Angola Introduction Angola is not considered a free country by the Freedom House organisation (Freedom House, 2019a). was gained in 1975, the party Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola (MPLA) has been in power. José Eduardo dos Santos was president for 38 years until João Lourenço took over after his election victory in August 2017. While the election went quite peacefully and was well organised according to the African Union election overseers, pro-government media, deficiencies in voter registration and the fact that the MPLA used government resources for their campaign gave them an unfair advantage. Oppositional parties called the election fraudulent, but the High Court of Angola dismissed the claims and instead accused them of providing fraudulent evidence themselves (Freedom House, 2019a). The internet is one of the less tightly controlled forms of media available in Angola (Freedom House, 2019b), however access within the country is one of the lowest in the world with a penetration rate of only 21% in December 2019 (Internet World Stats, 2020). Concerning social media, in early 2020 Facebook is by far the most prevalent (82% of social media use), followed by Instagram and Pinterest (roughly 5% each) (GlobalStats, 2020). The main reason for these low rates is likely the cost of internet and mobile phone subscriptions, which are much higher compared to neighbouring countries (Freedom House, 2019b). For these reasons, conventional media sources such as print newspapers or the radio are the main resource for information in Angola. An Overview of Cyber Troop Activity in Angola Organizational Form The Angolan government owns most of the media in the country and most influential outlets in Angola which are based outside of the country are usually privately owned by MPLA members and work as mouthpieces for the party. Additionally, the MPLA and its members are involved with owning service providers (TV, Radio and increasingly internet providers) and prevent any media criticism from reaching Angolan citizens (Freedom House, 2019). Table 1: Organizational Form and Prevalence of Social Media Manipulation in Angola Initial Government Politicians Private Contractors Civil Society Citizens & Report Agencies & Parties Organizations Influencers Evidence Evidence Evidence found found found Source: Authors’ evaluations based on data collected. Blank spaces indicate no evidence was found. Strategies, Tools, and Techniques Given that most outlets and service providers are owned by the government or party members, the MPLA has a significant degree of control over what news gets broadcasted. Recently, the party appears to be going through something of a power-struggle, with some party members appearing displeased with President Lourenço as he is supporting the prosecution for corruption of family members and political servants of former President dos Santos (Freedom House, 2019a). How or if that has affected the party’s general control over the media or their influence and disinformation campaigns remains unclear. 5