Internet Research Agency

The Internet Research Agency (IRA), known in Russian Internet slang as the Trolls from Olgino, is a Russian company, based in Saint Petersburg, that engages in online influence operations on behalf of the Russian government. The agency has employed fake accounts registered on major social networks, discussion boards, online newspaper sites, and video hosting services that were used for promoting the Kremlin's interests in domestic policy, Ukraine, and the Middle East, as well as influencing the 2016 United States presidential election to support the candidacy of Donald Trump.

The extent to which the Russian government tried to influence public opinion using social media became widely known after a June 2014 BuzzFeed article greatly expanded on government documents published by hackers earlier that year. The IRA gained worldwide media attention by June 2015, when one of its offices was reported as having data from fake accounts used for biased Internet trolling. Subsequently, there were news reports of individuals receiving monetary compensation for performing these tasks.

The group's office in Olgino, a historical district of Saint Petersburg, was exposed by Russian journalists in 2013. "Trolls from Olgino" and "Olgino's trolls" have become general terms denoting trolls who spread pro-Russian propaganda, not only necessarily those based at the office in Olgino.

Russian newspaper Vedomosti links the approved by Russian authorities strategy of public consciousness manipulation through new media to Vyacheslav Volodin, first deputy of the Vladimir Putin Presidential Administration of Russia.

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