The occupying authorities in Kherson and the region used photographs of children from the Kyiv region on propaganda billboards. A resident of the Kyiv region, professional photographer Hanna Pasichnyk recognized her children on pro-Russian posters that appeared in Kherson no later than July 18, writes BBC Ukraine. Hanna Pasichnyk sold a photo session with her son and his best friend on the website of the Shutterstock photo bank. The children were standing on a flowering field of rapeseed in embroidered shirts. “Children are asking for support for Ukraine,” that is the description of the photo in English. Pictures with children in vyshyvankas (embroidered shirts) will later appear on billboards in occupied Kherson. Russian propaganda used her photo without permission. “Russia is here forever!”, “Kherson is forever with Russia”, “Kherson is a Russian city,” photos of billboards with such slogans were published by the pro-Russian public Kherson.ru a few weeks later. The Russian flag was photoshopped behind the children's backs, and yellow rapeseed flowers were replaced with a flower meadow. Subsequently, photos of a damaged billboard in Kherson appeared on the network. In the inscription "Kherson - forever with Russia" the unknown painted over the letters "son" in the name of the city. On August 24, Hanna published a post on Instagram in which she publicly spoke out against the use of her photos in occupied Kherson: “[Russia] takes photos of my happy children in embroidered shirts, despicably photoshops their bloody dirty flag, writes a false, hateful slogan and hangs it in Ukrainian Kherson, from which you want, excuse me, to jerk ... " After this publication, Hanna says, residents of the occupied Kherson began to write to her, who, she says, got angry: they say that the Russians dressed their children in our embroidered shirts and now they say that we want to go to Russia. “Now they are writing to me: thank you for telling all this, because it was very disgusting for us to see it. Now we understand that they didn’t even take pictures of anything,” she says.  

The primary source of the fake document was the Telegram channel of the Russian propagandist Volodymyr Soloviov. This "letter" is allegedly printed on the letterhead of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine and is addressed to the Secretary of the National Security Council, Oleksii Danylov. It was allegedly signed by the Commander-in-Chief of the Ukrainian Armed Forces Valerii Zaluzhnyi, who has nothing to do with the correspondence of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine. In fact, such documents must be signed by Minister Oleksii Reznikov or his deputies.

Information about the losses of the Ukrainian army is a state secret, therefore, according to logic, the "document" should be marked accordingly. In addition, the "writing" has a lot of grammar mistakes, indicating that it was automatically translated from Russian or written by a person who does not speak Ukrainian well. Probably, the purpose of the letter is to demoralize Ukrainians because of the extremely high loss figures and to emphasize the victory of the Russian army for Russians.

Russian propagandists have been creating fake documents since the beginning of the Great War. Recently, fake letters from the Ukrainian and Polish MFA about renaming a street in honor of Stepan Bandera were circulated. Also included in the list of fake documents are the "decrees" of the President of Ukraine that women should "support by any means and forces the spirit of men restraining military aggression in Ukraine" and the deprivation of citizenship of certain politicians; "letter" from the head of the President's Office to the commander-in-chief about not using "Bairactars"; "order" of the commander of the National Guard to shoot captured servicemen; "letters" of the Ministry of Education of Ukraine on the formation of lists of graduates of draft age with the characteristics of the evaluation of military-patriotic education or with malicious programs. These are only private examples of the work of propagandists to undermine the confidence of Ukrainians in the government. The common feature of all these documents is illiteracy and ignorance of the norms of Ukrainian business administration.

The press service of the Main Intelligence Directorate reported that the occupiers had developed special “methodical recommendations” for working with the population of Zaporizhzhia and Kherson regions.

This "document" is distributed exclusively to "instructors affiliated with the leadership of "United Russia" and is not passed on to third parties for perusal."

According to the "manual", the work of the occupation administrations in the occupied Ukrainian territories is supervised exclusively by the Kremlin party "United Russia", which agrees and strictly controls the work of any other organizations. This "document" allows the occupiers to "collect material funds from the population." Instead, it is strictly forbidden to take food products and medicines (including hermetically sealed ones) due to frequent cases of poisoning. Also, the developers of the "manual" offer a table with questions that Ukrainians most often ask the occupiers, and typical answers with additional explanations.

Earlier, it became known about other manuals for Russian propagandists to compare the war in Ukraine with the First World War and how to write about the "special operation" in Ukraine in general.

