the invasion.

In the digital era, disinformation has evolved in both scale and sophistication. The Internet Research Agency, a Russian organization, conducted extensive social media campaigns during the 2016 U.S. presidential election, creating fake accounts that posed as American citizens and organized both pro-Trump and anti-Trump rallies. The goal was not necessarily to elect a specific candidate but to deepen social divisions and erode trust in democratic institutions.

State actors are not the only practitioners. Corporations have engaged in disinformation to protect their interests. The tobacco industry famously funded research designed to cast doubt on the link between smoking and cancer, a strategy later adopted by fossil fuel companies to undermine climate science. These campaigns did not necessarily produce outright false claims but strategically amplified uncertainty to delay regulatory action.

Key Concepts

The firehose of falsehood. RAND Corporation researchers coined this term to describe the Russian disinformation model. Unlike traditional propaganda, which emphasizes a single consistent message, the firehose of falsehood floods the information space with multiple contradictory narratives. The goal is not to make people believe one specific story but to overwhelm them with so many conflicting claims that they give up trying to find the truth. This approach exploits the natural human response to information overload: when we cannot determine what is true, we tend to retreat into tribal loyalty.

Active measures. This is the term for the range of covert operations used by intelligence services, including disinformation, front organizations, and influence operations. Active measures are designed to shape the political environment in ways favorable to the sponsor, often without the target audience realizing they are being manipulated. The concept highlights that disinformation is not merely communication but a form of asymmetric warfare.

The DIME framework. Some scholars categorize problematic information using frameworks like DIME — disinformation, misinformation, and malinformation. Malinformation refers to genuine information shared with intent to harm, such as doxxing or revenge porn. This framework helps distinguish different problems that require different solutions, though the boundaries between categories are often blurry in practice.

Narrative laundering. This is the process by which a false or misleading claim moves from fringe sources to mainstream discourse. A claim might originate on an anonymous forum, get picked up by a partisan blog, be amplified by social media influencers, and eventually be reported by mainstream media as a story about what people are saying. Each step lends the claim more credibility, even though its origin is dubious. By the time it reaches mainstream audiences, tracing it back to its source is difficult.

Useful idiots. This term, often attributed to Lenin (though the attribution is disputed), refers to people who unwittingly advance the goals of a manipulator by spreading their message. In the context of modern disinformation, useful idiots are the ordinary citizens who share fabricated content because they believe it, not realizing they are participating in a coordinated influence operation. The concept illustrates why the distinction between disinformation and misinformation, while analytically important, is complicated in practice.

Malign creativity. Researchers at the Atlantic Council's Digital Forensic Research Lab use this term to describe the innovative tactics disinformation actors develop to evade platform moderation. As platforms develop better detection methods, disinformation operators adapt, finding new ways to spread their messages. This creates an ongoing cat-and-mouse game between platforms and bad actors.

Contemporary Relevance

Disinformation has become a central concern of the digital age. Governments, international organizations, and civil society groups now recognize it as a threat to democratic governance, public health, and international security. The European Union has established a Rapid Alert System to detect and respond to disinformation campaigns. NATO has recognized cyber attacks and disinformation as hybrid threats. The World Health Organization has dedicated resources to countering health-related disinformation.

The challenge is compounded by advances in artificial intelligence. Generative AI tools can produce convincing text, images, and video at minimal cost, lowering the barrier to creating disinformation. While high-quality deepfakes still require technical expertise, the technology is improving rapidly and becoming more accessible. This raises concerns about a future where fabricated audio or video could be used to manipulate elections, damage reputations, or trigger international incidents.

Platform responses have been uneven. Social media companies have implemented various measures, including labeling state-controlled media, removing coordinated inauthentic behavior, and partnering with fact-checking organizations. However, these measures have been criticized as too little, too late, and inconsistently applied. The fundamental business model of engagement-based platforms creates a structural tension: the same algorithms that maximize advertising revenue also amplify emotionally charged, potentially false content.

From a philosophical perspective, disinformation raises deep questions about the nature of knowledge in a networked society. Traditional epistemology often assumes that knowledge is acquired by individuals through perception, reason, or testimony. But in a world where information flows through opaque algorithmic systems shaped by both commercial interests and state actors, the social conditions of knowledge are fundamentally different. Social epistemologists argue that we need new frameworks for understanding how knowledge is produced, distributed, and corrupted in digital environments.

The legal landscape is also evolving. Some countries have passed laws criminalizing the spread of false information, but these laws raise serious free speech concerns. Authoritarian regimes have used anti-disinformation laws to silence dissent, labeling accurate reporting as false information. Democratic societies face the difficult challenge of countering disinformation without undermining the free expression that democracy requires.

Sources

• Paul, C., & Matthews, M. (2016). The Russian "Firehose of Falsehood" Propaganda Model. RAND Corporation. https://www.rand.org/perspectives/PE198.html
• Pomerantsev, P. (2019). This Is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality. London: Faber & Faber.
• Wardle, C., & Derakhshan, H. (2017). Information Disorder: Toward an Interdisciplinary Framework for Research and Policymaking. Council of Europe.
• Jack, C. (2017). Lexicon of Lies: Terms for Problematic Information. Data & Society Research Institute. https://datasociety.net/pubs/oh/DataAndSociety_LexiconofLies.pdf
• Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. "Social Epistemology." https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/social-epistemology/

Related Topics

• What is misinformation? — False information spread without deceptive intent
• What is fake news? — The evolution of a contested term
• What is an echo chamber? — How social environments reinforce beliefs
• How to evaluate sources — Practical tools for assessing information
• What is media literacy? — Building skills to navigate digital information
• What is information literacy? — Finding, evaluating, and using information effectively