Cyabra: Nepal 2025 Gen Z Uprising & Info Warfare Analysis

Section 1: Executive Summary

The September 2025 uprising in Nepal, which resulted in the collapse of the government, was a watershed moment in the nation’s political history. This report provides a comprehensive analysis of the event, arguing that while the immediate trigger was a government-imposed ban on social media, the revolution was the inevitable culmination of deep-seated socio-economic despair, systemic political corruption, and a profound generational disconnect. The unrest, which claimed at least 72 lives and left over 2,100 injured, was not merely a protest but a national reckoning that exposed the fragility of the Nepali state.

A central finding of this analysis, based on a forensic examination of social media discourse by the threat intelligence company Cyabra, is the critical role of information warfare in the crisis. A genuinely authentic, youth-led movement was systematically targeted and dangerously radicalized by a sophisticated, coordinated inauthentic campaign. This network of fake profiles, comprising as much as 34% of the conversation on key platforms like X, amplified the most violent and incendiary narratives, achieving a staggering potential reach of over 326 million views and successfully goading authentic users into over 164,000 interactions. This activity acted as a violence accelerator, hijacking authentic outrage and steering the movement towards chaos and destruction.

The primary implications of this revolution are multifaceted and far-reaching. The fall of the Oli government and the installation of a fragile interim administration under former Chief Justice Sushila Karki have ushered in a period of profound political uncertainty. The event has heightened geopolitical sensitivity, given Nepal’s strategic position between India and China, particularly in light of documented U.S. funding for youth political mobilization programs in the years prior. Furthermore, the uprising has established a new, potent, and replicable playbook for digitally-native dissent across South Asia, following similar youth-led government overthrows in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.

This report concludes with a series of strategic recommendations for key stakeholders. For the government of Nepal, the path to stability requires urgent and tangible institutional reform, a fundamental shift in economic policy to address youth aspirations, and the development of a sophisticated crisis communication strategy that forsakes information blackouts. For technology platforms, the crisis is an indictment of their failure to curb coordinated inauthentic behavior, necessitating heavy investment in proactive detection and local compliance. Finally, the international community must re-evaluate its engagement, shifting its focus from funding political mobilization to strengthening core governance institutions, thereby fostering genuine, long-term resilience against both internal decay and external manipulation.

Section 2: Anatomy of a Generational Reckoning: The Nepal Uprising of September 2025

The events of September 2025 were not a spontaneous or isolated incident. They were a predictable eruption fueled by years of accumulated pressure, where a disconnected political elite governed a desperate and digitally-native generation. The social media ban was merely the spark that ignited a tinderbox of long-standing grievances.

2.1 The Tinderbox: Decades of Disillusionment

The foundation of the Gen Z Revolution was laid over decades of political failure and economic stagnation that created an environment of pervasive hopelessness, particularly for the nation’s youth.

Economic Stagnation and Youth Despair

Nepal’s economic model has been one of managed decline rather than dynamic growth, creating a desperate environment for its younger generation. Youth unemployment reached a critical level of nearly 20% in 2024, with a staggering 30% of young people classified as not in employment, education, or training (NEET). With a per capita income of just $1,447 in 2024, the prospects for a stable future within the country were bleak for many.

This reality forced the country into a heavy dependence on remittances, which constituted between a quarter and a third of the nation’s GDP. This economic structure is more accurately described as a system of “exporting people” for survival rather than a strategy for transformative development. The scale of this exodus is stark: on average, more than 2,000 young Nepalis were leaving the country every single day to find work in the Gulf and Southeast Asia. This mass migration occurred even as families made significant investments in education, creating a generation of educated but chronically underemployed youth whose aspirations were systematically frustrated. The national economic model, therefore, created the very conditions for the revolution it was meant to prevent. By relying on mass youth migration, the state made digital communication platforms an essential lifeline for maintaining family ties. The subsequent ban on these platforms was not just a political act but a direct attack on the core social and emotional coping mechanism of the remittance economy, turning what was once a safety valve into a pressure cooker.

