Stephanie Williams served as a senior official in the United Nations between 2018 and 2022. Her last post was as Special Adviser to the United Nations Secretary-General for Libya.
In this conversation, she reflects on how disinformation and digital manipulation have influenced one of the most intricate international mediation processes in recent years. Drawing on her experience leading the UN peace mission in Libya, Williams explains how online hate speech, disinformation, and foreign interference not only exacerbated divisions on the ground but also directly endangered women negotiators and peacebuilders.
She also describes how the UN mission responded to digital violence through direct collaboration with social media platforms and by organising online dialogues, an experience she recounts in her book Libya Since Qaddafi: Chaos and the Search for Peace.
How would you describe the political and social context in Libya when you first arrived as a UN mediator?
The country emerged from 42 years of authoritarian rule in 2011, when Muammar Qaddafi was ousted following a popular uprising. During the four decades of his capricious and violent rule, the government tightly controlled information. There was absolutely no freedom of expression, speech, or assembly. Following Qaddafi’s overthrow, the population went from zero freedom of expression to complete, untethered, unfettered freedom. It was, of course, a remarkable transformation as Libyans finally found their voices: many Libyan media outlets emerged—radio stations, newspapers, television channels.
During the Arab Spring, of which Libya was a part and parcel, the uprisings were to a great extent organised online. I was on the other side of the Arab world, in the tiny island nation of Bahrain, where social media also energised the short-lived uprising there. In general, during that tumultuous period in the region, the internet became a massive engine of mobilisation. The same happened in Libya, and the trend continued after Qaddafi’s overthrow, mainly for the better, but in some cases for the worse, as anyone could create and edit news or shape public opinion.
How did social media change the conflict dynamics in Libya?
Social media became a double-edged sword as the Libyan conflict evolved. The platform that thrived in Libya—and continues to thrive—is Facebook. There are more Facebook accounts in Libya than there are people. After Qaddafi’s ouster, things did not go as envisioned: Libya began to fracture and then descended into armed conflict. There are many reasons for that devolution, but one of them was the use of social media to divide the population and to spread incitement to violence through the use of hate speech.
After 2011, Libya went through two civil wars: one in 2014 and another between 2019 and 2020, the latter being the one I witnessed. In this most recent conflict, it often felt as though the war was unfolding as much online as on the physical battlefield, with polarising rhetoric, hate speech, and narratives of “otherness.” The dehumanisation of the “enemy” made it extremely difficult for us, as the United Nations mission, to promote dialogue.
From our position, we strongly opposed hate speech and sought to collaborate with various media outlets. We brought together some of the leading influencers to encourage them to moderate their tone, with mixed results. Still, it was impossible to get media figures from opposing sides into the same room because the fighting on the ground was too intense.
It was during this period, when I served as the United Nations’ lead mediator, that digital violence became most dangerous.
Social media became a double-edged sword as the Libyan conflict evolved. It was used to divide the population and to spread incitement to violence with hate speech
What other challenges did you encounter regarding disinformation?
A significant challenge was external interference. Most observers are aware that countries deployed mercenaries and supplied weapons in blatant violation of the UN Arms Embargo. Still, certain foreign capitals also employed electronic armies and coordinated disinformation campaigns. For instance, when General Haftar launched his surprise attack on Tripoli in April 2019, there was a significant (dis)information component attached to it to make his attack appear a fait accompli, even though it faced significant resistance.
After the cessation of hostilities and the ceasefire, the latter of which I mediated in October 2020, we moved to political talks under the umbrella of the internationally blessed Berlin Process. It was during the political negotiations that we saw the most immediate and personal digital harm caused by disinformation and hate speech. Women participants, in particular, became the primary targets of online abuse, character assassination, and intimidation.
In fact, violence against women in Libya had already manifested itself earlier.