Finnish imaging expert Lauri Linnamäe posted on Twitter a series of posts about elements proving the fakeness of the “military ID” presented by the FSB named Natalia Vovk, whom Russia called the fighter of the Azov regiment and the organizer of the murder of Daria Duhina, propagandist and daughter of the ideologist of the Russian world "and the so-called "Eurasianism" of Oleksandr Duhin.

The examiner checked the "identity" through an online image interference analysis tool. In particular, the program selected fragments of the image where the clone tool was used in Photoshop (allows you to replace the color and texture of one fragment with any other fragment of this image).

The expert also drew attention to unsuccessfully reflected shadows, clear boundaries of the embedded photo of the cut out face and background, as well as an artificially inserted stamp, which, by the way, cut off part of the woman’s cheek from the portrait.

We remember that Russia has already tried to forge evidence of the involvement of Ukrainians (in particular, "Azov" in crimes against famous Russians. In particular, when Volodymyr Putin said that Ukraine was allegedly preparing an attack on the "famous Russian journalist" Volodymyr Soloviov. The Russians allegedly found unconditional evidence of guilt - improvised explosive, eight Molotov cocktails, six pistols, a sawn-off hunting rifle and an RGD-5 grenade, Ukrainian passports and "nationalist literature" autographed with "Signature illegible". Readers of "Media Detector" identified this case as the most ridiculous fake of Russian propaganda.

The Center for Counteracting Disinformation under the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine warned: Ukrainians in the temporarily occupied territories of the Zaporizhzhia region receive SMS with fake information and a link to the enemy's Telegram channel. The report says that 85% of the region's residents are in favor of joining Russia.

As the specialists of the Center found out, the link leads to the Zaporizhzhia Vestnik Telegram channel, owned by the Russian occupation authorities and aimed at residents of the Zaporizhzhia region.

“This channel was created just a month ago, and its main goal is to incline people to the side of Russia, demonstrating “all the beauty of the Russian world” and at the same time to discredit the Ukrainian authorities,” the CСD wrote.

Together with the CCD, we urge you to use time-tested, reliable sources of information, as well as those where you can identify the author of the content.

German fact-checkers of Correctiv found out that Unser Mitteleuropa (Our Central Europe) published a false article alleging that the director of the Economic Security Bureau, Vadym Melnyk, admitted that "Ukraine is selling military aid" to the West and "mass appropriation of Western funds." It seems that he said this in an interview with the Ukraine 24 channel.

Neither the Correctiv publication nor the editors of the Media Detector could find Melnyk's interview with the Ukraine-24 channel of July 5, where he stated this. Also, no other sources contain such a statement by Melnyk. The article in the German edition is, in fact, a literal translation of the news of the Russian media that was massively distributed on July 6. It was in them that Melnyk's statement was quoted and noted that he told the Ukraine-24 channel about this, and there is no link to the interview in both Russian and German media.

Anton Krasovskyi, a director of the Russian-language speech of the RT channel, made a film about the occupied Kherson called “Russian Kherson. We've been waiting for this for 30 years." Many fakes, both historical and modern, were circulated in the film. For example, a fake that no one fought for Kherson, this is not true. Or that the Armed Forces of Ukraine are shelling residential buildings in Nova Kakhovka, but the Armed Forces of Ukraine launched a missile attack on the military personnel. Or that Kherson is a Russian and Russian-speaking city, that in Ukraine it was forbidden to celebrate May 9 or speak Russian, or that the locals have been dreaming of "liberating" for decades.

This and other lies of the Russian propagandist were refuted by two regional publications “Watermelon. City" and "Bridge" at once. They also named everyone with whom Krasovskyi spoke: they are exclusively collaborators who are now trying to impersonate the local authorities. Among them are Kyryll Stremousov and Volodymyr Saldo, as well as other not-so-well-known traitors. Not a single person who would not agree with the occupation is shown in the film. Krasovskyi also did not tell about pro-Ukrainian rallies at the beginning of the occupation, about the actions of partisans and torture, murders and abductions of Ukrainians in Kherson and the region.

This is the second time Krasovskyi has been making a film about “Russian cities” for his own channel. Previously, he was the producer of the same false film about Mariupol.

Fraudsters send messages from a hidden user. They say that "today" at 12 o'clock it was decided that every citizen of Ukraine can receive financial assistance in connection with Russia's aggression. Instructions on how to get money on the card are allegedly posted at the link.