Political Sclerosis and Systemic Corruption

Parallel to the economic decay was a complete erosion of public trust in the political establishment. For years, Nepali politics was dominated by a “game of musical chairs” between three aging leaders: K.P. Sharma Oli, Sher Bahadur Deuba, and Pushpa Kamal Dahal. This constant rotation of the same figures, with the country cycling through 13 different governments since the monarchy’s abolition in 2008, fostered a deep-seated cynicism and a belief that the political class was entirely self-serving and disconnected from the populace.

Rampant corruption and nepotism were not abstract problems but a lived reality for most citizens, destroying faith in state institutions. This simmering anger found a potent and visible target in the viral #NepoKids social media trend. This online movement, which contrasted the lavish lifestyles of politicians’ children—flaunting designer goods and luxury holidays—with the daily struggles of ordinary people, served as a powerful catalyst for the physical protests. The #NepoKids trend was more than a hashtag; it represented a strategic intelligence failure for the government. It was a clear, public signal of rising, specific, and targeted youth anger, demonstrating a capacity for coordinated online mobilization. The government’s decision to implement the social media ban precisely as this trend was peaking indicates a gross miscalculation; it was perceived as a direct attempt to silence this specific and deeply embarrassing critique, transforming a latent digital threat into an active, physical one.

The Unfulfilled Promise of Revolution

The 2025 uprising must also be understood within a historical context of betrayal. The movement drew on a deep well of disillusionment from nearly two decades prior, following the end of the Maoist civil war and the abolition of the monarchy. That period had promised a radical transformation of Nepali society but failed to deliver meaningful change. A key factor in this failure was the Maoist leadership’s strategic decision to pursue a capitalist economic model first, delaying socialist goals. This was seen as a “profound miscalculation” that led to ideological compromise, political co-optation, and the continuation of the very patronage politics the revolution was meant to end. For Gen Z, who grew up in the shadow of these broken promises, the political system was not just corrupt but fundamentally illegitimate.

2.2 The Spark: The Profound Miscalculation of a Social Media Ban

On September 4, 2025, the government of Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli made a fateful decision, ordering a ban on 26 social media and messaging platforms, including global giants like Facebook, X (formerly Twitter), Instagram, and WhatsApp. The official justification was regulatory: the companies had failed to comply with local registration laws mandated by a Supreme Court order, which required them to establish local offices and appoint grievance officers.

This move, however, was perceived by Nepal’s youth not as a technical or legal matter, but as a direct and profound assault on their core existence. For a generation where nearly half the population grew up using social media, these platforms were the primary space for expression, communication, political discourse, and economic activity. The ban was interpreted as an attack on their freedom, their livelihoods, and their very “dignity”. The government’s action demonstrated a baffling and ultimately fatal disconnect from the realities of modern Nepali life. Social media was integral not only to the gig economy and small businesses but also to maintaining the familial bonds that the state’s own economic policies had stretched across continents.

2.3 The Inferno: A Chronology of Collapse (September 8-12, 2025)

The government’s miscalculation ignited a firestorm that consumed the state within a week.

• September 8: The protests began peacefully in Kathmandu. Organized by youth-led civil society groups like Hami Nepal using platforms that had complied with registration, such as TikTok and Viber, and censorship-resistant tools like Discord, thousands gathered with slogans like “End corruption, not the internet”. The peaceful demonstration was short-lived. The situation escalated dramatically when security forces responded with disproportionate force, deploying tear gas, water cannons, rubber bullets, and ultimately, live ammunition against protesters near the Parliament building. The killing of at least 19 young people on this first day was a point of no return.

It transformed a protest against censorship into a revolution against the state itself, creating a pantheon of “martyrs” for the cause. That same evening, the Home Minister resigned, signaling the first crack in the government’s authority.

