Internet Research Agency



One should not trust the internet completely because it is full of various fake stories, deception and lies. The internet is rife with information attacks because information is just another offensive weapon in the modern world, and information attacks are just another effective type of struggle. The Internet "Research" Agency (IRA) is a Russian troll farm operating out of  The troll farm became notorious for its interference in the 2016 U.S. presidential election on behalf of former Troll-in-Chief and Putin fanboy Donald Trump. It has also been involved in running pro-Kremlin propaganda networks regarding the War in Ukraine since 2014.

The IRA was founded in mid-2013. The terms "Trolls from Olgino" or "Olgino's trolls" have become a sort of catch-all label for paid agents spreading Russian propaganda online, and does not necessarily refer to the IRA proper.

The trolls themselves
The actual trolls in question are often just young people looking for a job. The trolls themselves are mostly politically illiterate about foreign affairs. To quote the US State Department:

The trolls work 12 hour shifts where they are expected to endlessly type bullshit that serves Russian interests. If an employee is even slightly late to work, they get fined 500 rubles, or "about 9 USD."

The founder
The company was founded by Russian oligarch a man who is allegedly close to the Modern Tsar himself. Prigozhin also had a hand in founding the Russian mercenary company named the Wagner Group. Prigozhin was among those indicted by Special Counsel Mueller for Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election.

Prigozhin reportedly didn't care all that much about being named in the indictment. We are going to quote his exact (apathetic) words on the subject below:

Prigozhin was also named in the indictment as controlling "Concord Catering", a company that funds the IRA. The indictment goes on to say that by September of 2016 the budget for the project that included the interference campaign "exceeded 73 million rubles", or over 1.2 million US dollars.

In February 2023 Prigozhin, in an interview conducted on a Wagner Group Telegram channel, admitted to being the founder of the IRA:

Interference in the 2016 US presidential election
The IRA engaged in organized astroturf campaigns on social media on behalf of Trump as part of the wider Russian interference in the 2016 US presidential election. The Russians' goal was to ruin any chance of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton winning the election. Both the Trump campaign and the Russians used similar tactics to stoke deep political discord within the United States electorate, including through social media and "selective leaking".

The Russian social media astroturf campaign began in 2014 as a "generalized program" to fuck with United States politics, but by 2016 had grown to favor Trump and disparage Clinton specifically. The IRA, which receives funding from "an oligarch linked to Putin", created fake accounts on Twitter and Instagram and opened group pages on Facebook to "attract followers" with their polemic bullshit on "race, gender, and other polarizing content." The attention the astroturf campaign received grew, and eventually millions of Americans were viewing their bullshit. It helped that American political figures would spread the Russian bullshit even further.

Some IRA employees would even travel to the United States to conduct research on their targets and gather photographs for their posts. These Russians in particular were among those indicted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. 12 of the 13 Russians named in the indictment worked for the IRA in some capacity.

Russian trolls stole the identities of American citizens to use as cover for their social media ops. The trolls also bought political advertisements in the name of "US individuals and companies." The Russians also, without revealing that they were foreign agents, American personalities to "promote and disparage" candidates.

According to the Intelligence Community Assessment (ICA), Putin personally ordered interference in the 2016 election. What this means is that the "trolls from Olgino" were not rogue agents, but operating with orders directly from the Kremlin. Putin also personally favored Trump, and ordered for an organized character assassination campaign against Madame Clinton.

Ukraine
The IRA has been heavily involved in running an anti-Ukraine propaganda campaign on social media. Starting in April 2014, a systemic effort had begun by Russian propagandists to shift Western perceptions of the unrest following the Euromaidan crisis that overthrew the previous pro-Russian government. Leaked documents also contained instructions for the Russian trolls to engage in and flood prominent American media sites (social and otherwise) with pro-Kremlin horseshit. To quote Buzzfeed News:

In 2016, the Ukrainian state-owned news platform claimed that a network of pro-Kremlin bots had been operating on social networking platforms which called for violence against the Ukrainian government and spread calls to start the "Third Maidan". Ukrinform went on to identify the person supposedly behind the bot network in question: Sergiy Zhuk, a veteran of the on the side of the pro-Russian insurgents. He was alleged to run the bot network from a neighborhood in Moscow.