Brian Liston
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brianjliston.bsky.social
Brian Liston
@brianjliston.bsky.social
Senior Threat Intelligence Analyst at Recorded Future
Analyzing Russia IO, Ukraine, election security
Cited in NYT, FT, Politico, Axios, NBC, France 24
GSPIA class of 2017
rn
June 17, 2025 at 12:21 AM
I’ve yet to see any evidence suggesting this post, delivered to 6.3 million followers, is true.

Instead, just a deluge of misleading posts, misattributed photos, and other fake news saturating the info space.

In my opinion, it’s worse than Russia-Ukraine.
May 8, 2025 at 9:41 PM
T’was great to unplug for a week.
April 21, 2025 at 1:41 PM
If they’re so ineffective, are you asking for sanctions relief as a ceasefire condition?
March 25, 2025 at 9:24 PM
RT doing RT things
March 24, 2025 at 9:29 PM
The good thing: this fake Charlie Hebdo cover got community noted.

The bad thing: the community note source is part of the Portal Kombat “Pravda” ecosystem…
March 24, 2025 at 1:55 PM
March 11, 2025 at 4:34 AM
CCD issued a statement earlier today on the below fake graffiti (Overload/Matryoshka) first appearing on Telegram, then making the jump over here and on X.
March 3, 2025 at 7:19 PM
This is so sad.
March 3, 2025 at 1:54 AM
In case it wasn’t clear how closely the Kremlin is watching all of this unfold…
February 28, 2025 at 7:07 PM
“You gotta be more thankful”
February 28, 2025 at 5:56 PM
They’re also quite clear about who they want Germany to vote for.
February 22, 2025 at 4:38 PM
Today, Matryoshka/Overload bots are interns at European news agencies.

Quite a resume!
February 22, 2025 at 4:35 PM
Noticed an interesting *maybe* new TTP with these Matryoshka/Overload bots: posing as freelancers or journalists of reputable news organizations.

Some screenshots of ones live today:
February 20, 2025 at 11:42 PM
Wow.
February 20, 2025 at 2:00 AM
Russian IOs targeting the German election, summed up in a screenshot of a Matryoshka bot posting AI imagery:
February 18, 2025 at 6:03 PM
As is tradition, the Kremlin cries false flag.
February 14, 2025 at 11:33 AM
OO themes include non-credible security alerts, questions of election integrity, and character attacks on German political figures.

@ISDglobal also published a report on Overload today, highly recommended read. www.isdglobal.org/digital_disp...
February 13, 2025 at 3:09 PM
Since October, we have tracked a series of new websites we now attribute to Doppelgänger, each with German titles (e.g. Militärblatt, Kriminal Radar, Stolzvolk), and each with a German socio-political and economic “news” focus. Impersonations of DER SPIEGEL and Welt also continue.
February 13, 2025 at 3:09 PM
Got my first Overload/Matryoshka DM! 🤡
February 6, 2025 at 9:56 PM
Incredible
February 6, 2025 at 3:35 PM
It’s one thing to report the news - even for state media - but we all know what RT’s trying to do here…
February 1, 2025 at 12:00 AM
I’m skeptical that this “leak” is real.
January 27, 2025 at 7:53 PM
Except the war in Ukraine was already six years old at the time.
January 24, 2025 at 8:00 PM
Hoping at some point @safety.bsky.app will publish indicators on these Matryoshka/Overload trolls so we can better under understand how they keep popping up.

Story is obviously fake but we’re beyond that.
January 23, 2025 at 7:40 PM