• September 9: The news of the killings unleashed a wave of fury across the nation. The protests, now swelled by enraged citizens from all walks of life, exploded into widespread violence. Mobs descended on the homes of current and former government officials, in many cases burning them to the ground. The core symbols of state power—Parliament, the Supreme Court, and the Singha Durbar ministry complex—were stormed, vandalized, and set ablaze. In a stunning collapse of state control, police forces withdrew from the streets of Kathmandu, leading to a state of near-anarchy marked by widespread looting, vandalism, and jailbreaks. In a remarkable display of tactical ingenuity, protesters used drones to disrupt operations at Tribhuvan International Airport, effectively trapping government officials in the country.
• September 10-12: The Nepal Army was deployed to restore order, and a curfew was imposed in Kathmandu and other cities. However, the government’s authority had irrevocably shattered. Under overwhelming pressure, Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli resigned. By September 12, with the halls of government still smoldering, a new path forward emerged. Sushila Karki, a 73-year-old former Supreme Court Chief Justice widely respected for her integrity, was selected as the nation’s interim Prime Minister. Her selection was driven in part by a remarkable youth-led online voting process conducted on the Discord platform, bypassing traditional political horse-trading entirely.

The speed of the government’s collapse was astonishing, revealing not just an unpopular regime but a hollowed-out state. A stable, albeit disliked, government can typically withstand days or weeks of protest. The fact that the Nepali state apparatus—from the police who vanished from the streets to the Prime Minister who resigned within 48 hours of the first major clash—disintegrated so rapidly suggests that its legitimacy and institutional resilience were already critically low. The protests did not simply defeat the government; they exposed its authority as a facade, lacking the deep institutional and popular support required to survive a genuine crisis.

Section 3: The Digital Battlefield: A Forensic Analysis of Cyabra’s Findings

The Nepal uprising was a quintessential hybrid event, where street protests and digital information warfare were inextricably linked. While the grievances were authentic, the online conversation was heavily manipulated by a sophisticated network of inauthentic actors. The analysis conducted by Cyabra provides a forensic look into the mechanics of this manipulation, revealing a deliberate strategy to amplify violence and accelerate chaos.

3.1 The Ghost in the Machine: Quantifying the Inauthentic Network

Cyabra’s analysis of social discourse across X, Facebook, and TikTok during the protests uncovered a massive and highly impactful network of fake profiles operating within the authentic conversation. The scale and influence of this network were substantial.

• Scale of Infiltration: A significant portion of the online discourse was driven by these inauthentic actors. On the platform X, which served as a key hub for political discussion, a remarkable 34% of the profiles participating in the conversation were identified as fake. Across the broader analysis, Cyabra noted that “nearly one-third” of all profiles involved were inauthentic, indicating a systemic and widespread campaign. This figure represents a new threshold for hybrid social movements. When a third of the actors in a conversation are artificial, they are no longer mere background noise; they become a core component of the information ecosystem itself, fundamentally altering its dynamics.
• Disproportionate Reach: The content disseminated by these fake profiles achieved a disproportionately large impact. Cyabra estimates that their posts reached over 326 million potential views, ensuring that the narratives they amplified were seen far and wide.
• Successful Engagement: The network was highly effective at deceiving real users. The “thousands of inauthentic accounts” successfully generated more than 164,000 interactions (likes, comments, shares) from authentic profiles. This demonstrates a high level of sophistication, as the network was able to not only inject its messaging but also elicit genuine engagement, thereby laundering its influence through real people.

The following table summarizes the key metrics of this inauthentic campaign, illustrating the magnitude of the digital manipulation.

Table 1: Key Metrics from the Cyabra Report on Inauthentic Activity

Metric	Value	Source(s)
Percentage of Fake Profiles (on X)	34%
Total Potential Reach of Inauthentic Content	326 Million Views
Interactions Generated from Authentic Profiles	164,000+
Key Amplified Hashtags	#NepalProtest, #GenZProtest, #SocialMediaBan, #EnoughIsEnough, #September8, #WakeUpNepal
Primary Platforms Analyzed	X (Twitter), Facebook, TikTok

3.2 Tactics of Digital Manipulation

The effectiveness of the inauthentic network stemmed from its sophisticated tactics, which were designed to evade detection and maximize influence.

