This is how a Russian misinformation network leverages BRICS to promote its messages in Australia

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Reports last week that Russia had requested the use of a military base in Indonesia, a new BRICS member, caused an uproar in Australia. The suggestion that Russian military planes might be positioned just 1300 kilometres from Darwin elicited strong comments from both the Prime Minister and the leader of opposition.

Two days later, a spokesperson from Indonesia’s Foreign Ministry published an official statement that the country “never granted permission to any country to build or possess a military base”.

Politicians, commentators and experts are now grappling with how to respond to the growing influence of Russia and , an intergovernmental organisation of 10 countries with “emerging economies”. But reports suggest some Russian organisations have already been using BRICS as a platform for spreading disinformation abroad, including in Australia.

‘Geopolitical centre of the world shifting to the East’

In September 2024, John Shipton, activist and father of Julian Assange, from Australia at a panel discussion in Kazan, Russia, titled “Freedom of Speech in Digital Multipolarity: Guarantees and Risks”.

At the event, organised by the BRICS Journalists Association (BJA), Shipton received a “Voice of the World BRICS 2024” award. Mira Terada, chair of the panel discussion and co-director of BJA, said her organisation decided to award Shipton for his “steadfastness, dedication and honesty”.

The same award was also presented to another Australian, Simeon Boikov. Also known as Aussie Cossack, Boikov has reportedly been evading arrest by hiding out in the Russian consulate in Sydney for over two years.

Terada said that BJA was awarding him “for courage, loyalty and assistance to the front”.

Speaking to the event via conference call from the Russian consulate in Sydney, Boikov said that BRICS should become a foundation for new, alternative platforms that support freedom of speech.

Mira Terada (L) and John Shipton (R) present at a panel discussion in Kazan, Russia, in September 2024. Terada is co-director of the BRICS Journalists Association, and director of the Russian Foundation to Battle Injustice (R-FBI). Researchers at Clemson University have linked R-FBI to disinformation campaign Storm-1516, that creates and promotes pro-Russian disinformation narratives.

A month later, in October 2024, the Russian city of Kazan was in the spotlight again. It hosted the 16th BRICS summit, with India’s Narendra Modi and Chinese president Xi Jinping in attendance.

This time appearing in person, John Shipton Russian state media outlet RT, which is subject to sanctions in Australia, that “the movement of the geopolitical center of the world” was shifting towards the East.

“I am enthralled with … the Russian Federation, China and Xi Jinping and Modi in India … I’m enthralled by the emergence of their vision within the difficulties [of the] historical distribution of geopolitical power,” he said.

Shipton appeared at the BRICS summit alongside another Australian, Adrian McRae, member of Port Headland Council in Western Australia.

with a Russian state media outlet during the summit, McRae praised BRICS for offering a “new system of cooperation and trade” as opposed to “the hegemony of the US dollar”.

What is BRICS?

BRICS was founded in 2009 as a meeting of four countries — Brazil, Russian, India and China (BRIC) — interested in reforming global financial systems. They were joined by South Africa in 2010.

Melissa Conley Tyler, executive director of the Asia-Pacific Development, Diplomacy and Defence Dialogue (AP4D) and an honorary fellow at the University of Melbourne, told SBS Examines BRICS has gone through significant change in the past two decades.

“[There was] this sense of networks across the countries. That could be everything from hospital administrators to academics to think tanks and journalists.

“They were saying: the BRICS countries had more in common, and they should network more with each other … essentially sharing knowledge.

“But then surprisingly, in 2024, the third stage happens and we had expansion. So we now have Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran, the UAE, and Nigeria. And most recently, just this year, after Indonesia’s election, President Prabowo had Indonesia join.”

Today, BRICS has a network of organisations and professional forums from a range of spheres — from law to theatre — and even has its own BRICS TV, a media outlet registered in Russia.

The BRICS Journalists Association (BJA) is not officially affiliated with BRICS, but actively participates in events organised by other government agencies around BRICS, and hosts its own events, sometimes with Russian government officials in attendance.

BJA states on its that it is “a public formation and is outside the sphere of state policy”.

Among its purposes, it lists: “Ensuring a strong and coordinated media response to information attacks, which continue to be directed both at the BRICS countries and at all states supporting multipolarity. Especially from the mainstream Western media.”

‘Russia is not a cancelled country’

While in Russia, Shipton appeared alongside BJA co-director Mira Terada for an , where she told the outlet he arrived at the invitation of BJA.

“It is important to show that Russia is not a cancelled country with cancelled culture, how the West is trying to show to the rest of the world. And this is a good example,” she said.

Dr Robert Horvath, specialist in Russian politics at La Trobe University, told SBS Examines that Terada belongs to a group of pro-Kremlin so-called human rights activists. These activists have served prison time in countries regarded as adversaries of the Kremlin, and are presented as victims of unjust persecution.

