Claim OwnershipThe Active Measures Newsletter Podcast
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From the Pell Center at Salve Regina University and the creators of the Active Measures Newsletter, a weekly dive into the latest trends in political warfare, influence, and information campaigns.
68 Episodes
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On the first episode of the new year, Janis Sarts, Director of the NATO Strategic Communications Center of Excellence discusses the current information challenges facing the North Atlantic alliance, Russia's current use of these tools, and the transition from an ecosystem dominated by social media platforms to one dominated by artificial intelligence. Hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson also highlight disinformation spilling out of the U.S. strike in Venezuela and the actions of the Trump administration to sanction EU counter-disinformation officials and researchers.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In June of 1953, civil disturbances hit East Germany--and the Eisenhower administration faced a choice: make good on the rhetoric of 'liberation' or adopt a more restrained approach. According to host Jim Ludes, President Eisenhower and his team adopted the latter approach, restraint, seeking to exploit the uprisings for advantage in the Cold War without encouraging anyone to take needless risks or discrediting the protests themselves by endorsing them from Washington.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In this special edition of the podcast, host Mark Jacobson revisits the classic work of Edward Bernays whose 1928 book, Propaganda, argued that democracy required managed perception and was effective precisely because it bypasses conscious reasoning. Bernays wrote at a time when newspapers were the dominant form of communication, when radio and film were still nascent, but the clear implications of his work for our current world of algorithmically controlled media are numerous.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
It's been a dynamic year of growth for the Active Measures Newsletter Podcast. With great guests and a ton of news, each week we've had more to talk about than time to do it. So as the year winds down, hosts Mark Jacobson and Jim Ludes name their "final four"--the biggest stories from the Active Measures Newsletter in 2025. Artificial Intelligence, Sabotage in Europe, America’s Unilateral Disarmament, and more contend for the biggest story of the year. Mark and Jim have their pick. What's yours? Listen here or wherever you get your podcasts!See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
“They’re burning all the witches,” sang Taylor Swift on the album “reputation,” a lyric with meaning about modern-day witch hunts, cancel culture, and, in fact, disinformation. In this week’s episode of The Active Measures Newsletter Podcast, hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson break down the recent attack on Taylor Swift’s actual reputation and the self-harm done to America’s reputation by its new national security strategy. Then, they welcome L. Gordon Crovitz, co-CEO of NewsGuard, for a great conversation about the current threat-landscape, America’s unilateral disarmament in this fight, the prospect for corralling social media and AI platforms, and the enduring value of good local news.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
The terminology we use to describe new phenomena matters. On this week's podcast, defense intellectual Frank Hoffman reviews Chinese, Russian, European, and--to the extent there is any--American writings about 'cognitive warfare.' For the uninitiated--this runs the gamut from traditional tools of influence to novel technologies, including chemical and directed energy weapons that can "alter peoples’ brains and thought processes. . . .” Co-hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson also discuss the latest news about CopyCop/Storm1516 and the latest recruiting ad for the 4th PsyOp Group.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
American social media is filled with high-strung posters, outrage-addicts, and partisan players. It's a perfect avenue for amplifying division and most platforms let anyone play anonymously. So it came as a shock to some this week when X turned on a new geolocation service and the overseas posting of active accounts--some with hundreds of thousands and even millions of followers--proved to originate from Eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia. In this special edition of the podcast, host Jim Ludes takes us back to 2017, when Russia's use of fake personas on social media first became obvious.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week, Naomi O’Leary, European Correspondent for The Irish Times describes Russia’s hybrid warfare across Europe—from severed pigs heads dumped at French mosques to cases of arson in Poland and the United Kingdom. “Russia is recruiting what they call ‘Telegram agents’ over this messaging app to do small-scale sabotage,” she says, “and the aim is . . . ‘to disrupt the unity of Western states and sow discord among citizens of European countries. . . .’” Hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson also discuss emerging details about the Trump administration’s latest push for a deal in Ukraine; the potential for U.S. agentic AI information operations in Venezuela; and a litany of current disinformation campaigns in the Balkans.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Journalists at Sky News created an elegant experiment to assess whether content on X in the United Kingdom had political bias. From a database of 90,000 posts created by 21,690 accounts collected over two weeks in May of 2025, they were able to observe ". . . a clear imbalance of content promoted on the platform, with right-wing voices dominating and the algorithm pushing posts to new users that don't align with their interests." Digital Investigations Journalists Kaitlin Tosh and Michelle Inez Simon join hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson to discuss their experiment and its findings.