Russian deepfake campaign weaponizes celebrity videos to influence upcoming US midterm elections

Late last week, a series of deepfake videos surfaced on social media, each displaying a fabricated celebrity condemning the Democratic Party and tagged with one outlet watermark. The videos use stolen footage and voice-cloning technology to make actors such as Alyson Hannigan, Emma Caulfield and Sarah Jessica Parker appear to issue false warnings about Democrats. Affected performers, including Ed Begley Jr. and Eric Roberts, confirmed that their Cameo submissions were manipulated and that they do not endorse the statements.

Disinformation experts link the operation to the Russian-run Matryoshka, also known as Operation Overload, which distributes such content and boosts it with inorganic bot accounts. The campaign is viewed as the opening salvo in a broader effort to influence the November midterm elections, echoing previous Russian interference in European votes. Platforms have begun removing some posts, but the activity highlights ongoing vulnerabilities in election-related information ecosystems.