Meet Anatoliy Sheriy (Анатолий Шарий).
Shariy is a pro-Russian blogger who got arrested yesterday in Spain for, essentially, disinformation he's spreading in coordination with Russia.
What he says, when you look at it, is actually not that remarkable.
Really, there are three remarkable things about Anatoliy Sheriy.
The Security Services of Ukraine actually have evidence that he was saying it at the behest of Russian intelligence. Multiple sources are covering his arrest on this basis, including Politico.eu and Reuters as well as Kyiv Post.
You don't go that big, with this kind of arrest, unless you really have someone dead to rights.
That's remarkable in this world.He doesn't seem to have bot support that I can see. I took a look at the Facebook shares from his website since 2014; that's the graph there. There's a few key dates where he really pushes a popular story, but the interesting thing here is how he has a "floor" of 1,500 interactions on almost every story he ever posts.
I haven't seen that too commonly. I took a look at the top three stories in 2016 using random sampling, looking for evidence of fake profiles in the "likes" and "shares" and wasn't able to find any; that doesn't mean it isn't there, but it does shoot a hole somewhat in the theory that it's 1,500 bots that are keeping Sheriy's page up there.
Somehow, he's still on Facebook and Instagram.
Y'all know what to do.