Disinformation campaigns targeting Hungarian opposition could be prelude to more intense Russian activity, expert says

A recently published article, attempting to discredit Péter Magyar, president of the opposition Tisza Party by alleging that he was involved in a smuggling operation from Ukraine to Great Britain, is indicative of yet another Russian-style disinformation campaign. However, the "revelation" fails to stand up to even the most basic scrutiny: the source cited, the European Center for Investigative Journalism (ECIJ), is most likely a fictitious organization.

The article, published on the website of the previously unknown ECIJ, claims that Péter Magyar's trip to Kyiv in July 2024 – when he delivered aid collected by residents of Budapest to a children's hospital damaged by a rocket attack – was just a cover. According to the article, which fails to provide any hard evidence, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky's circle "pinched" $16.7 million off a European loan program, and Péter Magyar then delivered this amount to London under the guise of his visit.

Telltale signs

Telex asked former national security officer and intelligence expert, Péter Buda, to analyze the text. In his opinion, there is no doubt the text is of a “conspiratory nature” written by fictional authors with the intention of misleading the public.

The expert identified several telltale signs:

• The organization with the impressive name of European Center for Investigative Journalism (ECIJ) claims to have been operating in Brussels since 2019, but according to the domain registration, the website was only created on January 20, 2026, and it has no previous digital footprint.
• While the article about Péter Magyar is 1,300 words long, the other articles on the site are only 300-400-word abstracts. It can be stated with a certainty of more than 90 percent that these were generated by artificial intelligence.
• Although the portal did not exist before its registration in late January, the articles on the home page were dated as having been published 3-6 months ago, whereas the system data shows that they were actually published in January.
• Anonymity is uncommon in investigative journalism, but in this case, the names of the authors were probably omitted due to fear of exposure.

Logical inconsistencies

Another thing Péter Buda pointed out was the absurdity of the story. It is unlikely that the Ukrainian leadership, with one of the most effective secret services in the world behind it, would entrust 1.5 million euros in cash to a Hungarian politician who is under the constant scrutiny of his country's government propaganda.

"Who would believe that the Ukrainians would – completely unnecessarily – put themselves in a position where they could be blackmailed by a foreign politician, to whom they even reveal that the money in question is from stolen EU funds, and what's more, by someone who is under the strictest surveillance by his own country?"

– the expert asked.

According to Péter Buda, the article also reveals that its creators have a Hungarian background and that it was not written as an investigative piece, but rather with the goal of discrediting someone.

• This is revealed in the fact that a supposedly Brussels-based English-language site cites a Hungarian-language Telex article as a source for an international event (the missile attack on Kyiv).
• The text does not present facts, but is aiming to provoke an emotional response in the reader (using phrases such as "undermines trust," "devastating effect"), which are textbook examples of character assassination.
• The authors even used the Russian narrative when referring to the rocket attack on the Kyiv hospital. The wording used was that "according to Ukrainian authorities" the attack was carried out by Russia even though there was international expert consensus about Russia having committed it.

Buda further says that since the piece doesn't stand up to even the most minimal standards of verification, the article is an example of a poorly executed disinformation operation. The expert believes that the sole purpose of such an operation is to confuse and discredit in the short term.

According to him, “this is the result of counter-selection: jobs like that, which are specifically aiming to politically discredit someone, are only taken on by those who are not good at anything else or who do not take even minimal pride in their work". The other reason is that the genre in question, i.e., black propaganda – when obvious falsehoods are being disseminated about someone – aim to influence readers as quickly and as effectively as possible.

Facts do not have absolute value here because the goal is to impact the masses, and the majority of the masses will not fact-check, the expert explained. It is enough to establish an impression and to trigger an emotional response. This requires catchy, easy-to-understand disinformation that the listener will find easy to imagine. For example, familiar names and places should be mentioned. According to Buda though, this must be skillfully done, because if there is too much information that can be debunked easily, the effect may diminish.

As Buda sees it, Russia's strategy is clearly focused on releasing more similar materials, which they intend to "flood" the public with. The question, according to the expert, is what they hope to achieve with this, because people will either lose interest in the constant stream of "revelations," or they will find it impossible to figure out what the truth is.

Incidentally, sloppy execution is not uncommon in Russian operations of this kind. Last year, there was a document circulating on Instagram, Telegram, TikTok, and X, which was released by a Russian hacker group. The forged document claimed to reveal a secret plan under which four allies – France, the United Kingdom, Poland, and Romania – would divide Ukraine's territory and natural resources among themselves. It also claimed that the Coalition of the Willing would even deploy up to 50,000 peacekeepers to the country.

