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The Russian disinformation network “Matryoshka” is spreading fake videos on X, posing as Western media and quoting “relatives of Nikola Tesla” who glorify Elon Musk and criticize Ukrainians, the Bot Blocker project told The Insider. The videos, bearing the logos of Euronews, Deutsche Welle, and Car&Driver, show photos of Nikola Tesla, Musk, and Ukrainian protesters, with a voiceover reading the script.
One of the videos asserts that Tesla's heirs are receiving threats from Ukrainians because of Musk and Tesla's company name. Another video claims the grandnephew of the famous scientist accuses Ukrainians of setting Tesla cars on fire.
“Nikola Tesla's nephew Dusan Kosanovic has endorsed Musk and his company. Kosanovich says he is proud to have the name of his illustrious ancestor associated with such a company. And he is sick of Ukrainians around the world protesting Musk and Tesla. 'All the negativity around Tesla has to do with a small group of people no one has to worry about. Ukrainians can only destroy what others have created with hard work.' Earlier, a wave of arson attacks on Tesla cars swept across the U.S. and Europe.”
Meanwhile, open sources do not contain any reference to a Tesla descendant named Dusan Kosanovic. The famous scientist did have a nephew — his younger sister's son, Sava Kosanovic, but he died in 1956. No data on the existence of Sava Kosanovic's son could be found — to say nothing of any quotes regarding Musk or Ukrainians. Elon Musk himself has yet to repost these videos.
A Matryoshka video publicizing the supposed persecution of far-right French politician Marine Le Pen is also circulating. It claims that Germany may soon “squeeze out” Alice Weidel, the head of the far-right Alternative for Germany party, in a similar way.
The disinformation campaign known as Matryoshka (“Russian doll”) began as early as September 2023. It was first described by the Bot Blocker project. Most frequently, bots use videos denigrating Ukrainians, bearing the logos of reputable Western media outlets in order to create an appearance of credibility. Earlier, the campaign organizers used Twitter to appeal to Western journalists with the request that they “verify the information” — namely, the network’s own fake materials and anti-Ukrainian propaganda. These posts were then shared en masse by stolen accounts, ensuring a broad circulation.
Another campaign spread videos of world-renowned scientists “convincing” Western audiences that Ukraine should surrender to Russia. The voices of real academics were cloned using AI — as a University of Bristol professor, whose identity was used in one of the videos, confirmed to The Insider.
European intelligence agencies believe Russia is behind the campaign. The French government organization Viginum found that the content used in Matryoshka campaigns is usually first published by major Russian-language Telegram channels. Semantic analysis of publications in Russian channels showed a high frequency of copy-paste posts and an increase in the number of fake publications starting from September 2023, Viginum notes.