On June 1st, Poles elected their fresh president Karol Nawrocki supported by the national-conservative Law and Justice (PiS) party. During the run period leading up to the 2 election rounds, the ruling coalition repeatedly warned of abroad interference, namely from Russia.
The Kremlin has long been known for meddling with elections around the world. In Romania, it conducted disinformation campaigns against NATO and the EU and amplified the voices of pro-Russian candidates. In Germany, it spread AI-generated content on social media platforms, while France has fallen victim to data leaks.
Given Warsaw’s strategical importance and weakening support for Ukraine in the country, Moscow’s core nonsubjective is to influence society and advance Eurosceptic, anti-western, anti-Ukrainian and pro-Russian narratives.
But experts claim that the level of Russian interference in this year’s presidential election in Poland has been much lower than expected, attributing it to a diversified social media landscape, the limited powers of the president, and having learnt lessons from Romania’s fresh election.
In state of digital war
“Poland is definitely in a state of digital war with Russia,” the country’s Digital Affairs Minister Krzysztof Gawkowski told the broadcaster TVN24 in April. Gawkowski – who supervises and coordinates efforts to combat abroad digital threats – has made akin statements throughout the full presidential campaign.
In the beginning of May, he warned that Poland was facing an “unprecedented effort by Russia” to interfere in the election, claiming that Russia’s abroad military intelligence agency (GRU) has “doubled its activity against Poland” compared to last year.
According to the government, the Kremlin was targeting election committees, spreading disinformation, and conducting attacks on critical infrastructure. Over the period of May preceding the run-off, Poland noted on average 2,106 cybersecurity threats, 622 domains flagged as possible scams, and 574 reports on the activity of hacktivists per day, based on figures shared by the ministry of digital affairs on X.
One of the most notable examples of attempted interference was a cyber-attack against the IT systems of the ruling Civic Platform organization announced in April by the government. “Foreign interference in the elections has started. The safety services point to an east footprint,” Prime Minister Donald Tusk wrote on X.
In reaction to the various threats, the government announced its election protection plan, besides referred to as the “election umbrella”. The strategy proposed by the digital affairs ministry included the monitoring of social media for disinformation; training for NGOs, journalists and election committees; and strengthening cybersecurity measures.
The authorities besides launched diagnostic tools for citizens and businesses – including domain safety scans and password leak reports – and developed the Bezpieczne Wybory (Safe Elections) website, which offers information about the electoral process.
The government besides enhanced cooperation between the interior safety Agency (ABW), Government safety Center (RCB), the national investigation agency liable for monitoring external influences on the election (NASK), the State Election Commission (PKW), and applicable ministerial bodies.
“In fresh months, the largest-ever exercise of the country’s cybersecurity strategy was organized, with nearly 60 state and private institutions taking part, investigating scenarios for cyber-attacks on election systems and critical infrastructure,” the ministry told New east Europe.
“We’re doing everything so that Russia doesn’t bargain our democracy, even if it will effort to,” Gawkowski said before the first election circular to Polish media.
Lukewarm attempts
While being an crucial step in expanding cybersecurity, the election umbrella contained measures that had already been in place previously – specified as the Bezpieczne Wybory website or flagging and taking down disinformation – raising questions about its actual innovativeness and effectiveness.
Asked about the strategy, experts mostly praised it but besides remained reserved in their assessments.
For Dominika Kasprowicz, a investigator at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow and a associate of the state commission set up to analyse Russian and Belarusian influence, NASK has been successful in identifying and reporting threats. However, since its duties and functions tend to shift depending on the government in power, its findings from erstwhile years are of limited comparative value.
“The incidents are being identified and reported, there is an increased awareness that something could happen, there is increased discipline among journalists,” added Agnieszka Lipińska from NASK.
But erstwhile asked about the worst-case script erstwhile we spoke in early May, she stayed cautious: “Let’s say it’s an umbrella for this kind of drizzle that we’ve been experiencing for now. We’ll see how it does if it starts coming down in buckets.”
