Documents obtained by the University of Toronto's Citizen Lab indicate that BlackCore — which marketed itself as "an elite influence, cyber, and technology firm built for the modern era of information warfare" — trained Angolan government officials to run their own online influence operations. The programme was advertised as a four-week course in storytelling, copywriting, traffic management and social media operations; it ran 14 weeks and combined training with live operations, producing more than 40 pieces of content with at least 24 publications evaluated, plus Facebook and Instagram advertising and a TikTok campaign. At its centre was a Facebook page for a fictitious outlet, "Agita News." Screenshots in BlackCore's final report showed some deceptive posts reaching roughly 20,000 likes, later approaching 50,000, in a country with an estimated six million active Facebook users. France's interference watchdog Viginum has previously linked BlackCore to an operation against France Unbowed candidates and to suspected activity in New York, Scotland, Angola and Togo, and Meta disrupted a network it said originated in Israel and targeted Angola. Citizen Lab could not confirm the training took place or which officials attended, but called it "highly likely," and notes that training clients to run campaigns independently is historically a means of evading detection.

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