Fraudsters do not note who exactly made the decision to pay out. There is a separate link for each bank. The design of the pages is similar to real banking sites. However, the link to the pages of different banks has a similar part "ki-pay.me". This is a sign of a private domain and cannot be owned by an official organization. For the most part, such domains are used by graphic designers, web developers, photographers, etc.

The Center for Counteracting Disinformation under the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine discovered a fake letter in the information space, allegedly on behalf of the Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine. In it, the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry seems to appeal to its Polish colleagues with a request to rename the street in Warsaw in honor of Stepan Bandera, where the Russian embassy is located. The goal of the fake is to discredit Ukraine, warned the CPD.

In the West of Ukraine, in recent days, a message has been circulating on social networks calling for congratulations on the birthday of a fallen soldier. Users noticed that the message is distributing a portrait of Sashko Syvyi, who fell at the front in 2014, although his date of birth is different.

The authors of the "Brekhunets" project ("Liar" project) have tracked that messages calling for congratulations to fallen heroes in Facebook communities first collect a lot of comments, and then their content is transformed by replacing text, photos, or adding links to garbage sites.

The first five posts with the hashtag #againstsanctions on Twitter were posted from suspicious or fake accounts, according to fact-checker MythDetector. Europeans seem to have started posting photos of empty plates with the message that everyone ate the sanctions.

The board of the joint-stock company "Khersonoblenergo" (JSC), operating in accordance with Ukrainian legislation, reported that again the organization has nothing to do with the distribution system operator "Khersonoblenergo" JSC and draws funds from consumers in the Kherson region. Both the newly created company and its website are located in Moscow. The Ukrainian company also reminded that all electricity supplied to the Kherson region is supplied exclusively from the territory of Ukraine and must be paid exclusively to Ukrainian accounts.

This was reported by the spokesman of the Odesa Regional Military Administration, Serhii Bratchuk. Fraudsters send letters of appeal in personal messages to managers of many enterprises, private individuals, and the e-mail address of companies and organizations. In the letter, allegedly from Odesa OVA, signed by Maksym Marchenko, they are asked to participate in the humanitarian aid program of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and provide details for the transfer of funds. Fraudsters also write the amount to be transferred by the entrepreneur, allegedly for the purchase of military ammunition and equipment. The letter also states that "the actions have been coordinated with the President of Ukraine and the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine." This letter is fake.

Russian media are spreading information that a foreign journalist is allegedly conducting an "independent" investigation into the deaths of Ukrainian prisoners of war in Olenivka. As the Russian publication Insider writes, NTV has already shown material about "independent journalist Adrian Boke", who is "one of the few who tells the truth about Donbas to the world". He was also introduced as an expert in war crimes investigations.

Boke is neither a journalist nor an expert. He is a former military man who lied too much during his service in the French army. The French publication Liberation wrote about it. He visited Ukraine from the beginning of the great war under the guise of a volunteer, and then went to Europe to tell that "Bucha is a stage" and that he is a witness to "crimes by the Nazis from Azov." The StopFake publication conducted its investigation of Boke's visit to Ukraine, he did not provide any evidence of "crimes" to anyone; I was simply not physically in Buchi; does not understand Ukrainian or Russian, so he could hardly understand what his "friends from Azov" were talking about. With whom he seemed to befriend as much as two days of his stay in Lviv.

His lies were repeatedly refuted by journalists of various publications, but Russian propaganda continues to use him. This time he has already announced that he has "evidence" that it was a Ukrainian missile that hit the POW camp.

Bokeh is another example of how Russian propaganda works: it constantly uses supposedly foreign journalists to spread its messages to a Western audience.

Another fraudulent scheme, which is spreading in social networks and plays on people's difficult circumstances and the need for money, is revealed by the Nota Enota project. Fraudsters report that according to the adopted law, Ukrainians can get back VAT for three years, which can reach up to 90 thousand hryvnias of assistance. The condition is that the bank card must be checked. "After users click on the link, they are directed to a site where they enter their details and their payment card details. Accordingly, fraudsters gain access to accounts and steal people's money. In addition, people themselves give all the necessary information, thinking that they are filling out a form to receive funds," the post reads. "The Raccoon's Note" warns: that there is no such law; VAT is not refundable to individuals. In addition, information is distributed by a page called "Help Fund", which does not have a bluebird (check mark), which means it is not verified. The "round" number of 90,000 hryvnias was used to attract attention. In addition, fraudsters contradict themselves: they write either "law" or "decision". You can find out about real help and fill out an application on the E-support website. Information about assistance from international organizations is available on the website of the Ministry of Social Policy. 

