Oct 9, 2026 · 6 min · 7 segments
OpenAI said on October 8 it banned two influence operations that used ChatGPT to run 'false fronts'. A Russian operation controlled a Latin American think tank through a fake persona, with staff who…
Hold on.
The researchers were real people doing real work?
The staff interviewed experts across the region and wrote papers on things like Brazil's economy, and the site has more than 60 articles that are mostly original.
Mostly, it didn't write the fakes.
Creating propaganda was a small slice of the workload.
Status reports.
So the robot's main job in a propaganda ring was paperwork.
What did they actually pull off then, if they were inflating it? Enough that OpenAI rates it a five on the six-step scale researchers use for how far propaganda travels.
The first five it has seen in 30 operations.
The one that stands out happened in Peru in the spring.
A fake email dressed up as the Lima Education Office told schools to hold Ukraine-themed events and to feature Stepan Bandera, a nationalist from World War II whom Poland and Russia associate with wartime atrocities.
And schools did it? By the operator's own account, some wrote back to the fake address confirming they had, with photos.
Then, stories about Ukraine exporting extremism ran in Peru, in Poland, even in Hungary, and a Polish member of the European Parliament suggested barring anyone with anti-Polish views.
A fake email in Lima moved a politician in Poland.
Hold on.
The researchers were real people doing real work?
The staff interviewed experts across the region and wrote papers on things like Brazil's economy, and the site has more than 60 articles that are mostly original.
Mostly, it didn't write the fakes.
Creating propaganda was a small slice of the workload.
Status reports.
So the robot's main job in a propaganda ring was paperwork.
What did they actually pull off then, if they were inflating it? Enough that OpenAI rates it a five on the six-step scale researchers use for how far propaganda travels.
The first five it has seen in 30 operations.
The one that stands out happened in Peru in the spring.
A fake email dressed up as the Lima Education Office told schools to hold Ukraine-themed events and to feature Stepan Bandera, a nationalist from World War II whom Poland and Russia associate with wartime atrocities.
And schools did it? By the operator's own account, some wrote back to the fake address confirming they had, with photos.
Then, stories about Ukraine exporting extremism ran in Peru, in Poland, even in Hungary, and a Polish member of the European Parliament suggested barring anyone with anti-Polish views.
A fake email in Lima moved a politician in Poland.
The rest of this transcript — segmented and speaker-labeled, so you land on the exact moment something was said
Search every transcript — by keyword, by phrase, or by meaning, across every show Radar indexes
Trends — what is surging across podcasts, measured against its own baseline
Alerts — when a name you follow appears in a newly indexed episode
No account is needed to search Radar.
