The earliest documented allegations of the existence of "web brigades" appear to be in the April 2003 Vestnik Online article "The Virtual Eye of
Big Brother" by
French journalist Anna Polyanskaya (a former assistant to assassinated
Russian politician
Galina Starovoitova[12]) and two other authors, Andrey Krivov and Ivan Lomako. The authors claim that up to 1998, contributions to forums on Russian Internet sites (
Runet) predominantly reflected
liberal and
democratic values, but after 2000, the vast majority of contributions reflected
totalitarian values. This sudden change was attributed to the appearance of teams of pro-Russian commenters who appeared to be organized by the
Russian state security service.
[13][14][15][16] According to the authors, about 70% of Russian Internet posters were of generally liberal views prior to 1998–1999, while a surge of "antidemocratic" posts (about 60–80%) suddenly occurred at many Russian forums in 2000. This could also be a reflection to the fact that access to Internet among the general Russian population soared during this time, which was until then accessible only to some sections of the society.