A healthy respect for the free press and the institution of journalism is absolutely crucial for a healthy democracy. Media literacy matters, while a jaded “I don’t trust journalists, I do my own research” DIY attitude is easily co-opted.

A false claim that Vice President Kamala Harris was involved in a June 2011 hit-and-run incident that left a 13-year-old girl paralyzed was created by a Russian troll farm, according to a report released Tuesday by Microsoft.

The report by Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center said the fabricated story was created by a Kremlin-aligned group, dubbed Storm-1516, one of several Russian disinformation networks that Microsoft says is targeting the Harris-Walz campaign in the lead-up to November’s presidential election.

The hit-and-run claim surfaced in early September on a website masquerading as a local San Francisco news outlet named KBSF-TV. A five-minute video embedded in the article featured a woman speaking about the alleged incident. Microsoft’s report said the woman was a paid actor. The website was created on Aug. 20 and went offline days after it published the claims.

CBS News debunked the hit-and-run story when it first emerged; public records and news reports showed no evidence of the incident. The San Francisco Police Department told CBS News it did not have records of it. A CBS News analysis of a video that accompanied the article found it contained several photos from other unrelated news stories.

The story spread widely on social media; posts on X, formerly known as Twitter, that featured the article and video amassed more than 7 million views, and the story was also shared on Facebook, TikTok and YouTube. Pro-Russian channels on Telegram, the popular messaging app European officials are investigating for alleged criminal activity on the platform, also amplified the claims. —CBS News