The Meduza publication reported that the Kremlin had developed a manual for Russian propagandists by August 1. On this day in 1914, Germany declared war on the Russian Empire.

The authors of the manual say that the West constantly "draws" Russia into military confrontations, and Russia always participates in conflicts to protect "brotherly nations". According to Kremlin, in 1914, Russia "could not leave Serbia to its own devices."

The Kremlin calls the war in Ukraine "the modern Ukrainian crisis." Russian media should also tell their audience that after 2014, the West decided to "sponsor" in Ukraine "the raising of several generations of people who hate Russia and are ready to kill Russians with the help of xenophobic ideology and Russophobia."

A separate section of the manual deals with "Western interference" in Russia's internal affairs. Allegedly, the West sponsored the Bolsheviks and the events of 1917. Now, according to the manual, the West "finances non-systemic opposition, protest movements, and anti-Russian mass media."

It is also alleged that an "anti-American trend" will soon develop, so the United States "will not be able to find not only military Allie but even serious trade partners." The reasons for the spread of the "trend" are not reported.

Fraudsters on behalf of a well-known bank allegedly give 300 hryvnias to each "just like that" as "help in difficult times". To receive money, you need to share information and give your bank card number. On fake Instagram pages, fraudsters include the information "Monobank donates UAH 300" and a link to the Telegram channel in the description. There is only one post on the page (about a supposedly "gift") or none at all. Fraudsters ask to make a story about a fake promotion, post to themselves, and tag a fake page. Next, you need to reset your card number in direct mail and "wait for payment." Fact-checkers of the "Liar" project found 26 fake Instagram pages and 7 Telegram channels. The support service of Monobank confirmed to the fact-checkers that the bank does not give out 300 hryvnias to anyone, and urged them not to provide any data to fraudsters. 

Human rights defenders of the non-governmental organization "Crimean Tatar Resource Center" researched and presented trends of Russian disinformation about NATO's goals, values​​, and work in the temporarily occupied Crimea.

There are the following trends:

In April-May 2022, propagandists actively justified the invasion by saying that Ukraine will try to return Crimea by military means if it joins NATO.

In June, the message changed: it is alleged that NATO is unleashing the third world war and "beats Ukraine" to attack Crimea.

In July, propagandists began to say that Russia is already "at war with NATO" not with Ukraine.

The Center for Strategic Communications published an analysis of discretization and disruption mobilization measures in Ukraine by Russian propaganda. Propagandists have been doing this since 2014, the Center emphasized.

In particular, the key anti-mobilization messages of propagandists are named:

• military commissars announced a "hunt": summonses are handed out to men of conscription age on the streets, in transport, in shops, and at work;

• after serving the summons, the mobilized are sent to the front without training and medical examination, the mobilized are "cannon fodder";

• only Russian-speakers/Ukrainian-speakers are fighting; only people from the East of Ukraine (while the "Westerners" are "cooling down") / only people from the West (while the "Easterners" are fleeing to the West or abroad) are fighting;

• the wealthy are bought off summonses with bribes; only the poor are mobilized (option: city dwellers avoid mobilization, peasants are “taken away by whole villages”);

• the enemy is stronger, resistance makes no sense;

• women’s military registration is preparation for total mobilization;

• men of conscription age must be released abroad: the ban destroys families and harms the economy;

• you can avoid mobilization thanks to various "schemes" of going abroad.

The propagandists’ goal is to sow doubts about the general mobilization legality, to assure Ukrainians of the selective and unjust mobilization, to normalize various practices of avoiding mobilization, and to undermine the level of trust in the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

The Institute of Mass Information investigated how one of the largest telegram channels of the occupied Donetsk region spreads Russian disinformation in the occupied territories and how it changed the main message topics five months after the start of the full-scale invasion.

According to the research, propagandists most often refer to the Armed Forces of Ukraine as "VFU" (Armed Forces of Ukraine; 632 mentions), "Nazis" (601), "militants" (495), "Ukras" (160), "terrorists" (134), "neo-Nazis" (131), "Ukrainian Nazis" (117). Propagandists most often associate the Ukrainian army with Nazism in their word-making experiments, IMI writes.

IMI researchers identified five groups of messages:

More details in the study.

