Global Courant 2023-05-05 03:51:22
As it happens5:52Finnish newspaper uses video game Counter-Strike to circumvent Russian censorship laws
Russians playing war games online may come across information about the very real war their country is waging in Ukraine.
A Finnish newspaper uses the popular video game Counter-Strike: Global Offensive to circumvent Russia’s propaganda laws that make it impossible to accurately report on the country’s war.
“You play a fictional war game and suddenly there’s a place where you find the raw reality of the world – that the war is actually very real and happening close by,” Helsingin Sanomat editor-in-chief Antero Mukka told me. As It Happens presenter Nil Köksal.
“It’s part of our message that you can’t shut down any society in the digital world, because (information) leaks anyway.”
Helsingin Sanomat launched its secret in-game bunker full of news on Monday, May 3, on the occasion of International Press Freedom Day.
Created by a Finnish newspaper, this secret room in Counter-Strike features headlines and photos about the war in Ukraine. (Helsin Sanomat/Reuters)
The news outlet has been covering the war since Russia first invaded the country in February 2022, Mukka says.
However, Russia is not calling it an invasion or war, but rather a “special military operation.” Media outlets that contradict that official state narrative are often blocked or shut down under state propaganda laws.
In response to the crackdown by the Russian media, Helsingin Sanomat began publishing many of his own stories about Ukraine in the Russian language. It wasn’t long before Russia caught on and restricted access to their website, Mukka said.
“Without some tricks you cannot access our website there in Russia. It is closed by the authorities,” he said. “But we found that online games… are still available and no one has banned them. So why don’t we try that channel? And it seems to be working. At least we hope so.”
A secret underground bunker
Counter-Strike is a hugely popular online first-person shooter.
Helsingin Sanomat has built a map in the game of an unspecified, war-torn Slavic city called de_voyna, referring to the Russian word voyna meaning war – drawing attention to the word being forbidden in the Ukrainian context.
When a player arrives at de_voyna, Mukka says that signage and other clues will lead him to a secret bunker in the basement of a large building.
Once there, they will find real photos of the war in Ukraine taken by the paper’s journalists, as well as headlines from Helsingin Sanomat about alleged Russian atrocities, including the discoveries of mass graves in Bucha and Irpin.
LOOK | War reporting from a video game:
Finnish newspaper uses video game to circumvent Russian press restrictions
Antero Mukka, editor-in-chief of Helsingin Sanomat, explains how the Finnish newspaper uses the first-person shooter Counter-Strike to circumvent Russian censorship laws and cover the war in Ukraine.
In addition, Mukka says, they learn about Russian casualties, which he believes will be relevant to Russian Counter-Strike players, many of whom are young men who could be mobilized or recruited into war.
“Russians also have (the) right to know, and I wish that they can read reliable information (and) make their own choices,” Mukka said.
“If it gets at least some Russians to think, maybe for a minute or two, about the direction their country is taking, then I think it’s worth it.”
Mukka said the newspaper did not cooperate with, or seek permission from, the game’s publisher, US-based Valve Corporation, to launch this campaign. Counter-Strike allows users to create their own content and add it to the platform.
CBC has reached out to Valve for comment.
Mukka says he’s not sure how many players, Russian or not, have visited the map so far. The paper’s editor-in-chief, Esa Makinin, told Reuters that the goal is to attract as many people as possible to the paper to entice their target audience.
“The Russians are a big group of Counter-Strike players and they are part of the global community, so we hope that when players start playing this map and it becomes popular within the Counter-Strike community, the Russians will know about it too and will start playing,’ he said.
Mukka says there are many unknowns. It is unclear whether Russia will try to restrict access to the game. And he’s also not sure if Russians who find the newspaper bunker will pay attention to what they see there.
“There are many people in Russian society who know what’s going on, but they want to close their eyes and ears because they don’t want any problems. They just want to go about their daily lives,” he said.
“And it could be the same situation or in Counter-Strike. But at least we tried.”
