The Chinese Communist Party is increasingly adapting its domestic coercive tactics to influence and interfere in foreign democratic countries. Find ASD’s work on the tools China uses—ranging from the weaponization of its economy to Beijing’s attempts to control global and domestic narratives—to interfere in democracies on this page.
Influence-enza: How Russia, China, and Iran Have Shaped and Manipulated Coronavirus Vaccine Narratives
Introduction When Vladimir Putin announced last August that Russia had granted regulatory approval for Sputnik V, the world’s first coronavirus vaccine, it signaled—albeit perhaps prematurely—not only a potential turning point in the fight to end th [...]
Bret Schafer on Information Warfare and How Social Media Disrupts Democracy on the Jist
Media and Digital Disinformation Fellow Bret Schafer joined Josh Hamilton on The Jist. Bret and Josh first spoke three to discuss the weaponization of information and the threat to democracy. Now, three years later, things have unfortunately not gott [...]
Hamilton Toplines: February 22-28, 2021
Last week, Russian state media seized on a story involving “leaked” U.K. Foreign Office documents that allegedly revealed the “UK government's covert operations aimed at tarnishing Russia's image.” The outlets used the story to accuse both the U.K. [...]
Jessica Brandt and Josh Rudolph in Just Security: Outlaw Participation in Foreign Attacks on U.S. Elections
Nobody has suffered serious legal consequences for actively welcoming—some say aiding and abetting—Russian interference in the 2016 and 2020 elections, or for having asked the presidents of Ukraine and China to similarly interfere. One reason for th [...]
What’s Next for TikTok and WeChat? Lindsay Gorman Discusses with ASPI
A change in administration in the United States has given a brief reprieve to TikTok and WeChat, two Chinese apps targeted in a series of Executive Orders by former President Trump, but questions about the national security, privacy, and censorship [...]
Treasury Should Publish a National Corruption Risk Assessment
Summary Recommendation Within the first 100 days of the Biden administration, the U.S. Treasury Department should publish its first-ever National Corruption Risk Assessment about the financial networks of oligarchs and kleptocrats, reviewing case st [...]
Lindsay Gorman Discusses EU-China Trade on Bloomberg’s ‘Balance of Power’
China overtook the U.S. as the EU’s main trading partner in 2020. Emerging Technologies Fellow Lindsay Gorman spoke to David Westin about the national security implications of this news, as well as the national security aspects of emerging technolog [...]
Hamilton Toplines: February 8-14, 2021
Last week, Russian state media and diplomats highlighted various instances of alleged censorship by social media companies—a recurring theme in Russia’s external messaging. State media cited Twitter’s ban of Project Veritas as an example of politica [...]
Nad’a Kovalčíková Discusses Building a Transatlantic Approach Towards China with Atlantic Forum
Program Manager and Fellow Nad'a Kovalčíková spoke on an Atlantic Forum panel on building a transatlantic approach to China, which was made all the more timely by Eurostat's data revealing that China surpassed the United States as the EU's main trad [...]
Hamilton Toplines: February 1-7, 2021
In last week’s coronavirus vaccine developments, U.K. medical journal The Lancet published the results of a peer-reviewed study that placed Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine’s efficacy at a level comparable to that of leading Western vaccines. Russian stat [...]
Here and Now: Chinese Interference in the Transatlantic Space
For several years, the Alliance for Securing Democracy (ASD) has been monitoring and cataloging instances of authoritarian interference in the transatlantic space. In 2018, ASD launched the Authoritarian Interference Tracker, an online database that [...]
‘Wolf Warriors’ Go After U.K.’s Immigration Scheme for Hong Kong
Overview On January 31, 2021, a new immigration route for British National (Overseas) (BNO) passport holders came into force in the United Kingdom. The BNO was a document created for Hong Kong citizens who wanted to maintain ties with the U.K. after [...]