Sudan clashes go digital

The Digital Forensic Research Lab (DFRLab) at the Atlantic Council has found at least nine hundred potentially hijacked Twitter accounts retweeting content posted by Sudan’s Rapid Support Force (RSF) and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, the head of the RSF and deputy leader of Sudan’s ruling council. 

Following several days of clashes between the Sudanese military and the paramilitary RSF, the war is now also heading to the digital space. 

Many of the accounts that have been apparently hijacked displayed evidence of having previously been operated by real users, the DFRLab found, and now promote RSF narratives online. 

The DFRLab could not conduct similar research on the SAF or SAF leader Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, as neither the SAF or al-Burhan had active Twitter accounts at the time of data collection.