Social Media: Tools of Hybrid Warfare (Part One)

This report is a summary of the results of the study entitled "Internet-Based Problem Making as a Hybrid Warfare Tool: A Case Study of Latvia" which was entrusted to the Latvian Institute of International Affairs in collaboration with Riga Stradins University by NATO Strategic Communications Center of Excellence; “Social Infiltration in Social Media Communications in the Russian-Ukrainian Conflict” is the title of another study conducted by a group of Polish researchers; the paper of Joseph Shaheen, a member of American public sector in NATO Strategic Communications Center of Excellence, entitled “Terror Network: How ISIS employs the Well-Suited Social Networks to Communicate their Messages", as well as the debates presented in the conferences of this center in 2015 are all the cases that are dealt with in this summary. The use of new communications technologies in armed conflicts has led to the creation of the concept of "hybrid warfare". This concept is the main focus of the report of NATO Strategic Communications Center of Excellence and encompasses a whole range of concepts such as cyber warfare, network warfare, psychological operations, etc. Publication of this report in Psychological Operations Quarterly does not signify the endorsement of its content and is only to enhance the readers’ information.