• Seamless Integration: The report stresses that these were not crude, easily identifiable bots. The fake profiles “blended seamlessly with authentic voices,” mimicking the language, tone, and behavior of genuine protesters to build trust and avoid suspicion. For the average participant in the online conversation, this seamless integration made it functionally impossible to distinguish an authentic peer from a malicious actor, creating a state of “epistemic collapse” where the origin of a message became irrelevant compared to its emotional resonance.
• Strategic Hashtag Amplification: The network did not attempt to create its own trends. Instead, it hijacked the organic hashtags of the movement, such as #NepalProtest and #GenZProtest, to inject its content directly into the most active and visible conversational streams.
• Authentic Engagement Simulation: To further enhance their perceived legitimacy, the fake profiles actively engaged with real users. They would comment on authentic posts and participate in discussions, building a history of seemingly organic interaction before pushing their own amplified narratives.
• Cross-Platform Coordination: The operation was not confined to a single platform. While X had the highest concentration of fake accounts, Cyabra identified coordinated activity spanning TikTok and Facebook as well. This created a powerful multi-platform echo chamber, reinforcing the amplified messages across different user bases and digital environments.
• Use of AI-Generated Imagery: A novel and complicating factor was the use of AI-generated visuals. Both authentic protesters and the inauthentic network used AI-generated images of demonstrations to enhance the appeal and reach of their posts. This dual-use of synthetic media presents a critical turning point and a verification nightmare. It normalizes the presence of AI content within protest movements, making it impossible for observers to dismiss a piece of media simply because it is synthetic. The challenge shifts from identifying fake media to identifying the intent—legitimate mobilization or malicious disinformation—behind its creation and dissemination.

3.3 Narrative Warfare: Amplifying Violence

The core strategy of the inauthentic network was not to invent new grievances but to selectively amplify the most extreme elements within the existing, authentic discourse. Cyabra identified three dominant narratives driven by genuine users: 1) the protest as a youth-led democratic struggle, 2) outrage over police brutality and state repression, and 3) a crisis of political leadership demanding the government’s resignation.

The fake profiles surgically targeted these conversations, “picking and choosing some of the most aggressive and violent narratives” and ensuring they gained disproportionate visibility. This network acted as a “violence accelerator,” exploiting the state’s initial blunders to guarantee a chaotic outcome. The protests began peacefully on September 8, but the dynamic shifted irrevocably after the police responded with lethal force, killing 19 youths. It was at this precise moment of authentic shock and rage that the inauthentic network became most active, amplifying calls for retribution and violence. The state’s actions provided the spark of genuine anger; the network’s role was to ensure that spark ignited an uncontrollable inferno, hijacking the narrative away from reform and towards pure destruction.

3.4 The Broader Infodemic: Beyond Cyabra’s Scope

The coordinated campaign identified by Cyabra did not operate in a vacuum. It thrived within a wider, chaotic information environment saturated with misinformation from a variety of sources. Reports from the period document a deluge of false and misleading content, including geographically misattributed videos from other countries presented as events in Nepal, wildly exaggerated casualty claims, miscontextualized videos of military movements that fueled rumors of a coup, and polarizing religious misinformation designed to incite sectarian conflict.

Nepal’s fact-checking organizations were completely overwhelmed, struggling to debunk emotionally charged viral claims that spread panic and deepened social divisions.

This chaotic “infodemic” degraded the public’s ability to discern truth from fiction, making them more susceptible to the targeted, strategically amplified narratives pushed by the sophisticated inauthentic network that Cyabra uncovered.

Reshaping a Nation: Political, Social, and Economic Implications

The Gen Z Revolution has irrevocably altered Nepal’s trajectory. In the span of a single week, it dismantled the existing political order and unleashed powerful new social forces. The immediate consequences are clear, but the long-term implications for the nation’s governance, social fabric, and economy remain deeply uncertain.

A New Political Chapter, An Uncertain Future

The most direct outcome of the uprising was the complete toppling of the government. The resignation of Prime Minister K.P. Sharma Oli and the dissolution of his coalition represented a stunning victory for the protesters. The subsequent installation of an interim government, led by the respected former Chief Justice Sushila Karki and tasked with guiding the country to snap elections in March 2026, marked the beginning of a new political chapter.

However, this new chapter is fraught with peril. The interim government faces the monumental challenge of rebuilding public trust, restoring basic state functions, and navigating a volatile political transition with a populace whose expectations have been radically heightened. The fundamental question that looms over Nepal is whether this revolution will catalyze genuine, systemic change or simply fade into another chapter in the country’s long history of political instability. Leaderless, spontaneous movements, while powerful in their ability to disrupt, often struggle to translate street power into durable political reform and risk fragmentation or co-optation by old elites.