Terada served two years in US prison for money laundering. After she arrived back in Russia, she became the director of the Russian Foundation to Battle Injustice (R-FBI).

“Terada’s Foundation to Battle Injustice is probably the most extreme Kremlin-backed ‘human rights organisation’,” Dr Horvath told SBS Examines.

“This is not surprising, because it was originally created by Evgeny Prigozhin as part of his media and disinformation empire”.

Dr Horvath said some of the activities of Terada’s R-FBI include fake reports defaming leading German politicians, suggesting they support the legalisation of paedophilia.

“Another [report] falsely alleged that the Ukrainian armed forces were engaged in medical experimentation. The clear aim was to suggest parallels with medical experimentation in Nazi death camps and to reinforce Kremlin propaganda about democratic Ukraine as a neo-Nazi regime.”

Dr Horvath said that despite her role as a purveyor of disinformation, Terada has spoken at least twice at UN Security Council’s Arria-formula meetings, once on and once on the .

Narrative laundering campaign

In October 2024, the Media Forensics Hub at Clemson University published a report linking R-FBI and a “narrative laundering campaign” known as Storm-1516.

Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Centre earlier that year as an actor that “successfully laundered anti-Ukraine narratives into U.S. audiences using a consistent pattern across multiple languages”.

described “narrative laundering” as a process of spreading disinformation while trying to conceal its origins.

It detailed how Storm-1516 and R-FBI generate fake news stories and “propagandistic reports”, sometimes with the help of AI, then use networks of influencers to share and promote them online.

According to the report, stories are published in multiple languages, with content critical of the US, and “with particular focus on the relationship between the West and the Zelensky government”.

Professor Patrick Warren, co-director of the Media Forensics Hub and one of the authors of the report, told SBS Examines there are several narratives “pushed” by R-FBI.

“By far the most common is a narrative about corruption in the Zelensky government in Ukraine. They’re pushing this idea that any aid given to Ukraine will just be wasted or stolen, that the regime is both financially and morally corrupt.

“These include lots of examples of Zelensky buying fancy things, Olena Zelenska buying jewellery or yachts.”

These narratives have been created from whole cloth, where they’ve actually created fake eyewitnesses and fake documents.

Patrick Warren, Clemson University

Another type of narrative, Prof Warren said, targets global leaders and countries supporting Ukraine, with fake news and disinformation shared about Emmanuel Macron, Joe Biden and the British government.

“The main goal here is to make it less attractive to support Ukraine.”

‘Oddball unusual journalists’

Clemson University’s report suggested that the BRICS Journalists Association (BJA) is used by R-FBI as a network to promote this content.

“[R-FBI] has really set itself up as the leading Russian organisation that pulls in what they call independent journalists, sort of outsider journalists from many countries around the world; especially BRICS countries, but other countries too,” Prof Warren said.

“It uses that network of kind of aligned voices to distribute narratives that make the Russian government look attractive, and maybe even more common than that — make competitors to the Russian government look unattractive.

“So that’s the role that the organisation plays: bringing together these disparate voices that might be led to sing the same song, a song that the Russians like.”

The Clemson report lists some individuals who have been especially active in promoting false narratives. Originating from a range of countries, from the US to the Netherlands, they have either fled for Russia after charges were pressed against them back home, or have moved to the territories of Ukraine occupied by Russia.

Many of them are also affiliated with RT, Russia’s English-language state media sanctioned by a number of countries, including Australia.

Analysis by SBS Examines found many of these individuals regularly appear virtually or in-person at the BJA’s panel discussions, including the event where Shipton was presented with the “Voice of the World BRICS 2024” award.

So although it’s called the BRICS Journalists Association, I think you should think about it more broadly than that.

Patrick Warren, Clemson University

“I’m gonna call them kind of oddball, unusual journalists, ” Prof Warren said.

Prof Warren added that in a few cases, some of the individuals have affiliations with relatively mainstream media outlets.

“In the cases of more Western-oriented journalists, these tend to be journalists who don’t have any sort of mainstream media credentials at all.”

SBS Examines sent a request for comment to Mira Terada, but she did not respond by the time of publication.

‘I have a knack and a talent for it’

In Australia, Simeon Boikov, also known as Aussie Cossack, “has been tightly linked to the R-FBI for quite a long time,” Prof Warren told SBS Examines, adding that Boikov was often the first person to share misinformation narratives linked to R-RBI and Storm-1516.

Prof Warren said that “rather than just being one amongst many, [Boikov] was the guy that was breaking this story every time.

“Then we find out the whole history about him fleeing to the embassy and hiding out. Of course, that made us a little more suspicious.”

Boikov has repeatedly claimed he is being persecuted for exercising free speech and sharing his political views.