Before 2019, several prominent Libyan activists, politicians, and parliamentarians had already been targeted. A preeminent female human rights activist, Salwa Bugaighis, was killed in 2014 in Benghazi, at the time of the parliamentary elections. Legislator Fariha Berkawi was also killed in Derna in the summer of 2014. In July 2019, during the height of that civil war, Seham Sergiwa, a parliamentarian from Benghazi, was forcibly disappeared. She had been outspoken in her criticism of the use of military force; she was very brave. One night, after expressing what I would call mild criticism of General Haftar’s forces on television, masked men raided her home in Benghazi and abducted her. She has never been seen again.
So, there was already this climate of fear. And then, when we began the political talks in November 2020, we gathered all of the Libyan participants —17 of whom were women— outside of the country, because conditions inside the country were still too fragile. Naturally, the female participants were concerned about their safety.
How did the attacks against women take place in the digital sphere?
Almost immediately, the women delegates started to be targeted on Facebook. It began with the creation of fake Facebook pages meant not only to publicly shame them for their political participation, but also to intimidate them and their families.
One of the steps we took to counter this was to create a trusted relationship with Facebook. By then, it was well known that disinformation had played a role in fuelling conflicts, for example, in Myanmar, so Facebook was sensitive to this phenomenon. Libya was not a massive market for the company — only 7 million people — but Facebook was aware of the negative implications of its inaction in other instances, so when we flagged these false accounts, they took them down within 24 hours. That enabled us to keep the women in the room.
Women became the primary targets of online abuse, character assassination, and intimidation through false accounts in social media
However, while we were conducting the political mediation in November 2020, Hanan al-Barassi, another female activist in Benghazi, was gunned down in broad daylight for speaking out on social media, Haftar’s sons. Needless to say, it was a hazardous climate for women. We ended up losing one woman from the political dialogue—she withdrew. She was from Eastern Libya; I guess you can draw your own conclusions as to her reasons. It wasn’t my position to question her. You could see that all these women were under terrible pressure. Direct digital violence created fear among the participants in the political dialogue.
Was there also coordinated disinformation targeting the UN mediation itself?
During the first round of our political negotiations, a large-scale disinformation campaign took place, the origins and impact of which we did not understand at the time. We saw a lot of activity on social media but couldn’t tell where it was coming from.
It wasn’t until a month after that round of talks that we realised what had happened. A study by Stanford University’s Internet Observatory revealed that the Internet Research Agency, linked to the late Russian Wagner Group leader Yevgeny Prigozhin, had coordinated with electronic armies from the Middle East region to carry out a massive disinformation campaign against the UN mediation in Libya.
Prigozhin personally harassed me. As I describe in my book, the worst incident occurred in January 2022, when I visited Moscow. The Russian warlord — or someone impersonating him — appeared at my hotel with a group of cohorts and he followed me into the elevator. We didn’t realise what was going on until the next day, when photos were published online as part of a false story claiming I had struck a deal with Prigozhin. I was still in Moscow when the story broke, and it was genuinely frightening for me and my team, given what we knew of his brutality. The UN mission in Libya had already suffered violent attacks; three staff members had been killed in Benghazi in 2019 under still-murky circumstances.
The Stanford study noted that what was happening in Libya was part of a broader pattern also seen in Syria and Sudan. The report prompted Facebook to take down hundreds of pages linked to the operation.
Which technologies contributed most to promoting digital violence?
I think it’s now well established that disinformation campaigns, the use of algorithms, and the manipulation of social media were factors in Brexit; they were also a factor in the U.S. elections in 2016. So, it shouldn’t be any surprise that essentially some of the same or similar forces were applying the same methodology in the Libyan context.
Russia had a strong interest in Libya and was fully backing one side of the conflict — they had already supplied Haftar with weapons and mercenaries. The Russians were interested in producing an outcome that would not jeopardise their standing or interests on the ground in Libya and more broadly on the African continent. It wasn’t a big surprise, but the revelation reinforced our commitment and approach—or at least my approach—that the only way to combat this was to be completely transparent about the mediation process and the end goal to reassure the Libyans.