A critical element of this new political landscape is the radical experiment in techno-populist governance that led to Karki’s selection. The use of Discord, a platform primarily associated with gaming communities, to crowdsource and vote on a new national leader is an unprecedented circumvention of traditional political processes. While this demonstrates a powerful form of direct, digital democracy born from a total loss of faith in existing institutions, it also raises perilous questions about legitimacy, security, and scalability. This act has created a new, informal source of political authority in Nepal that exists entirely outside constitutional frameworks, posing a significant long-term challenge to institutional stability.

A Generational Rupture and the New Social Contract

The events of September 2025 represent more than a change in government; they signify a landmark in Nepal’s democratic evolution and a definitive generational rupture. The uprising was a forceful rejection of a political culture long defined by impunity, dynastic privilege, and unfulfilled promises. Nepal’s youth, previously dismissed as politically apathetic, have demonstrated their capacity to set the national agenda and are no longer a force on the margins of power.

This has fundamentally altered the social contract in Nepal. The revolution was primarily about shifting the “moral habitus” regarding government practices—a deep-seated demand for accountability and transparency. However, the path from this moral awakening to tangible reform is long and difficult. There is a significant risk of widespread disillusionment if the high hopes for a new, cleaner future are not met with concrete action against the corruption and clientelism that are deeply embedded in Nepali society. Changing laws is one thing; changing a deeply ingrained culture of patronage is a monumental challenge for the new administration and for Nepali society as a whole.

Economic Fallout and the Path to Recovery

The immediate economic consequences of the revolution were severe. The widespread destruction of public and private property, including key government buildings, police stations, and commercial establishments like the Hilton hotel in Kathmandu, will likely result in billions of dollars in damages. This devastation, coupled with the image of instability, poses a serious threat to Nepal’s vital tourism sector and may discourage much-needed foreign investment.

More importantly, the core economic grievances that fueled the protests—high unemployment, systemic inequality, and rising inflation—remain unaddressed. These issues represent the most significant and immediate challenge for the interim government. Any path to long-term stability must involve a fundamental rethinking of Nepal’s economic vision. A sustainable future cannot be built on the precarious foundation of remittances. It will require a genuine social democratic program focused on developing domestic industry, creating meaningful employment opportunities for its educated youth, and ensuring that the country’s resources benefit the many, not just a privileged few. The success of the revolution may have inadvertently made this task harder. In succeeding by exposing the weakness of the state, the movement also participated in the physical and symbolic destruction of its core institutions. The interim government must now attempt to govern without the full authority or infrastructure of the very institutions that were just proven to be so fragile, creating a power vacuum that could make sustainable governance and economic recovery even more difficult to achieve.

The Geopolitical Chessboard: External Influence and Regional Dynamics

The Nepal uprising cannot be fully understood through a purely domestic lens. The nation’s strategic geography, the documented influence of external actors, and its place within a broader regional trend of youth-led political upheaval all contribute to a complex geopolitical picture with significant implications for South Asian stability.

The Great Game: Nepal Between India and China

Nepal’s position as a strategic buffer state nestled between the regional giants of India and China ensures that any internal instability has immediate and significant geopolitical repercussions. Both powers view Nepal as critical to their security and regional influence.

For India, a stable Nepal is essential. The open border and deep cultural ties mean that instability can easily spill over, while political chaos in Kathmandu threatens critical Indian access corridors and creates a potential vacuum that Beijing could exploit. India’s response to the crisis was accordingly cautious, consisting of official advisories for its nationals and an increase in border security, reflecting a desire to monitor the situation without being seen to interfere.

For China, the unrest creates uncertainty for its strategic investments under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), which are a key component of its regional strategy. A change in government and a period of instability could jeopardize these projects and complicate Beijing’s efforts to draw Nepal further into its sphere of influence.

The Washington Connection: Funding, Influence, and Perception

The geopolitical context is further complicated by documented evidence of United States government funding for youth political mobilization programs in Nepal in the years leading up to the revolution. Internal records from the International Republican Institute (IRI), an organization funded by the U.S. National Endowment for Democracy (NED), detail a $350,000 program named “Yuva Netritwa” (Youth Leadership) that ran from 2021 to 2022.