Additionally, there was a map circulating online that supposedly showed the future "spheres of influence" in detail. However, the Russians who carried out this disinformation operation failed to pay attention to a number of minor details: the map was riddled with grammatical and spelling errors. For example, the definite article was missing from its title, which is a typical mistake made by Russian native speakers.

Moscow already made it clear last summer who it was siding with

The fact that the Russians are carrying out disinformation and influence operations targeting the Hungarian public is nothing new. Last August, the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) issued a statement claiming that the European Commission wanted to engineer a change of power in Hungary and would do everything in its power to replace Viktor Orbán with Péter Magyar.

The SVR's statement was picked up by the Hungarian state news agency (MTI) without any criticism or context, leading many to conclude that Moscow had thus entered the election campaign on the side of Fidesz. When we confronted MTI about this, they replied that Telex was jeopardising the country's sovereignty.

A little over a month later, Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the Russian Foreign Ministry cited an article published on the Hungarian pro-government Pesti Srácok website and accused Zelensky of ordering Ukrainians to carry out acts of sabotage in Romania and Poland so that they could blame them on Russia. The article published on Pesti Srácok referenced information supposedly originally published on Telegram. However, even after extensive research, we found no evidence that anyone had written anything about this, either on Telegram or elsewhere, prior to the publication of the article on Pesti Srácok.

Thus, while there have been clear signs of Russian disinformation operations being carried out with Hungarian backing, Viktor Orbán has continued to accuse Ukraine of wanting to interfere in the Hungarian elections. Regarding the latter point, Péter Buda emphasised that for years, the Hungarian Prime Minister has consistently avoided any mention of Russia's responsibility for the outbreak and continuation of the war that has been the most serious threat to European security since World War II.

"Viktor Orbán has been constantly lashing out at the party under attack and those rushing to its defense, but has never so much as uttered Putin's name. It is well-known – especially in our profession – that it is not only the communication of facts that is considered information, but also the failure to communicate them." The above, as well as the silence of the Hungarian authorities with regard to Russian interference in the Hungarian elections clearly indicates whose side the Hungarian government is on, not only in this war, but in general," writes the former national security chief, who recently suggested in his blog that the government's communications department is preparing additional smear campaigns.

Is what we are seeing now just the beginning?

According to Buda, the publication of smear pieces such as the one mentioned at the beginning of this article is rarely an isolated incident, but rather part of a deliberately constructed process. He said that the current "exposé" may simply be preparing the ground for much more aggressive intervention.

Buda noted that the essence of this strategy is the blurring of lines. If disinformation campaigns succeed in irrevocably linking the Hungarian opposition and Ukraine in the eyes of the public, it will pave the way for the next phase: false flag operations.

Buda doesn’t even rule out the possibility of a future attack against a Hungarian facility or critical infrastructure, with the blame then being placed on Ukraine. Since the opposition will by then have been labeled as “pro-Ukrainian,” such an incident could indirectly be used to discredit them as well.

"One shouldn’t envision monumental destruction here; in the Hungarian context, even a smaller, well-timed operation would be able to cause political upheaval," the expert stated.

It was during our interview with Péter Buda, that the news broke that several Hungarian schools and government offices had received bomb threats written in Ukrainian. Péter Buda emphasized that while defamatory articles are often produced in local "workshops", physical sabotage or more serious attempts at influencing are much more likely to be carried out with the backing of the Russian secret services. He pointed out that both historically and in the present day, Russian services have proven time and again that they will stop at nothing to influence a country's election results or its domestic political stability.

Buda believes that in the event of a change of government, the most important question in this environment will be how much public legitimacy the next government will have and how quickly it will be able to regain the trust of Western allies. "With a strong mandate from society and serious Western backing, such operations could backfire, given that the swaying of public opinion would require the use of more serious measures, which would be more difficult to carry out against the backdrop of Western intelligence support. In addition, there would be greater pressure placed on Hungarian political forces which may have an interest in these operations," said Péter Buda.

According to the expert, following a potential change of government, there will be greater scope for such operations if political stability and, consequently, a change in political direction are delayed. This is because they can then be carried out less expensively and under circumstances that are easier from a counterintelligence perspective, thereby increasing the potential for a return on investment.