As the Russian invasion of the country entered its fifth day, Facebook issued a warning about increased targeting of Ukrainian military and public figures by hackers and took down several fake accounts, pages and groups that were engaging in a disinformation campaign.
The fake accounts were trying to publish false claims about Ukraine being a failed state.
The company said in a statement that it had discovered a relatively small network of accounts, pages and groups on Facebook and Instagram that were violating its policy against foreign influence.
These fake accounts posed as independent websites, created fake identities using profile pictures generated by artificial intelligence techniques, and operated across multiple platforms including Telegram and Russian social networks.
Facebook said that these fake accounts posed as news editors, engineers and scientists and ran websites publishing claims about the West betraying Ukraine and Ukraine being a failed state.
The hacker group Ghostwriter is using fraudulent emails to gain access to a user's social media accounts, and Facebook warned that it was seeing increased targeting of Ukrainians.
The company said it found hacked Facebook accounts being used to post videos showing Ukrainian troops surrendering to Russia.
All of Facebook's users in Russia and Ukraine are urged to take additional precautions to protect themselves from hackers.
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