The only way to combat disinformation was to be completely transparent about the mediation process and the end goal to reassure the Libyans
You can see in the algorithms that people go down these rabbit holes and believe all kinds of conspiracy theories. It’s very hard to reach people whose primary source of information is social media and who reside in an echo chamber. It becomes an identity trait at some point: you create a new identity, or an added identity, complementary to your offline identity. Phones, computers, and any technology that enabled social media became weapons used by either side in the conflict.
How did your commitment to transparency translate into your mediation strategy?
The best disinfectant is sunlight, right? You just have to shine a light on what you’re doing, because if you’re not open and transparent and on the offensive rather than the defensive, you’re not really responding. So, we needed to become much more transparent and grew increasingly committed to what I’d call radical transparency.
It was quite a difficult conversation within the United Nations context, because — and I respect this — there is a great deal of caution. But I felt that the social media environment in Libya, including the foreign interference, was so aggressive that if we weren’t out there telling our story, others would — and it wouldn’t be the right one.
In this context, we organised digital dialogues — mainly with young people — to counter false narratives circulating on social media. We held five sessions over five months and conducted surveys to understand young people’s views on key issues, including elections, economic reform, militia disarmament, and human rights. This helped us counter widespread claims like, “You know, elections can’t be held in Libya — that’s just a Muslim Brotherhood thing.”
Through these exchanges, we quickly found that the vast majority of Libyans wanted elections, a change in the status quo, greater transparency in oil revenue management, accountability for human rights violations, and transitional justice. And all of this happened live, in Arabic, and outside the reach of the “Big Brothers” watching online.
These dialogues became hugely popular and even trended on social media. We used humour to connect with young audiences and show that their voices could be heard.
How did you expand that transparency during the political dialogue?
In February 2021, during our second political dialogue, I decided to broadcast most of it live. It was the post-pandemic period, and when the dialogues took place, people were still suffering from the aftereffects of COVID-19 — including its psychological impact — which made it even more critical to ensure maximum transparency in the room, allowing the Libyan public to witness what was happening, whether it was the voting process or the interviews with candidates for the unity government.
This experience confirmed my belief that any political or peace process must be inclusive. Of course, the preference of many countries — and of Libya’s political elite — is to keep negotiations behind closed doors. You know, five or three men meet in a smoke-filled room, and an agreement is reached, right? But I believed, and still do, that in places like Libya, the more inclusive peace is, the more likely it is to take root — or at least to have a real chance of doing so. Conversely, the more it becomes a simple division of spoils or a power-sharing deal, the more likely it is to slide back into violence.
Any peace process must be inclusive. We need greater inclusion of women, youth, and civil society. The more inclusive peace is, the more likely it is to take root
We need greater inclusion of women, youth, and civil society, as well as representatives of vulnerable groups — whether ethnic communities or tribes.
In this context of digital violence, is there room for hope?
My feeling is one of concern rather than optimism. During the Arab Spring, for example, social media was a major driver of mobilisation, but once a technology begins to be used positively, other forces soon arrive to sabotage and manipulate it.
Traditional institutions — whether democratically elected governments or the United Nations — are always at a disadvantage, trying to keep up with rapidly evolving technology. We are now witnessing the use of fake news even by prominent world leaders, such as President Trump, and disinformation has become normalised.
My question is: if the British voters had known how the Brexit campaign was being manipulated online, would they have made the same decisions? Democratically elected governments and responsible institutions tend to act cautiously. They will always be vulnerable because malicious actors will stay one step ahead, and they are willing to use the same tools without ethics. For them, morality doesn’t exist; the common good doesn’t exist.
We need to raise public awareness about how and why people are being manipulated online.
Photography
Acting Special Representative of the Secretary-General Stephanie Williams briefs the press during the fourth round of the 5+5 Libyan Joint Military Commission, Palais des Nations. 21 October 2020. Author: Violaine Martin (UN).