As the press service of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine reports, in the temporarily occupied cities of the southern part of the Zaporizhzhia region, representatives of the self-proclaimed authorities are searching for collaborators to create a "mass" for the so-called "spontaneous actions" in referendum support. The occupiers believe that such television stories will reduce the degree of dissatisfaction with the war among Russians. Despite the "material incentives", the local residents are not active enough, so the "mass" is brought from the occupied Crimea.

 “The Meduza” reports that it has received from its sources two manuals developed in the Kremlin for Russian propagandists and public figures. According to them, the basis of "Russian civilization" was the Orthodox faith, which teaches compassion, love of neighbor and, patience with others. "Special operation" should be compared with the Christening of Russ, and Putin with Alexander Nevsky. The manual’ authors write that the Christening of Russ, as well as the war in Ukraine, lay the "national foundations" as well as "the foundations of the Russia development for the next century." Allegedly, this is due to the "unification of society around the army and the strategic course of the president", and Russia's mission is "to protect the oppressed". One of the goals of the special operation is the "war against the godless," who "use women and children as human shields." They are characterized as "rapists, robbers and, murderers." The Kremlin proposes to use such theses to describe the Ukrainian military. He said, "there is no morality" for them, because most of them are "open Satanists and followers of philanthropic cults." The war was started by "the collective West, which is confident in its rationalism". Propagandists are recommended to use the alleged words of Alexander Nevsky that there is strength in the truth. However, Russian soldiers are convinced of their rightness, because they are continuing the work of their grandfathers - destroying Nazism. As a matter of fact, the theses about love for neighbor and tolerance proposed by the manuals are nullified by the atrocities of Russian soldiers in the occupied territories. Russia accuses Ukrainians and the whole world of Nazism, ignoring the fact that the Russians are the closest to Nazism today. More details. 

 Facebook users told about the mailing. The reports say that allegedly Ukrainian politicians short-sightedly hand over national interests to Poland, and Poles "do not consider us as people, they are Polonizing and will soon "take away" the western regions". They are also trying to convince Ukrainians that "Ukrainian children will be stolen and turned into Poles"; the "absorption of Ukrainians by the Polish nation" is taking place; "our children will not remain Ukrainian in Polish schools"; it is already allegedly about a "Ukrainian-Polish federation or confederation, and in Poland, Ukrainians are increasingly not welcome." It is also alleged that ordinary Poles harass volunteers who collect money for Ukrainian refugees and want to return the western regions of Ukraine under their control, telling at their official events that Lviv is a Polish city." Bandera and the Volyn tragedy are also mentioned in the reports.

In the posts, topics and messages that affect the reader's emotional state are deliberately used. Messages are sent from Russian numbers. Subscribers with the numbers +7 (950) 869-0734 and +7 (908) 186-7552 are served by the operator T2 Mobile in the Rostov region of Russia. In this way, the Russians are once again trying to destroy friendly relations between Ukrainians and Poles and discredit Poland's assistance to Ukraine during the war. 

Pro-Kremlin media and social networks spread information, citing the representative of the Russian Ministry of Defense, Igor Konashenkov, that the military and space forces destroyed "more than a hundred rockets to the HIMARS multiple-launch rocket system" in Lyubimovka, Dnipropetrovsk region. Allegedly, as a result of the attack, the Armed Forces of Ukraine lost about 120 soldiers, and that the Russians killed "foreign mercenaries and technical specialists". "However, the strike was carried out on the agricultural enterprise hangars, in which at that time, more than 800 tons of straw were stored (according to Konashenkov, it would be possible to make from it about 100 missiles for HIMARS). In addition, one child (obviously a foreign mercenary) was injured," a fake exposed journalist Roman Tsymbalyuk.

The Russians have created a "Handbook for Ukrainian citizens on organizing resistance to the Kyiv puppet leadership," in which they advise to sabotage work in socially significant areas - in administrative positions, office workers, employees of government bodies, in the medical and educational fields, law enforcement activities, etc. It is reported by the HUR of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine.

The manual has 14 pages, which repeatedly use terminology that reinforces the propaganda of hatred towards everything Ukrainian: "Kyiv hunta," "puppet leadership," etc.

The Main Directorate of Intelligence the Ministry of Defence of Ukraine claims that the "tips" encourage people to promote the Russian language (pretending not to understand Ukrainian), slow down the pace of work of state organizations, send various incorrect requests to state structures, make mistakes in the documentation and use more materials, including the number of medical, than required.