The program’s stated objectives were explicit: to train and mobilize young Nepalis in political advocacy, protest strategies, and the use of digital tools to “put pressure on Nepali political decision-makers”. Crucially, the program’s internal documents framed this mobilization within a geopolitical context, with the expressed goal of enabling these youth networks to counter the influence of India and China in Nepal.

While this documentation does not constitute proof that the U.S. directly orchestrated the 2025 revolution, it is a critical and undeniable piece of the puzzle. It establishes that Washington was actively cultivating the exact type of youth activist networks that ultimately led the uprising, and that it did so with clear geopolitical aims. This fact, when viewed alongside the findings of the Cyabra report, creates a combustible geopolitical narrative. The identification of a massive, sophisticated social media manipulation campaign by Cyabra, an Israeli company, coupled with the evidence of U.S.-funded protest training, will not be seen as a coincidence by rival powers. For Beijing, and even for a wary partner like New Delhi, the sequence of events will almost certainly be interpreted as a U.S.-backed hybrid operation designed to engineer regime change in a strategic buffer state. The perception of such an operation, regardless of its veracity, could be as geopolitically destabilizing as the reality, likely prompting strategic countermeasures from China and India.

A South Asian Wave: A New Playbook for Dissent

The Nepal uprising is not an isolated phenomenon. It is the third violent overthrow of a government by a youth-led movement in South Asia in just four years, following the “Aragalaya” protests in Sri Lanka and the student-led movement in Bangladesh. This pattern suggests the emergence of a new regional playbook for dissent.

A comparative analysis of these events reveals a striking set of commonalities. Each movement was youth-driven, digitally organized, and fueled by a deep-seated anger at systemic corruption, economic failure, and an entrenched, aging political elite out of touch with youth aspirations. They share common tactics, including decentralized organizing and hashtag campaigns, and a focus on broad socioeconomic grievances that allows them to build wide coalitions that transcend traditional ethnic or religious fault lines.

This “South Asian Wave” is more than just youth anger; it represents a systemic failure of the post-conflict or post-authoritarian political settlements across the region. In Nepal, Sri Lanka, and Bangladesh, the political systems that emerged from previous eras of turmoil failed to deliver good governance or economic opportunity. The children of these flawed transitions, who have no memory of past conflicts but live with the consequences of a broken peace, are now demanding a generational reckoning.

The following table provides a systematic comparison of these three landmark events, highlighting both the unique local triggers and the overarching regional trends.

Table 2: Comparative Analysis of Recent South Asian Youth-Led Uprisings

Feature	Nepal	Sri Lanka	Bangladesh
Primary Trigger	Social Media Ban	Economic Collapse / Debt Default	Discriminatory Job Quotas
Core Grievances	Corruption, Nepotism, Unemployment	Corruption, Economic Mismanagement	Authoritarianism, Police Brutality
Key Digital Tactics	Discord/TikTok organizing, #NepoKids hashtag	Facebook Live, WhatsApp coordination	Student-led online campaigns
Defining Characteristic	Infiltration by inauthentic network amplifying violence	Broad-based, middle-class participation	Student-led movement escalating to general uprising
Outcome	PM Resignation, Interim Gov’t	President Fled & Resigned, PM Replaced	PM Resigned & Fled, Interim Gov’t
Source(s)

Section 6: Strategic Recommendations: Mitigating Future Crises and Fostering Resilience

The Nepal Gen Z Revolution serves as a stark warning of the consequences of ignoring youth grievances in a digitally interconnected age. Preventing a recurrence of such a crisis requires a concerted, multi-stakeholder effort focused on addressing root causes, building institutional resilience, and adapting to the new realities of the information environment.

