The insidious rise of Russia's state media, RT and Sputnik

RT is a Russian state-owned television channel, or series of channels. Sputnik is a radio version of the same thing. For years before 2022 they pumped out pro-Russian propaganda in English, aimed at western audiences. They have corresponding websites, that are very similar. After the full-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, the principal outlets of this state-run Russian media, that were based in the United Kingdom, came under increasing pressure to close their operations. But they have moved elsewhere, spreading Russian propaganda across the globe.

The legal hammer fell first, but not last. In March 2022 the UK regulator revoked RT’s broadcast licence on the ground that the licensee was not fit and proper, citing serious and repeated breaches of impartiality rules. In the United States, RT America collapsed almost simultaneously when distributors walked away. The European Union, for its part, adopted restrictive measures against RT and Sputnik, later upheld by the General Court of the European Union; in 2024 it widened the net to include further Russia-associated outlets. Yet enforcement has been imperfect: investigative reporting has shown that RT and Sputnik sites remained reachable from many EU networks long after the ban.

This pressure did not shrink Russia’s foreign-language propaganda effort so much as it redirected it. Africa has become a prime theatre. Sputnik launched a French-language “Sputnik Afrique” in 2022; RT signalled an Africa hub based in South Africa; and Russian state media have leaned into partnerships with local broadcasters and radio stations, a strategy that blends geopolitical messaging with local voices. In Mali, for example, a Bamako station has carried Sputnik programming; more broadly, African defence and policy outlets have tracked a visible rise in Russian television and radio content across the continent. 

The same pivot is plain in Latin America. RT en Español, long one of Moscow’s most effective foreign-language channels, is widely distributed on cable and online, and it tailors narratives to local concerns rather than simply rebroadcasting Moscow’s line. Research institutions have documented sustained Spanish-language output designed to frame Ukraine and the West through a Latin American lens. 

In the Arabic-speaking world, RT has kept up a vigorous digital and advertising presence, including a region-wide brand campaign meant to recast the channel as a tribune of audience rights against Western gatekeepers. The aim is not merely audience growth but legitimacy: to present Russia’s narratives as part of the normal media diet from Rabat to Muscat. 

Just as important as geography is the migration of channels. When YouTube, broadcasters and some regulators shut doors, RT and Sputnik poured through windows. They shifted distribution to Telegram, where link-sharing and reposting blur provenance; they seeded video on “free-speech” platforms such as Rumble and Odysee; and they probed newer lanes like TikTok with aggressive posting in Spanish. Policy analyses and platform studies track this pattern in detail. 

The cat-and-mouse dynamic is now a feature, not a bug. French and European investigators have spent the past two years unpicking large-scale Russian “mirror site” operations that clone real news brands, plant fabricated articles and launder content back into social feeds. The so-called Doppelganger network (a Russian state disinformation campaign founded in May 2022 establishing fake news websites promoting reasons for the Russian invasion of Ukraine), along with newer clusters like “Portal Kombat” (a network of some 200 purported news websites with pro-Russian content), shows how overt state media and covert systems of media influence and disinformation reinforce each other. Take one node down, and another pops up on a look-alike domain or a lightly moderated platform. 

Western platforms and governments have responded unevenly. In late 2024 the US sanctioned RT executives for covertly recruiting influencers through a front company; shortly afterwards major platforms announced removals or bans of accounts tied to Russian state media and covert operations, and TikTok said it had taken down networks linked to TV-Novosti and Rossiya Segodnya ahead of the US election. But as with broadcast curbs, these measures push distribution into ever more diffuse channels rather than eliminating it outright. 

All the while, a familiar pair of editorial tactics has underpinned the growth. One is narrative localisation: Spanish-language feeds focus on anti-imperial grievance, corruption and energy politics; Arabic-language ones reframe Western policy in the Middle East; African products link sanctions and food insecurity, often with a conspiratorial edge. These messages are then amplified through local partners, influencers, community radio and syndication agreements that grant Russian content a veneer of domestic authorship. A second tool used is narrative laundering: stories and clips ricochet from an RT or Sputnik node into a proxy website, then into a Facebook page or a broadcaster’s segment, returning later to Russian outlets as if they were third-party validation. 

Nor has the legal and civil liberties debate gone away. Scholars and courts have wrestled with the proportionality and legality of outright broadcasting bans on foreign state media. Even where courts have upheld restrictions, critics warn of precedent creep and of the need to match sanctions with transparent, technically competent enforcement. Those arguments will continue, because the line between propaganda and free speech is contested, and democracies are rightly cautious when wielding censorship tools. 

For Ukraine and her partners, the consequence is not only reputational. RT and Sputnik’s evolved system of disinformation makes it cheaper to inject doubt, sow wedge issues and chip away at public support for aid. It also complicates election security by providing ready-made narratives that domestic actors can repackage. The Voice of Europe affair (a pan-European news website fed by Russian state propaganda) and the EU’s 2024 expansion of media sanctions are reminders that Kremlin messaging now flows as much through nominally local outlets and political actors as through Moscow-branded channels. 

What, then, is to be done that is both effective and compatible with liberal democratic norms? Three principles stand out. The first might be described as precision over pageantry: targeted enforcement against covert networks, and commercial fronts and mirror sites, is more useful than symbolic bans that are easily routed around. The Doppelganger takedowns and the sanctions on covert recruitment represent the right kind of focus. 

Second, daylight beats deletion. Mandatory provenance labelling for foreign state content, robust archives of takedown decisions, and support for independent fact-checking in the languages where RT and Sputnik are actually growing—Spanish, Arabic and French in Africa—will blunt impact without feeding martyrdom narratives. Research already shows that much of Russia’s online reach depends on laundering and misattribution; provenance tools strike at that centre of gravity. 

Third, compete, do not just contain. Partnerships with reputable regional outlets, grants for public-interest reporting, and open-licence explainers on sanctions, energy and food security targeted at Latin American and African audiences matter more than Western self-addressed messaging. The objective is not to silence Russian media but to make their least honest work less persuasive by surrounding audiences with better choices. The story of the past three years is that RT and Sputnik did not fade when barred from Europe’s airwaves; they adapted and, in some places, advanced. Meeting that challenge requires the same adaptability, anchored in law and local trust.