Sentenced to 10 months in prison for breaching a suppression order and naming an alleged paedophile at an anti-lockdown rally in May 2022, Boikov told SBS Examines his sentence was “extreme government persecution … payback for my opinions, for my outspoken position”.

Boikov successfully appealed the sentence and was released early. In December 2022, while on parole, he was charged with assaulting a 76-year-old man at a pro-Ukraine rally in Sydney. He was granted conditional bail ahead of the trial, and reportedly fled to the Russian consulate, where he still resides over two years later.

Boikov claims the alleged assault was “self-defense … not a serious crime”, and said he had no faith in the Australian legal system to prosecute the case fairly.

In July 2024, that Russian actors could be behind fake videos warning of imminent violent attacks by Palestinian militants during the Paris Olympic Games. France24 reported allegations some of the videos were published on X by Boikov’s since-suspended account, ‘@aussiecossack’.

In April 2024, that Boikov was “one of the key figures” spreading misinformation about the Bondi Junction stabbing attack, falsely claiming the offender was a Jewish man and stoking antisemitism. In October that year, allegations that Boikov had paid US-based bloggers to post fake videos of Kamala Harris ahead of the US presidential election.

In late December 2024, Boikov volunteered to be swapped for Oscar Jenkins, an Australian man captured by the Russian forces while fighting in Ukraine. At the time of publication, Boikov remains in the Russian consulate in Sydney.

In a phone call with SBS Examines, Simeon Boikov said he has never been contracted by Mira Terada or R-FBI.

He added that he has been contracted by Rossiya Segodnya, a Russian state media outlet, and that he has declared such contracts through the with the Attorney General’s Department.

“I get plenty of different contracts on and off. But if they’re formal state media affiliated contracts, I declare them and I put them on the transparency register.

“If it’s just some type of private thing, then I’m not obliged to declare that. And that’s my legal advice from my lawyers also,” Boikov said.

He went on to add that apart from contract work, he does “a lot of independent work” and considers himself an independent journalist.

“Because even the money that they would pay me, the Russian state media, it’s peanuts to me.

“It’s like a symbolic thing. It’s not a high-paying thing. You don’t go there for the money.”

Collaborating with Russian state media is more of a patriotic thing. I’m a dual citizen, a Russian citizen. I’ve got a homeland in Australia, I’ve got a homeland in Russia.

Simeon Boikov, also known as Aussie Cossack

Boikov told SBS Examines that “no one regulates ever” what he does.

“I’m never told what to write or what to say or what to publish or what to say in my broadcast. I have a knack and a talent for it myself, I have to admit.”

He said he has a team of people working for him from a range of countries, “networks and circles of employees who work as admins, editors, producers, tech guys, and influencers”.

“I never say no. When people send me anonymous things all the time through our feedback bot, through Telegram, tips, stories, leads, my team publishes.

“Sometimes I wake up in the morning, I check my channels and there’s 70 posts while I was asleep. I’ve got employees in India, in Pakistan, in Britain, in the Philippines, in the United States, in Canada, in Russia, in Belarus, where else? We’ve got people all over the place.”

Boikov confirmed to SBS Examines he has paid for “exclusive” content shared on his channels.

“Sometimes people pay me, sometimes I pay people. I pay lots of people. I pay people through subscriptions, through all sorts of support buttons, ‘buy me a coffee’.

“That’s normal in our business, in the social media world, because it’s good to have good networks.”

He added that he has also sold clips to Sputnik, a Russian state media company, “many times in the past”.

“That’s our industry. You know that as a journalist. I’m very open to everyone. You could say I’m not shy, I’m not averse, I pay first, ask questions later.”

When asked about the fake narratives he allegedly broke first, Boikov responded that the volume of content he posts is “a lot,” and he and his team are not obliged “to go and investigate everything”.

“The news cycle is so fast and so instant, and often Telegram channels, such as my own, actually are first to report, even before the mainstream media news. Especially when it comes to the Russia-Ukraine war there.

“Now, being in front of the news cycle means if we’re unsure, we can say this is unverified. ‘This is unconfirmed, breaking’. Or we can say — ‘can anyone confirm this?'”

He added that he believes if mainstream media hasn’t debunked his posts, it means they are correct.

When asked what his relationship is with Mira Terada, he said he had never met her in-person and called her “a very talented journalist”.

'Very painful': Russian journalists on cost of Putin's attack on press freedom 2 image

‘Fascistic’ elites in Australia

A few days before the 16th BRICS summit, Mira Terada appeared titled “The decline of freedom of speech in the West: State censorship as a tool for suppressing pluralism”.

The discussion was organised jointly with Rossiya Segodnya, a Russian state media organisation whose director Dmitriy Kiselyov is subject to sanctions in Australia.

