Employees of the SBU State Security Service of Ukraine have exposed a resident of Kyiv, who, under the supervision of special services of the Russian Federation, administered anti-Ukrainian communities on social networks and intended to manipulate the opinions of Ukrainian voters in the interests of Moscow.

"Our field investigators, among other things, exposed a resident of Kyiv, who, under the supervision of Russian special services, administered anti-Ukrainian web communities on social networks. He also managed to get access to the so-called 'advertising tools' of accounts belonging to Ukrainian users of social networks Facebook and Twitter for cash rewards. According to his employers, in this way the attacker was supposed to manipulate the opinions of Ukrainian voters in the interests of the Kremlin," the SBU's press service said on its Facebook page on January 24.

SBU agents also exposed more than 300 accounts, which were meant to be used during the presidential election campaign in Ukraine to promote political targeting advertising that would bring benefits to the Russian side.

"Through them, the organizers planned to influence the legal awareness and personal choice of voters, as well as disseminate tendentious and fake information to discredit the Ukrainian government and law enforcement agencies," the SBU said.

Under the established procedure, the SBU provided the administration of social networks Facebook and Twitter with information about the identified accounts that can be used by the Russian Federation as part of hybrid aggression against our nation.

The SBU recalled that in 2019, Facebook strengthened its security policy governing the use of political advertising in the Ukrainian segment of the Internet, and now, in order to prevent manipulative influence on Ukrainians, Facebook prohibits political advertising from accounts administered outside of the Ukrainian segment of the Internet.

"Because of the adoption of measures by the administration, the aggressor’s special services have become increasingly interested in Ukrainian citizens' accounts on social networks. At the same time, users receive commercial offers from people who are actually behind the Russian 'troll factory'— Internet Research Agency LLC," the SBU said.

The Security Service of Ukraine calls on Ukrainian users of social networks to stay cautious and in case of receiving proposals from strangers on using their accounts on social networks to report such cases to the SBU's hotline.