Information war in internet and Armenia
On October 13, 2006 a seminar called “Information war in internet and Armenia” was held in “Noravank” Foundation. In his welcoming speech the executive director of “Noravank” Foundation Gagik Harutyunyan stressed up the importance of the rising role of mass media and internet in public opinion shaping. In comparison with other sources of mass media, information is circulating very quickly through internet and in a long period of time is accessible to a large audience.
Since the Karabakh conflict has been initiated, Azerbaijan has been spreading internet propaganda against Armenia and Karabakh on state level, which has also become one of the most important issues of Azerbaijani society.
The main reporter, Samvel Martirosyan, pointed out that Azerbaijan works quite efficiently through news sites in the war against Armenia by means of its resources and associations, often turning to disinformation. It is proved by the fact that one of the Azerbaijani portals, Day.az, spreading disinformation, at present is considered to be one of the main and often visited sites in South Caucasus, which gives information on the region and even Armenian mass media makes use of it. The same strategy is also adopted through association-forums. It is noteworthy that Azerbaijani resources on Armenia and Karabakh are better available then the Armenian ones. Even in internet resources of encyclopedic significance Azerbaijan strives at having privilege over Armenia.
In information war against Armenia Azerbaijan also wildly uses hackering, which is directed at upsetting the competitor’s internet resources temporarily or once and forever, at which the Armenian party tries to resist.
Armenia’s efforts in this field of strategic importance are also important. “Deficiency” in internet propaganda in Armenia is conditioned by not sufficient level of development of internet and internet resources in general, not that sufficient work carried out by official press services, possession of not full information etc. Successful work of Armenian internet resources is in certain cases conditioned by the efforts of enthusiasts.
All the participants of the seminar agreed that for Armenia it was very urgent to work out a conception of information security a component part of which was internet information security.