All three invited guests appearing in person alongside Terada were Australian: John Shipton, Adrian McRae, and legal expert Augusto Zimmermann from Western Australia. The moderator of the panel said they had been brought to Russia by Terada and the BJA.

During the discussion, Shipton expressed sympathy towards Europeans, whose civilisation he said is in decline. As an example, Shipton mentioned the “spread of perversities where it is believed that a man can have a baby, from a back hole not a front hole”.

Councillor Adrian McRae said that government censorship in Australia is so severe he had “to travel to Russia to actually say things that, if I dared say back in my own country, in Australia, [I] would risk serious persecution and in many cases even potential arrest and jail time”.

McRae had already made headlines in Australia earlier the same year, when he travelled to Russia for the presidential elections, which he praised in an interview with local press as “democratic and transparent”.

He concluded his presentation to the BRICS panel discussion by thanking Russia.

“I hope and pray that Russia and the BRICS nations do continue to hold onto the reverence of the ideals of free speech. Because certainly we see it rapidly deteriorating across the West. And if it disappears here as well, then God help what happens to the rest of the world,” he said.

Augusto Zimmermann was the last to present. He called himself “a warrior for free speech” and said that “things have gotten completely out of control” in regards to freedom of speech in Australia.

I can tell you that the behaviour of the elites in Australia is absolutely fascistic. They are suppressing diverse opinions…and those who dare to disagree will face severe punishments, severe persecution.

Augusto Zimmermann

“They are already establishing laws that will indeed not only destroy a person’s life, removing him from his professional activities. But potentially even sending people to jail for the crime of opinion. Which is very typical of totalitarian regimes.”

SBS Examines approached Adrien McRae and Augusto Zimmermann to request further comment regarding their claims during the panel discussion about the deterioration of free speech and the risk of persecution in Australia. Neither McRae nor Zimmermann responded to these requests.

SBS Examines also sent requests to John Shipton, Adrien McRae and Augusto Zimmermann asking whether they were paid for their trips to Russia, and whether they received legal advice before the trips. They did not respond to the requests in time for publication.

Australians Augusto Zimmermann, John Shipton and Adrian McRae appear alongside head of R-FBI, Mira Terada, at a panel discussion in Moscow ahead of the 16th BRICS Summit in Kazan, Russia Credit: @voiceofrightness/Mira Terada, Telegram

The Australian Government continues to advise against travel to Russia due to the dangerous security situation, the impacts of the military conflict with Ukraine and the risk of arbitrary detention or arrest.

The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) does not comment on specific matters, but in a statement to SBS Examines, a spokesperson for DFAT said:

“The Australian Government has joined international partners in expressing serious concerns about Russia’s continued use of disinformation globally, including efforts to justify its illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine.

“The Australian Government has clearly and consistently advised Australians not to travel to Russia since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in February 2022.”

Senate committee urging action

In October 2024, a Senate inquiry into Australia’s aid to Ukraine published a report urging action against Russian propaganda.

The Senate committee referred to submissions discussing the presence of Telegram channels, run by supporters of Russia and based in Australia, spreading Russian propaganda.

According to the committee, reporting of these channels to authorities was “falling on deaf ears”.

When questioned by the committee, a representative of the Department of Home Affairs said it was aware of “a range of different misinformation campaigns”, and that it was coordinating across all national intelligence agencies to counter those activities.

“It is clear that Russia is not being held to account for its dissemination of propaganda,” the report concluded.

The committee is of the view that the Australian government must take concrete steps to curtail the effects of disinformation on public debate on the conflict.

Senate inquiry report into Australian support for Ukraine

The committee recommended that the Australian Government should “ensure relevant agencies are appropriately resourced to identify and address foreign interference and disinformation activities in Australia, including from Russian actors, and to respond to community and diaspora concerns regarding these activities”.

to the Senate committee report, the Australian government agreed to the recommendation, saying that “Australia has robust and tested frameworks and safeguards in place to protect its democratic institutions at the federal, state and territory, and local level”.

It listed several steps it takes in this regard, including the Counter Foreign Interference Taskforce, AFP Community Liaison Teams and the Electoral Integrity Assurance Taskforce.

It added that the Australian government, through the Department of Home Affairs, has established the Community Interference Cross Agency Engagement Program, that coordinates engagement with eleven identified at risk communities.

“The Department of Home Affairs has engaged with the Ukrainian community at their request, under this program,” the response read.

SBS Examines asked ASIO whether it was aware of foreign organisations paying local actors to spread Russian disinformation in Australia, and what steps the agency was taking to combat Russian disinformation in Australia. The agency’s spokesperson referred SBS Examines to Home Affairs.

A Home Affairs spokesperson did not provide a statement, noting that the Australian Government is currently in a caretaker period until a new government is sworn in, following the upcoming federal election.