Table 1: Organizational Form and Prevalence of Social Media Manipulation in Azerbaijan Initial Government Politicians & Private Civil Society Citizens & Report Agencies Parties Contractors Organizations Influencers 2011 Ministry of Internal Youth branches IRELI Youth Evidence Affairs and Ministry of Group found of Transportation, Yeni Azerbaijani Communications and Party High Technologies, former president’s Assistant for Public and Political Affairs Source: Authors’ evaluations based on data collected. Blank spaces indicate no evidence was found. Strategies, Tools, and Techniques IRELI Youth cultivated websites and blogs dedicated to contentious historical events such as “the Karabakh problem” (AZ News Staff, 2011). They have also been known to post abusive comments on social media, with frequently individuals being targeted on Twitter and other social media platforms if they criticize the government. The use of bots has also been observed (Geybulla, 2016). Independent journalists and activists, such as the investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova, are often the targets of intimidation campaigns based on illicitly obtained intimate images (Freedom House, 2018). The tactics used by these trolls are unsophisticated. Their techniques include spreading rumours, creating cartoons or memes, harassment, and reporting accounts until they are suspended (DeGeurin, 2018). According to a 2019 report by the Index of Censorship, progovernment automated and human fake accounts trolled and commented on YouTube videos on channels critical to the government, such as OsmanqiziTV and MeydanTC (Djalilov, 2019). As regards mass-reporting, it is a well-documented tactic and was used against opposition media outlet Abzas.net on 27 December 2018, as hundreds of trolls attacked their Facebook page and reported it for violating Facebook’s ‘community standards’ (Geybulla, 2019a). Similarly, in December 2019 activist Shakir Zade’s YouTube channel was taken in response to reports issued by Milli TV, Qanun TV, and AnTV (Activist’s YouTube channel down, 2019). Previous to these attacks, in April 2017 the journalist Sevinc Osmanqizi wrote an open letter calling on Ali Hasanov to order “his trolls” to stop attacking her on Facebook and YouTube (Said, 2018). Arzu Geybulla, an Azerbaijani journalist, observed that some trolls are tasked with trolling specific activists or members of civil society (Meisenzahl, 2018). Hacking to gain access to social media accounts takes place alongside cyber troopers’ use of fake accounts, takedown requests, and blackmail (Geybulla & Kobaidze, 2019). This includes attempts to compromise social media accounts belonging to opponents off the government and other activists (Geybulla & Muntezir, 2018). For example, on 24 November 2018, Aziz Karimov – a journalist in Baku – had his Facebook account hacked, resulting in his removal as administrator from several Facebook pages, including Turan News Agency, Azerbaijan’s only independent news agency. At the same time, administrators of other Facebook pages were also compromised. For example, Azadliq Radio and Azerbaijan Service for Radio Free Europe lost all their video content (2,000 videos, posts and photos) and 25,000 of its 500,000 followers (Geybulla & Kobaidze, 2019). On 29 January 2018, Meydan TV lost 100,000 subscribers to 29