After hackers broke into a system for sharing do ents at Soros’s Open Society Foundations, material describing the organization’s work in Russia appeared on two different sites: in November on the web platform of CyberBerkut, a pro-Russian hacking group that opposes Ukraine’s current government, and in June on DC Leaks, a website that hosts purloined do ents and is believed by security researchers to be a Russian project.
Among the do ents posted, at least three appear on both sites. The do ents posted by CyberBerkut have been edited to try to show that Open Society provides significant financial support to Navalny.
CyberBerkut edited one budget do ent to include a line describing a grant to Navalny’s Foundation for Fighting Corruption to the tune of either $240,000 or $122,000 — CyberBerkut’s editors managed to put two different amounts on the same budget line. In another do ent led, “Russia Project Strategy, 2014-2017,” CyberBerkut added the name of Navalny’s foundation to a paragraph describing the lack in Russia of “ins utions that focus analytically on issues of policy relevance.” By adding the Foundation for Fighting Corruption to that paragraph, CyberBerkut falsely implied that Navalny’s group received financial support from Open Society. And CyberBerkut edited a third do ent, which describes how Russian nonprofits are complying with the country’s harsh laws governing civil society groups, to claim that Navalny receives support from Yandex, a Russian internet services firm that competes with Google.
Navalny denies receiving funding from Soros and says he has had no support from Yandex. Laura Silber, a spokeswoman for Open Society, said the foundation has never supported Navalny and that the edited do ents posted by CyberBerkut amounted to a libelous claim.
The Kremlin, Navalny wrote in an email to Foreign Policy, “really likes that type of [tactic]: posting fake do ents among real hacked do ents.” The goal, he wrote, is to create a mess for the opposition.
“At the end of the day everyone will understand — do ents are fake, but it will be a two-week-long discussion: ‘Is [the] opposition and Navalny in particular using Soros’ money?'” Navalny wrote.
The Kremlin reportedly hates Soros because Open Society, his marquee philanthropic organization, focuses on boosting democracy in the former Soviet bloc and elsewhere. Silber says Open Society “supports human rights, democratic practice, and the rule of law in more than 100 countries around the world.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin, however, views Soros as a deep-pocketed troublemaker whose philanthropy has helped support governments in the former Soviet bloc with distinctly pro-Western leanings. The Russian leader and former KGB officer saw Soros’s hand behind the so-called color revolutions in Ukraine in 2004 and in Georgia in 2003. When Russian authorities banned Open Society from Russia last year, they said the group cons uted “a threat to the foundations of the cons utional system of the Russian Federation and the security of the state.”
By claiming that Navalny received financial support from Soros, hackers with apparent connections to Russian security services were attempting to tie Russia’s most outspoken and prominent dissident to one of the Kremlin’s biggest enemies. And by claiming that Open Society funds Navalny’s work, which has in recent weeks leveled explosive and well-do ented corruption allegations at senior Kremlin officials, the hackers sought to smear Soros’s work, essentially accusing him of meddling in internal Russian politics.
The “focus of discussion is switched from ‘Putin’s corruption’ to ‘opposition and its shadow money,’” Navalny said.
finally! 
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