While influence operations typically exploit anger and outrage, this report reveals a subtler vector: weaponized nostalgia. Case studies from Romania (a 75-page Russian-linked Facebook network idealizing the communist era) and Okinawa (PRC-aligned campaigns invoking Ryukyuan history) show how idealized pasts are used to erode trust in the present, evade detection, and normalize anti-Western narratives, all without ever announcing themselves as political.

Hybrid threat actors increasingly exploit credibility in influence campaigns by posing as research institutes, news outlets, or open-source investigation platforms to appear trustworthy. This blog examines three models: OSINT investigation platforms, impersonated news outlets, and pseudo research institutes—all leveraging borrowed legitimacy to spread misleading narratives while disguising state-dictated agendas.

Commissioned by the Friedrich Naumann Foundation For Freedom Malaysia in late 2025, as part of a Study on Perceptions of Geopolitics and Regional Issues, this dedicated CRC report examines how Chinese and Russian influence affects Malaysia’s digital information environment and public opinion. The report integrates the results of two recent national surveys, narrative intelligence findings, and a media environment analysis.

Unresolved integration trauma represents a structurally distinct vulnerability vector that Russian and Iranian intelligence services actively exploit — yet current analytical frameworks fail to capture it. When belonging is chronically denied, an offer of identity and community operates at a more fundamental level than ideology, making integration-traumatised recruits both harder to detect and less likely to recognise themselves as targets.

This study examines the complex dynamics of pro-Palestine mobilization at Columbia University post-October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel. It uses the Cyfluence Secuitry Paradigm and a multi-descipline approach to track how grassroots activism, digital framing and amplification, and persistent hostile influence threats shaped and drove narratives and on-campus mobilization. This is a granular deep-dive into next-gen hybrid cognitive threats and their potential impact on U.S. soc

Athena Tong argues China’s Western Pacific conduct is strategic and consistent, not episodic. Maritime gray-zone moves are paired with the PLA’s “Three Warfares” and amplified through FIMI: lawfare manufactures legal-administrative pretexts, media operations seize the narrative, and psychological pressure normalizes coercive presence.

Smart cities, built on deeply interconnected digital systems, are increasingly vulnerable to hybrid threats in which cyberattacks and influence operations converge, making trust in technical and communicative infrastructures a central stability factor. Using Indonesia’s ambitious smart-city projects as an illustrative case, the article highlights how technological, societal and informational dynamics intersect, and how Cyfluence operations are becoming a pivotal risk within t

Tonga votes on 20 Nov 2025. The Pacific monarchy faces economic dependence, regional competition, and growing information disorder. Local efforts exist, but limited institutional capacity leaves gaps ahead of the elections.

The prelude and opening stages of Russia's 2022 invasion of Ukraine were one of history's most intense periods of hostile cyber and influence activity. This study examines the conflict's information dimension from late 2021 to April 2022 via a novel analytical paradigm adapted from strategic marketing and audience segmentation.