Inside The Russian Disinformation Playbook: Exploit Tension, Sow Chaos; Fresh Air with Terry Gross via 91.7 FM San Francisco KALW,

[Podcast] Fresh Air with Terry Gross via 91.7 FM San Francisco KALW; Inside The Russian Disinformation Playbook: Exploit Tension, Sow Chaos

"This is FRESH AIR I'm Terry Gross. The Russian playbook for spreading fake news and conspiracy theories is the subject of a new three-part video series on The New York Times website titled "Operation Infektion: Russian Disinformation: From The Cold War To Kanye." One episode goes back to the 1980s, when the Russians created and spread the conspiracy theory that the AIDS virus was created by the U.S. military for use as a biological weapon. The other episodes are "The Seven Commandments Of Fake News" and "The Worldwide War On Truth." My guest, Adam Ellick, produced and co-directed the series. He's the executive producer of opinion video at The New York Times, which is a new feature on their website.

Previously, he was senior international video correspondent and a reporter at the Times who focused on human rights. When he was reporting from Pakistan in 2009, he was the first journalist to tell the story of Malala and how, with her father, she fought for girls to have the right to attend school. That was three years before she was shot. In 2015, Ellick co-produced a Pulitzer Prize-winning video about an Afghan woman who was burned to death by a mob. Ellick won three Overseas Press Club awards for his coverage of Pakistan and the Arab Spring. He produced videos from North Korea one year ago.

Adam Ellick, welcome to FRESH AIR. So I want to start with the conspiracy theory about the AIDS virus. And you track how this originates with Russian fake news, with Russian disinformation. So just describe the conspiracy theory for those people who don't remember it."