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Fighting disinformation in the Czech Republic and Germany.
Čevela, Tomáš ; Handl, Vladimír (advisor) ; Lizcová, Zuzana (referee)
The presented work deals with the struggle of the Czech Republic and the Federal Republic of Germany with disinformation. It arises against the background of a conventional war conflict, the invasion of Ukraine by the Russian Federation. At the same time, the Russian Federation is using the information space to expand its influence in Europe as part of the hybrid war. The work compares the means and procedure of both states in combating disinformation, specifically compares the legislative framework of both states, their institutions and their international cooperation. The work came to the conclusion that in many aspects the Czech Republic lags behind Germany. Although both states have a similar approach in establishing or empowering state institutions to combat disinformation and in international cooperation. However, unlike Germany, the Czech Republic does not yet have effective legislation to combat disinformation and does not invest funds in civic education and research projects.
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Hybrid threats: Best practices to counter mis/disinformation and propaganda
Lopez, Antoine Louis Marie ; Střítecký, Vít (advisor) ; Ludvík, Jan (referee)
This thesis examines the extent of Russian information warfare efforts targeted at the West in recent years, highlighting the strategic use of information warfare by Russia to destabilize the West. Information warfare, which consists of but is not limited to disinformation, misinformation, demoralization, and psychological operations, as well as the overall concept of revisionism, and sources of revisionist thought in modern Russia, are detailed through a theoretical discussion. This discussion highlights the cultural and geographically based notions that blur a wholistic understanding of these concepts, particularly in their Russian application. Four case studies, focusing on Russian information warfare attempts surrounding COVID-19, migration crises, and the ongoing war in Ukraine, serve to demonstrate the danger posed by Russia's information warfare capabilities, by analyzing the origins, goals, targets, and methods of these attempts. The research conducted leads to multiple conclusions. First, Russian information warfare campaigns are successful when they exploit existing feelings or emotions but have so far not been able to create entirely new ones, whether anger or fear. Second, recent proactive efforts to thwart Russian information warfare in the West have so far been successful. Third,...
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Fake news as a security and political issue today
Hadbavniková, Ivana ; Romancov, Michael (advisor) ; Charvát, Jan (referee)
The topic of this diploma thesis is fake news as a current security and political problem. The term fake news is not officially codified. This diploma thesis will mainly focus on the theoretical definition of the term fake news and its differentiation from similar terms with which it's often interchanged incorrectly. Furthermore, this thesis will focus on social media, which can be used to spread fake news, as well as on the methods used for distinguishing fake news in the online world. The term fake news is also often connected with the term hybrid threat also referred to as a possible tool of the hybrid war, therefore this thesis will dedicate a section to these concepts and their critique. Fake news as a security and political issue will be observed within the example of the Czech Republic based on the selected definition of fake new with focus on the influence of Russia. First, actors who are possibly responsible for spread of fake news within the Czech Republic will be mapped, after which four specific websites and their reporting on certain news events in connection with Russia in the period from March 2020 until present will be examined.
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Artificial Intelligence as the upcoming Revolution in Military Affairs. The Cases of the United States and China through the lens of Strategic Culture
Macagno, Vittorio ; Kučera, Tomáš (advisor) ; Špelda, Petr (referee)
Artificial intelligence is nowadays a key element in many people's everyday life. Since its beginning, this technology has grown leaps and bounds, drastically revolutionizing everything it has touched throughout its developing process. Arguably, every aspect of society has more or less been impacted by artificial intelligence. Military affairs do not appear to be immune to this, with many examples of this technology's implementation in this field appearing more and more. However, it appears likely that the effects experienced so far by countries' military affairs are still quite limited, with the technological potential of artificial intelligence bound to drastically change military affairs altogether. So much so that it can be even argued that artificial intelligence has the potential to completely revolutionize them. For this reason, one may argue that this technology could be the upcoming Revolution in Military Affairs. This thesis will look into this specific idea, aiming to prove that the world is witnessing the coming of a new Revolution in Military Affairs, based on artificial intelligence. To verify this idea, the methodology this work will make use of consists of taking all of the three levels of war one by one, to then analyze the revolutionary potential that AI has in transforming each...
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Genesis of Russian propaganda as a serious security threat of the 21st century from the perspective of NATO and EU
Stejskalová, Jana ; Kučera, Tomáš (advisor) ; Střítecký, Vít (referee)
The thesis entitled "Genesis of Russian propaganda as a serious security threat of the 21st century from the perspective of NATO and EU" examines the phenomenon of contemporary Russian propaganda. Russia commonly uses propaganda as a tool of promoting its interests. Russian propaganda is very sophisticated, aggressive, and massive. Mainly due to the effective use of the internet and social networks, Russian online actors are able, in a short space of time, to successfully generate an information chaos, which is difficult to navigate in. Contemporary Russian propaganda has several key aspects, namely the anti-American and anti-European orientation, attacks on Western democratic values, and the mixing of truth with fiction. Thus, propaganda becomes an effective weapon in the information war that the Kremlin has initiated. The West is aware of these alarming issues and tries to respond. The thesis analyzes the development of the perception of the Kremlin propaganda by the Western international security organizations NATO and EU. At the same time, it attempts to identify the moment when Russian propaganda began to be perceived as a serious security threat. Whereas the key of the analysis is to interpret the perception of Russian propaganda, the concept of securitization was chosen as the theoretical...
