"Canadian Ukrainian Volunteer", a self-described member of a "four-man team" fighting in Kherson, Ukraine with over 118,000 followers on Twitter, has deleted his account after being exposed as a fraud.
For months on end, @canadianukran1 wowed followers with tales of unflinching heroism and glory.
In one post in April, he claimed to have infiltrated a Russian-controlled area of southern Ukraine on a bicycle while disguised as a Russian trooper.
“Our contact had warned us to remain in the shadows and not to expose ourselves to spying eyes. A window opening above us or a flicker of someone’s cigarette from a balcony, a barking dog in the distance, all were enough for us to cling to the walls in the darkness and hold our breath,” the "volunteer" wrote, apparently taking literary inspiration from a John le Carre spy thriller novel.
In other posts, @canadianukran1 posted selfies of fighters standing against the background of burnt-out tanks, bombastically adding tag lines such as “Excellent harvest this spring. Glory to Ukraine.” On other occasions, he would post mundane photos of gear, of himself in the field or at rest, and regaling readers with tales about beating back the Russian hordes, discussing the effects of combat exhaustion, and posting photos of troops with “balls of steel” who “barely flinch” amid incoming artillery attacks.
“Hello, all ye good people of Middle Earth. Gondor holds still, but do send the Rohirrim, we are stretched a little thin. Meanwhile, we shall continue,” the poster wrote in one Lord of the Rings-themed post accompanied by a stylized photo of himself sitting at a table smoking a cigarette.
Photo of 'Canadian Ukrainian Volunteer' in a Lord of the Rings-themed tweet about the fight against the Russian 'orc' hordes.
© Photo : Twitter
@canadianukran1’s stories became popular enough to spawn doppelgangers, with @canadianUkranl, a parody account of a “Canadian super soldier” who is “totally in Ukraine” and “unselfishly volunteering my skills to my brothers in #Ukraine” pumping out parody tweets echoing the style of Canadian Ukrainian Volunteer’s exploits.
“Earlier I was struck directly with an 80mm mortar round, but it did not penetrate. #Russia can only dream of such equipment,” the joker account wrote in one post. “By now, you’ve probably heard, but I wanted to give you confirmation. I have recaptured Snake Island for #Ukraine. I will be selling #NFTs of my exploits in the coming days,” he wrote in another. “Disabled #Russian BTR-82 in Odessa. Thanks for playing, comrade,” the parody "volunteer" wrote in yet another post, adding a photo of a smashed up 1970s Volkswagen Beetle.
The "real" Canadian Ukrainian Volunteer was exposed as a fake after online sleuths paying close attention to his posts revealed that his weapons were just airsoft guns, and that his kit consisted of replicas.
Eventually, NexusIntel, an open-source intelligence expert, contacted the Twitter poster with a phishing link news story about other Canadians fighting in Ukraine that captures the IP address of those who click on it. “He clicked twice and then blocked me,” NexusIntel recalled in an interview with The Telegraph. The sleuth discovered that the brave volunteer was posting from Ontario, not Ukraine.
“The only truthful thing that he ever said was that he was Canadian, in my opinion,” NexusIntel said.
"Canadian Ukrainian Volunteer’s" motives remain unclear. What is evident is that he is far from the first social media "troll" pretending to be someone he’s not, somewhere he’s not, or something he’s not, with Western militaries, intelligence services, and even private companies known to have extensive tools to clandestinely manipulate social media using fake online personas to influence conversations on topics of interest.
Paired with the steady stream of fake news coming from mainstream media and government statements, online mis- and disinformation has generated a host of virally popular, but untrue, info, from the legendary (and as it turns out non-existent) "Ghost of Kiev" fighter ace, to the brave Ukrainian defenders of Zmeiny Island (Snake Island) who supposedly heroically laid down their lives after telling a Russian warship to “go f*ck itself,” to the MSM’s manipulation of the real-life Bucha massacre. For reasons political, financial, or personal, online disinformation has become a crucial factor in the ongoing crisis in Ukraine.