How Ukrainian Disinformation Spreads in Hungary

A “news item” appears on one Ukrainian portal, one of the Hungarian leftist-liberal portals picks it up, and without any verification they treat it as fact, the senior analyst at the 21st Century Institute explained. This is how the leftist-liberal media spread fake news citing a Ukrainian source.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (Photo: AFP)

"On September 23 (Photo 1), Telex began spreading the news, citing a Ukrainian portal (Photo 2), that neither Hungary nor Slovakia had been invited to a security policy meeting about the planned drone wall along the EU’s eastern border. This fake news eventually spread across the entire Hungarian public sphere," pointed out Daniel Deak, senior analyst at the 21st Century Institute, in a Facebook post.

Yesterday, it turned out that this was not the case at all. Representatives from Hungary and Slovakia were also present, and the defense ministers of the countries concerned agreed to coordinate their drone-related investments,

Daniel Deak said, adding:

The leftist-liberal portals that spread the fake news wrote ‘elegantly’ in their reports covering the meeting (Photo 3): ‘Earlier there were reports that neither Hungary nor Slovakia had received an invitation to this meeting.’”

The analyst highlighted:

They wrote this even though they themselves had spread those so-called ‘earlier reports,’ and the articles containing the Ukrainian fake news have remained accessible without any changes.

Daniel Deak emphasized:

This example clearly shows how Ukrainian disinformation spreads: a ‘news item’ appears on one Ukrainian portal, one of the Hungarian leftist-liberal portals picks it up, and without any verification they treat it as fact. And when publishing the opposite of what they had claimed, they do not even admit that they had previously spread fake news, while leaving the earlier article unchanged.

Cover photo: Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky (Photo: AFP)