Atlantic Council: “As its adversaries wage an information war, the United States is retreating from the front lines. Washington has dismantled key programs for countering foreign information manipulation and interference (FIMI), such as the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Foreign Influence Task Force. This leaves a dangerous vacuum in the US national defense posture. If left unaddressed, this vulnerability will degrade public trust, fracture civil society, and threaten US military cohesion. Because conflicts between states increasingly occur in a gray zone—involving actions that fall just short of war—the United States must treat foreign information manipulation as an act of hybrid war and build societal resilience to match the threat. Feeding false narratives – The Trump administration’s 2025 Annual Threat Assessment from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence makes clear that China, Russia, and Iran are using evolving information warfare tactics to sow dissension and conflict among Americans. TikTok accounts linked to a Chinese propaganda apparatus targeted candidates from both political parties in the 2022 midterm elections. Beijing uses these covert influence operations to “weaken the United States internally” and cast doubt on US institutions. Meanwhile, Russia is deploying deepfakes using artificial intelligence (AI) to obscure its involvement in information manipulation while feeding false narratives to increase public divisiveness on already polarizing topics, such as abortion. Iran, too, has combined cyberattacks with information manipulation. Ahead of the 2024 election, Iran sponsored fake websites posing as news outlets for veterans, using them to spread narratives that painted both major political parties as betrayers of military interests. And Iranian cyber actors linked to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps accessed email accounts associated with US President Donald Trump’s 2024 campaign to weaponize internal communications, spread manipulated narratives, and erode trust in the democratic process. Leaked or fabricated content from such breaches can be used to stoke conspiracy theories, cast doubt on the fairness of the election, and convince voters that the system is rigged. All of this can undermine the legitimacy of the outcome before ballots are even counted…”