The Strategic Logic of Digital Disinformation

Why do countries engage in disinformation campaigns even though they know that they will likely be debunked later on? We explore a core puzzle in information warfare in which countries that pursue disinformation to confuse and demobilise their adversaries usually suffer from reputational penalties after they are debunked, yet they nonetheless continue to pursue such tactics. In order to explain this dilemma, we employ a formal model and walk through anarchy, pre-emption and cost miscalculation explanations of disinformation and demonstrate that countries may rationally engage in disinformation campaigns if they have a different calculus about reputational costs, if they believe their adversaries will not be able to debunk their claims successfully, and if those adversaries will not be able to disseminate their debunked claims well enough to incur reputational costs on the initiator. Ultimately, we suggest that deterrence in information warfare is attainable if the “defender” can signal its debunking and “naming-shaming” capacity prior to the disinformation campaign and if it can mobilise the support of the international audience against the attacker. We conclude by arguing that a country’s fact-checking ecosystem and its pre-existing perception within the mainstream international digital media environment are the strongest defences against disinformation.