Students’ research. The Effect of Kremlin’s Disinformation to the National Security of Italy

Project idea

This research project seeks to improve the student’s competences to carry out independent research. The goal of this research is to understand the effect of Kremlin’s disinformation to the Italian national security, to accumulate new knowledge on the real scale of Kremlin’s hybrid attacks in Italy, and to assess the immunity of the country’s security strategy to false narratives of Russia. Since Lithuanian and Italian security cooperation is increasing, this topic is gaining an exceptional importance to Lithuania and the whole Baltic region. Based on the experience of the Baltic states in the research field, new conclusions and recommendations could be generated, as well as the effectiveness of current security strategies against the threats of Kremlin’s disinformation could be critically assessed. To ensure the successful implementation of this research, it is split into three stages: firstly, to uncover false narratives in Italy and to measure resilience against them, semi-structured interviews will be conducted; secondly, dissemination of disinformation will be measured by analysing Italian media; thirdly, a well-structured Baltic region disinformation study structure (Bankauskaitė, 2019) will be employed. Specific cases will be analysed by trying to understand the real reactions of Italy and the Western alliance towards disinformation attacks and by suggesting a possible effective response, based on the theoretical model of disinformation studies. The results of this project will be available both in academic and in public space. For example, an article for a scientific journal will be prepared and translated to Italian seeking to increase its availability and to encourage dialogue on this topic among Italian speakers in Lithuania and abroad. The results will also be presented in a conference and will become a source for further research, thus creating knew knowledge in the security field.