Despite this, after both rounds of the election, all signs point to the fact that the Russian storm never came. After the first round, Lipińska told New east Europe that the level of disinformation was much lower than during the European Parliament election in 2024. She besides stressed that another forms of interference were not as advanced as previously expected.
“You don’t see specified aggressive actions as reducing the scope of supporters of a given organization [on social media] as was the case in the United States, there are no leaks of private correspondence like in France, and there are no operations with algorithms on a Romanian scale,” she said.
But the expert explained that the goal of disinformation spread by abroad actors is not to change things suddenly: “It serves to influence the public’s long-term view of certain issues and problems.”
“Election disinformation, on the another hand, is different, it’s ad hoc, it’s embedded in that peculiar minute in time. If the candidates don’t supply quite a few sensationalism, it’s hard to usage it,” she added.
“I can’t say that disinformation actions are non-existent, due to the fact that they are not, but they are just so standard,” she stressed, giving examples of typical narratives spread during election time specified as warnings of falsifying or cancelling the results. “We were dealing with pre-election disinformation, but it was not very aggressive.”
And while the ministry of digital affairs continued to print data on cybersecurity incidents besides after the run-off, it did not release any information about large-scale abroad operations or attempts to meddle with the results of the election.
In its post-election report, the observers from the Organization for safety and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) mostly praised Poland’s performance, including the measures to counter abroad interference.
The OSCE concluded that “While no circumstantial fresh threats or interference attempts were reported between the 2 rounds, the Prime Minister announced extension of national safety measures in consequence to ongoing hybrid and cyber threats from the Russian Federation and Belarus.”
Key to success?
Various different reasons can be identified to explain Russia’s disinformation and interference attempts being little intense than expected. Preparing for the presidential election in Poland, NASK analysed abroad influence campaigns conducted in another countries.
First, experts point to a more diverse social media scenery in Poland compared to another states, which makes it harder for disinformation actors to conduct their campaigns. In Romania, where Facebook and TikTok dominate, it was easier to influence the electoral process and voter preferences due to a more homogeneous social media environment, Lipińska explained.
“If there are 2 dominating kinds of media, a perpetuum mobile appears. The ads and bots make traffic and the algorithms themselves begin at any point to work in favour of the provocateurs,” she said, adding that Polish citizens usage more social media platforms. The environment is much more diverse and, therefore, harder to penetrate and influence.
Another reason may be the limited power of the presidential function in Poland where the president holds a mostly ceremonial and supervisory role, with limited executive powers. While he can veto legislation, propose laws and represent the country internationally, actual governance is led by the prime minister and the Council of Ministers, who control home and economical policy. In contrast, countries like France or the United States grant their presidents far more executive authority.
That is why this election, albeit crucial domestically due to advanced polarization between the ruling coalition and main opposition parties, may have been strategically little applicable for external actors to target.
But the most crucial origin stemmed from another countries’ experiences. It was the fact that Poland’s presidential election came after the elections in Germany and Romania, mostly seen as influenced by the Kremlin, which gave Warsaw time to admit the patterns and prepare a response.
“After those elections, we’re in a vastly different situation. We were able to learn our lesson,” Lipińska assessed.
The examples of Russian interference in the elections in Germany and Romania earlier this year have increased awareness and discussion around the essential measures to be taken in order to effectively defend the country from east influences.
On the EU level, associate states were able to implement the Defence of Democracy Package initially introduced in December 2023. In July 2024, the Union announced the European Democracy Shield to increase protection against abroad information manipulation and interference (FIMI).
Based on those measures, Poland was able to benefit from the fresh strategy obligating large social media platforms to respond to content flagged for disinformation, review it and, if necessary, take it down.
But while being an crucial step in a deeper and more effective form of cooperation between the countries and large corporations, for now the strategy has shown limited efficacy. According to NASK, not all content it reported was taken down by Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, showing area for improvement in the future.
Despite overall success in deterring disinformation and abroad influences, Poland should stay vigilant. The experts are calling on the state to proceed utilizing measures specified as NASK’s monitoring and educational efforts, or the election umbrella in the future. “It is crucial that this kind of monitoring becomes not just a task but an integral component of the country’s safety system,” Kasprowicz concluded.
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