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US Strategic communication towards Islamic state
Truchlá, Jana ; Beneš, Jan (advisor) ; Riegl, Martin (referee)
The main topic of my bachelor thesis is illustration of public image and strategic communication towards ISIS of two US most recent presidents Obama and Trump. In the theoretical part of the bachelor thesis I will outline the basic description of the Islamic state as a terrorist aggressor and the threat of the West as opposed to US protective policy and leadership in the World Anti-Terrorist Coalition. In this part of thesis I would primarily try to depict the main concept of strategic communication, its forms and the differences between the notions strategic communication and propaganda. In the main part I will describe the activities and the ways of formulating US strategic communication actors to explain the individual steps during the war against ISIS for the relevant audience - US citizens. In particular I will concentrate on official political strategic communication of the US Presidents which I will demonstrate on the particular examples - presidential press conferences and releases. Among digital media, I will focus on using the Twitter social network as a phenomenon to implement diplomacy through tweets. The key point of the work will be a determination of the priorities of strategic communication in the timeframe of Obama's and Trump's term in office. Choosing this specific timeframe...
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Historical Argumentation in the Russian Information Warfare in Ukraine between 2014-2016
Vaidišová, Natálie ; Kolenovská, Daniela (advisor) ; Šír, Jan (referee)
This bachelor thesis examines Russia's presentation of historical arguments in the information war in Ukraine between 2014-2016 and focuses on the methods and degree of Russia's manipulation of historical arguments. The work reviews the content of a pro-Russian website Russkaya Vesna, which targets Ukrainians. The thesis centres around two historical eras - World War II and the Soviet Union era. When describing events related to WW2, the website adopts a condemning narrative, labelling the UIA, OUN and Stepan Bandera as "fascist", which is examined in the first chapter of the thesis. In its evaluation of the Soviet era, the "soviet nostalgia" phenomenon is put under examination and the ways in which Russia encouraged this nostalgia are being focused on. Based on this research, the thesis proves that between the years 2014-2016, the informational sphere represented a substantial part of the Russian-Ukrainian war, and that the Russian government actively used misleading historical arguments to bolster pro-Russian attitudes in the people of Ukraine.
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An Interplay of Narratives: How Do the Czech Journalists Perceive Securitized Disinformation?
Hroch, Jaroslav ; Bahenský, Vojtěch (advisor) ; Střítecký, Vít (referee)
The aim of this thesis is to contribute to theoretically sound concept of Peace Journalism, which combines theoretical foundations from two spheres: conflict and peace studies and media studies. Influence of journalists as intervening force and explaining factor with regard to (violent) conflict is neglected. However, Peace Journalism is not theoretically strong and builds upon dualistic definition vis-á-vis so-called War Journalism. The concept of Peace Journalism has to overcome this delamination in order to reflect theoretical underpinnings of conflict transformation theory and conflict analysis. Moreover, Peace Journalism has to differentiate media according to an involvement of given societies in a conflict. This offers an opportunity to specifically and accurately analyse news coverage of conflicts. Case studies analysing Czech coverage of Cyprus and Nagorno-Karabakh conflicts illustrates this approach. The coverage is essentially flat, distorts a reality of the conflict, pays attention to visual and physical aspects of the conflict and closes the conflicts in arbitrary time boundaries.
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Seek Russians behind everything: Critical research of "Russian disinformation campaign" discourse in the Czech republic
Čech, Adam ; Rychnovská, Dagmar (advisor) ; Záhora, Jakub (referee)
of diploma thesis ‚Seek Russians behind everything: Critical research of "Russian disinformation campaign" discourse in the Czech republic'. Author: Bc. Adam Čech Supervised by: Dagmar Rychnovská, M.A., LL.M., Ph.D. Study programme: International relations Year of work defence: 2019 This study researches the "Russian disinformation campaign threat" discourse, that was established in the Czech republic since 2014. The study utilizes a method termed for the purpose of this work as "lesser discourse analysis". It explores the origins and influences that played a role in creation of a specific understanding of the topic. Subsequently it engages in a critical analysis of the discourse and assesses whether the understanding of the Russian hybrid threat, especially regarding the disinformation, is legitimate and based on known facts and correct interpretation of them, or whether it is not (partially) based on delusions, myths, logical shortcuts, misinformation (or possibly disinformation) on part of the creators and active participators of the discourse. The study also presents a set of recommendations to "straighten" the discourse on this important topic. The study engages in analysing of the process of the agenda-setting regarding the topic through the lenses of "securitization theory ". It identifies...
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