In a disturbing convergence of grief and technology, Russian families are using artificial intelligence to create lifelike digital avatars of soldiers killed in Ukraine, in what experts describe as a state-sanctioned propaganda campaign. The phenomenon, dubbed 'digital resurrection' by tech ethicists, raises alarming questions about the weaponisation of bereavement and the erosion of reality in the information age.
The practice involves feeding photographs, videos, and voice recordings of deceased soldiers into generative AI models. These models then produce interactive avatars that can mimic the deceased's speech patterns, mannerisms, and even offer personalised messages to loved ones. The results are shared on social media platforms like VKontakte and Telegram, often accompanied by patriotic hashtags and government-linked accounts.
I spoke with Dr. Elena Morozova, a digital anthropologist at the University of Helsinki, who has been tracking this trend. 'This is not a grassroots movement,' she says. 'There is clear coordination. The state is exploiting the rawest of human emotions to manufacture consent for a war that is increasingly unpopular.' She notes that many of the videos feature scripted dialogues where the 'resurrected' soldiers express pride in their sacrifice and urge viewers to support the Kremlin.
From a technical perspective, these deepfakes are increasingly sophisticated. 'The AI models being used are not off-the-shelf,' explains Dmitri Vasiliev, a former Yandex engineer now exiled in Berlin. 'They are fine-tuned on thousands of hours of Russian speech data, likely with government backing. The voices are eerily accurate, down to the cadence and accent.' He adds that the technology can even simulate aging or changes in appearance, making the dead appear as though they have merely been away.
The ethical implications are profound. This is not just propaganda; it is a violation of digital sovereignty. These families are being monetised as propaganda tools without fully understanding the psychological impact. Critics warn that normalising digital resurrection could desensitise society to death and warfare, turning ultimate sacrifice into a mere plot point in a state narrative.
The Kremlin has not officially acknowledged the campaign, but state media has featured several such videos uncritically. A spokesperson for Russia's Ministry of Digital Development told me that they 'support technological innovation that honours the memory of heroes'. Human rights groups, however, condemn the practice as a form of psychological manipulation.
For the families involved, the line between comfort and coercion is blurry. Anastasia Petrova, whose son was killed near Bakhmut, described the experience to me as 'a miracle'. 'Misha came back to us through the screen. He told me not to cry, that he died for a just cause.' When I asked if she knew the video was fake, she paused. 'I know it's not really him. But it feels like him. Is that so wrong?'
This is the user experience of autocracy: a hyper-personalised interface that anticipates your grief and offers a placebo. But placebos stop working when you know they are placebos. Eventually, the illusion shatters, and the grief returns amplified. Meanwhile, the state has achieved its goal: you have internalised its narrative.
Silicon Valley moved fast and broke things, but it never dreamed of breaking the final boundary between life and death for political ends. As a technologist, I fear we are sleepwalking into a world where our memories are no longer ours. The dead deserve dignity, not deepfakes. And the living deserve truth, not a simulation of comfort.
The international community is only now waking up to this new front in information warfare. The EU is drafting legislation to ban the unauthorised use of deceased persons' images in AI-generated content, but enforcement will be nearly impossible. Russia is proving that the future of propaganda is not a lie you tell once, but a truth you tweak forever.
In the end, this story is not about AI. It is about power. The power to define memory, to shape grief, and to turn the ultimate sacrifice into a performance. As these digital spectres multiply across Russian social media, one question haunts me: when every dead soldier can be brought back to praise the war, who will be left to question it?
