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01st Mar 2022

Anonymous has come up with an ingenious way to let Russians know what’s really happening in Ukraine

Charlie Herbert

Anonymous shares idea to inform Russians what is going on in Ukraine

‘Stand up to your dictator, stop killing innocent people’

Anonymous is calling on its followers to leave fake Google reviews for Russian businesses and restaurants in order to inform the country’s citizens on what is actually going on in Ukraine.

The hacking group shared the idea on Twitter with the aim of circumventing any censorship that may be present in Russian news coverage of the ongoing war.

Anonymous wrote in a tweet: “Go to Google Maps. Go to Russia. Find a restaurant or business and write a review.

“When you write the review explain what is happening in Ukraine,” they continued, crediting Twitter user @Konrad03249040 with the idea.

They then provide an “example text” in Russian for people to copy and paste into their review.

Once translated, it reads: “The food was great! Unfortunately, Putin spoiled our appetites by invading Ukraine. Stand up to your dictator, stop killing innocent people!

“Your government is lying to you. Get up!”

The idea has been picked up by a number of people, with some offering their own suggestions on how to go further with it.

“Leave 5 star reviews (unless its Russian State owned, then feel free to leave 1 star ratings),” wrote one.

“The point is to push information to the Russian civilian population being lied to by Putin.”

A second added: “But be careful. Do not leave any personal information and consider to vary the text templates provided here (otherwise they can be easily filtered automatically).”

Many then commented saying they had taken on the idea, with one saying they had done it to “restaurants, hotels, karaoke bars and even law firms.”

Another said that “every single restaurant they have clicked on” has “at least one of these reviews.”

“The power of social media,” they added.

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