Question to the Home Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for the Home Department, what steps her Department is taking to identify and counter potentially state-backed digital advertising campaigns promoting Russian citizenship and residency to people in the UK.

This Government takes the threat of information operations from foreign states seriously. We work closely with industry, international and operational partners to identify and counter state-backed influence activity in the UK.

Whilst we do not comment on specific operational matters, we keep the threat from state-sponsored information campaigns under constant review. Where activity linked to a foreign state poses a threat to the UK’s safety or interests, the Government will use the full range of powers to detect, expose and disrupt that activity.

That is why the Prime Minister has asked security chiefs to establish a new National Centre for Information Defence (NCID) – to transform the UK’s capabilities for detecting, attributing and disrupting information attacks from foreign adversaries, to support and defend our democracy and national security.

More broadly, the National Security Act 2023 provides robust powers to tackle foreign interference, including activity conducted on behalf of a foreign state to influence UK political processes. Russia has been placed on the Enhanced Tier of the Foreign Influence Registration Scheme, increasing transparency requirements and creating further legal consequences for those who seek to conceal their links to the Russian state.