Dear Colleagues, I am delighted to share with you today the latest updates in an important thread of my work investigating and highlighting how secrecy is undermining our national security, democracy and ability to defend public debates from foreign influence operations. Please take a look at this recent witness statement I provided to the UK parliament <https://emma-briant.us10.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e7f9f1379bf0f0311ebba75d7&id=05f258e2f4&e=ba76ce6920> which has just been published by the UK Public Administration and Constitutional Affairs Select Committee Inquiry into the Cabinet Office’s implementation of the Freedom of Information Act 2000. My witness statement, makes clear how vital defending FOIA is to securing public trust, strong national security reporting and, perhaps counterintuitively given secrecy is often advanced on the basis of security arguments, to undermining Russian influence operations. I include an NEW example of a leak of an SCL Group document - the defense contractor parent firm of Cambridge Analytica - on its training for NATO. I gave extensive evidence to the UK Parliament on this in 2018, highlighting how this fuelled Russian disinformation and hoping they would do something serious to regulate influence firms like these. This was part of private testimony and evidence from me and is the first time I have publicly written about it. Some of you will be aware that I have frequently highlighted how what we are seeing today are essentially paranoia operations, more than just disinformation (deliberate falsehood) they hinge on creating uncertainty and distrust in our institutions. This form of propaganda, where it is most effective in undermining democracy, hinges on distorted interpretations of truth. If you can undermine reality and create distrust, this leaves fertile ground for bare faced lies. I point out how the UK Government has been suppressing information more and more widely due to a concern about 'mosaic intelligence', an elastic concept that can be used to deny almost anything. Actions by militaries and governments which seek to suppress and control information about what they do in the information domain - or who are not up front with citizens about what they are doing - are routinely exposed of course. The negative impact of these 'suppressed truths' creates far more distrust than being honest generates criticism. Furthermore, distrust created is then leveraged to promote lies as 'suppressed truths'. This is why today I am a proud signatory of this Open Letter with 110 other academics, journalists, MP's and civil society organizations - published by Open Democracy: Editors and MPs urge watchdog to act over escalating government secrecy <https://emma-briant.us10.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e7f9f1379bf0f0311ebba75d7&id=302ef17581&e=ba76ce6920>. We need to build trust in governments, platforms and all institutions that support a democracy, scrutinizing systems and enforcing transparent ethical practices. If reporting has already come out in larger media or academic research, ideological or foreign outlets have less of a 'scoop' on western propaganda operations. The UK Government instead has been trying to impose secrecy and control with profoundly damaging effects on rising distrust. I have done a longer thread of this open letter and my most recent 3 statements to parliament on the issues of online influence operations and responses to them here <https://emma-briant.us10.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e7f9f1379bf0f0311ebba75d7&id=258220d90b&e=ba76ce6920>if you would like to share. I have seen numerous examples, where secrecy, poor understanding of actors behind campaigns, and ill-thought out knee jerk responses are *worsening the distrust* that fuels the deliberate propaganda attacks that are enabling war crimes in Ukraine. Similarly, platforms unwisely often have a greater concern with and focus on falsehood than trust - worsened by a complete inability to understand the actors and communities involved in generating propaganda and misinformation, let alone the wider effects different responses have in the communities they target. Just consider Scott Ritter's take-down by Twitter in the last couple of days - Ritter was suspended for making false claims about the Kremlin's massacre in Bucha. He was suspended then reinstated enabling a wide-reaching reinforcing narrative about how he was 'silenced' for speaking the 'wrong narrative' <https://emma-briant.us10.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e7f9f1379bf0f0311ebba75d7&id=abed8bcd59&e=ba76ce6920> . Supporters then are able to share screenshots of the banned tweet <https://emma-briant.us10.list-manage.com/track/click?u=e7f9f1379bf0f0311ebba75d7&id=32ed896ac0&e=ba76ce6920>, which gives further credentials within the receptive community as well as enabling large numbers of people to read the message Twitter sought to 'suppress'. His return helps reinforce a sense that there must be something to what he says, he's been allowed back so this underscores the belief it was arbitrary. Transparency and consistency for platforms, as well as an understanding of how their actions will play out is of paramount importance. Please do share and cite any of the publications linked above. I also regularly speak on digital disinformation threats and how we can respond to them better as citizens, as journalists, as organizations, as governments. Thank you all for supporting me and my work as readers, as colleagues and as friends. Best wishes, Dr. Briant -- Dr Emma L Briant Website: www.emma-briant.co.uk Associate at University of Cambridge, Center for Financial Reporting & Accountability Author of: *Propaganda and Counter-Terrorism: Strategies for Global Change *from Manchester University Press Co-Author of: *Bad News for Refugees* with Prof. Greg Philo and Dr. Pauline Donald from Pluto Press. Sign up for my Newsletter <http://emma-briant.co.uk/sign-up-for-important-updates/>! Follow me on Twitter @emmalbriant