The FBI reports false videos impersonating the agency and accusing Democrats of election fraud

The FBI is warning that two videos purporting to be from the FBI circulating online are fake, including one with false claims about the arrest of Democratic Party-affiliated groups for voter fraud.

“The FBI is aware of two videos that falsely claim to be from the FBI and relate to election security. One says the FBI has arrested affiliated groups committing voter fraud, and a second refers to the Second Gentleman,” the agency said in a statement Saturday.

In one of the videos viewed by CyberScoop, a voice plays still photos of people wearing FBI shirts and other images claiming that “three affiliated groups have been arrested for manipulating early absentee voting on ballots.”

The video further claims that lists of recently deceased U.S. citizens and Americans over the age of 90 were used “for voter fraud.”

It also contains alleged quotes from investigative journalist Eliot Higgins, who writes for Bellingcat, an organization that uses open source research techniques to debunk false narratives and is a constant thorn in the side of the Russian government.

In the video, Higgins is quoted as saying, “We've seen this before in 2020,” and while the FBI did a “great job,” that “doesn't mean the election will be transparent and honest.” The video ends with the assertion: “We do not know how many such groups acting on behalf of Democrats still exist in the United States.”

CyberScoop reached out to Higgins for comment via Bellingcat.

CyberScoop did not view the video related to Doug Emhoff, the husband of Vice President Kamala Harris, but a description provided by disinformation trackers described it as a video in which the FBI claims there are unspecified ties between Emhoff and one major government contractor. At the same time, he claims: “Any manipulation on this issue constitutes interference in the US elections.”

The FBI said both videos and the claims behind them were fake.

“These videos are not authentic, do not come from the FBI and the depictions are false,” the agency said.

Darren Linvill, a professor at Clemson University and co-director of the Media Forensics Hub, said the video appears to be another piece of Russian disinformation aimed at US elections.

“The posts we're seeing here are consistent with what we've seen from this campaign in the past, and I believe it's probably lookalike content as well,” Linvill told CyberScoop, referring to the Threat group linked to Russian government contractors and President Vladimir Putin.

Linvill added that Doppelganger's posts “don't tend to generate much interest; It's high volume and low quality content. Sometimes they get lucky though.”

The U.S. intelligence community has been warning for a month that foreign actors were likely to increase the spread of fake or manipulated media alleging election fraud, corruption and other allegations designed to reinforce claims of rigged elections and increase confidence in the weakening the integrity of US democracy.

In the last two weeks alone, the U.S. government and private researchers have cited several examples, including a fake video showing the destruction of ballots for former President Donald Trump in Bucks County, Pennsylvania, and another video purportedly by a Haitian immigrant who claims to have voted multiple times using multiple IDs.