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week, Politico's Marion Solletty (Editor-at-Large, France) and Laura Kayali (Defense Correspondent) join hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson to discuss the "Red Hands" trial in France, reports of ties to Russian intelligence, and the broader context in which France finds itself as a "hot-spot in Russia's hybrid war against Europe." The hosts also examine Shakespeare for lessons about irregular warfare and reports that Russia will spend less on defense but more on state-run information operations. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week on the Active Measures Newsletter Podcast, hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson speak with Poppy McPherson (Special Correspondent for Southeast Asia) and Karen Lema (Philippines Bureau Chief) of Reuters whose recent reporting showed Chinese government use of a local public relations firm in the Philippines to mount a pro-China/anti-U.S. influence campaign in the country. Mark and Jim also review some of the big stories from this week's newsletter including Suzanne Nossel's case that Americans have lost sight of what 'soft power' actually is; Peter Pomerantsev on how to fight Putin in an information war; rising temperatures in the hybrid war in Europe; and the deepfake attack on Ireland's election.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
In this special edition of the Active Measures Newsletter Podcast, host Mark Jacobson explores how the disinformation lessons of the past echo in the digital age. Drawing on Mark Twain’s reflections on Gutenberg’s printing press, Jacobson traces how revolutions in communication have spread both knowledge and deception, and asks whether artificial intelligence will bring us closer to enlightenment—or to a new kind of chaos. The full podcast will return next week.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week on the Active Measures Newsletter Podcast, hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson speak with Georgetown University's Renée DiResta about trends in technology, social media, and disinformation. They also discuss some of the reporting in this week's newsletter, including the U.S. Army General using ChatGPT to make military decisions, Russia's continued use of information laundering, the tendency of some victims of malinformation to wear it like a badge of honor, and news that Facebook continues to monetize sanctioned Russian entities.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week, hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson welcome Erol Yayboke of CSIS and FilterLabs.AI for a conversation about the potential of agentic artificial intelligence to contribute to effective and even ethical offensive information operations. They also review some of the top stories in this week's newsletter, including reporting from Rolling Stone about the Macedonian national who runs popular pro-MAGA accounts from Macedonia; a new study about social media and news consumption from the Pew Research Center; an essay in The Washington Post about foreign governments exploiting America's unilateral disarmament in the information-fight; and a plea by leaders of the BBC to fund their World Service like the national security asset it is.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week, Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson welcome Stephen Clermont, Head of Polling at Change Research, for a discussion of the sustained appeal of conspiracy theories in the United States, today--all stemming from a collapse in public confidence for the major institutions in American public life. First up, however, they discuss the optics and messaging of the gathering of uniformed U.S. military leaders at Quantico this week, the remarks of Secretary Pete Hegseth; President Vladimir Putin's remarks at Valdai and his appeal to the shared values between Russia and MAGA followers; as well as the recent election results in Moldova.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
One of the foundational concepts of political warfare--whoever is waging it--is to exploit existing issues. In this special edition of the Active Measures Newsletter Podcast, host Jim Ludes shares episodes from the Cold War and America's long struggle with racism to see how adversaries use original sins against their targets. The full podcast will return next week.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week, hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson discuss the impact to American soft-power of late-night comedian Jimmy Kimmel's suspension by ABC after Trump administration threats; the continued exploitation of Charlie Kirk's murder by hostile foreign powers; and the activities in Ukraine of an American neo-Nazi group with apparent Russian ties. Then, they welcome Liam Karr, Africa Team Lead for the Critical Threats Project at AEI, for an in depth discussion of his recent work tracking Russian influence campaigns and military activities in sub-Saharan Africa.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Guest Charlie Edwards, senior fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, tells hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson that Russia is engaged in the most sustained campaign of sabotage targeting Europe since the Second World War--and he's brought the receipts. Aimed primarily at undermining Western confidence in governments and, thus, support for Ukraine's defense, Russian sabotage is taking a toll across Europe. The hosts also discuss foreign exploitation of political violence in the United States and Russia's targeting of Moldova's upcoming parliamentary elections.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week, hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson review reports of a U.S. influence campaign targeting the residents of Greenland; Texas stands up an effort to counter-Chinese influence; the Trump administration embraces the Department of War; while the prevalence of disinformation in AI chatbots grows.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
This week, hosts Jim Ludes and Mark Jacobson welcome RAND's Jonathan Welch for a discussion of DOD requirements to get the most out of generative AI for U.S. influence operations. Also, fallout from the Trump-Putin meeting comes in many forms: from waltzing polar bears to Putin whispering about election fraud all while Russian malign influence campaigns targeting the west continue.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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