6.1 For the Government of Nepal and Future Administrations

The primary responsibility for ensuring long-term stability lies with the Nepali state. The following reforms are essential:

• Institutional Reform and Anti-Corruption: The core grievance of the protests was systemic corruption. Future governments must move beyond rhetoric and establish a truly independent anti-corruption commission with prosecutorial power and constitutional protection. Implementing radical transparency laws that mandate the public declaration of assets for all elected officials and their immediate families is a necessary first step to rebuilding trust.
• Youth Engagement and Economic Policy: The state must create meaningful channels for youth participation. This includes establishing a National Youth Council with real budgetary authority and a direct advisory role to the Prime Minister’s office, and scaling up successful models of local youth engagement. Critically, economic policy must pivot from its dangerous over-reliance on remittances towards domestic job creation. This requires strategic investment in sectors with high potential for youth employment, such as technology, sustainable agriculture, and high-value tourism.
• Crisis Communication and Information Strategy: The 2025 crisis demonstrated that information blackouts are a catalyst for chaos, not a tool of control. The government must establish a permanent, multi-agency crisis communication unit tasked with disseminating rapid, verified, and transparent information during periods of unrest. This is the only effective way to counter the misinformation vacuum that allows malicious actors to thrive.
• Security Sector Reform: The police’s use of lethal force on the first day of protests was the primary accelerant of the revolution. A comprehensive reform of the security sector is non-negotiable. This must include retraining police forces in modern, non-lethal crowd control and de-escalation techniques, establishing clear and strict rules of engagement benchmarked to international human rights standards, and creating a fully independent body to investigate and prosecute abuses by security personnel.

6.2 For Civil Society, Media, and Academia

Non-governmental actors have a crucial role to play in building societal resilience against the forces that led to the 2025 crisis.

• Scale Up Digital and Media Literacy: The primary long-term defense against the type of manipulation identified by Cyabra is a resilient and critical populace. Civil society organizations, with support from international partners, must launch nationwide, sustained media and information literacy campaigns. These programs should be integrated into the national education curriculum and tailored to reach youth in the digital spaces they inhabit.
• Strengthen the Fact-Checking Ecosystem: Nepal’s independent fact-checking organizations must be strengthened with increased funding, training, and technological resources. Building collaborative networks that allow these groups to share information and rapidly debunk the most harmful forms of malinformation during a crisis is essential.
• Promote Responsible Crisis Journalism: The media’s performance during the crisis was deeply flawed, often amplifying political rhetoric and misinformation while ignoring the human stories of victims. News organizations must recommit to the core principles of journalism: prioritize verification over speed, actively work to counter false narratives, and center the voices of those most affected by the crisis.

6.3 For Technology Platforms (Meta, X, TikTok, etc.)

The global technology companies whose platforms were the battlefield for this crisis bear significant responsibility and must take proactive steps.

• Proactive Detection of Coordinated Inauthentic Behavior: The presence of a 34% inauthentic actor share on X represents an unacceptable failure of platform integrity. Platforms must invest heavily in AI detection systems and local-language human moderation teams specifically trained to identify and neutralize the sophisticated “seamless blending” and “authentic engagement simulation” tactics used in Nepal.
• Transparent and Compliant Local Operations: The failure of major platforms to comply with Nepal’s reasonable registration laws provided the government with the pretext for its disastrous blanket ban. To prevent this from happening elsewhere, platforms should work with governments to establish transparent local operations, including accessible grievance officers. Engaging with governments through regional coalitions, as has been proposed for South Asia, could provide a more effective framework for this compliance.
• Crisis Protocol for Fragile States: Platforms must develop and publicize a clear “crisis protocol” for activation during periods of civil unrest in vulnerable nations. This protocol should include measures such as elevating verified information from credible sources (e.g., human rights organizations, established media), rapidly down-ranking known sources of disinformation, and dedicating surge capacity from human moderation teams to the affected country.

6.4 For the International Community (UN, Development Partners, Foreign Governments)

International actors must engage with Nepal in a way that fosters stability and genuine democratic development.

• Support for Governance over Mobilization: Programs that focus on political mobilization, such as the IRI’s “Yuva Netritwa,” can be perceived as foreign interference and exacerbate geopolitical tensions, regardless of their intent. International partners should pivot their funding and focus towards strengthening the core institutions of governance: supporting an independent judiciary, providing technical assistance for anti-corruption bodies, funding a free and pluralistic press, and investing in the civil society organizations that deliver digital literacy training.
• Condition Aid on Tangible Metrics: Future development aid and loans should be linked to specific, measurable, and publicly tracked progress on key reforms. These should include metrics on anti-corruption prosecutions, youth employment figures, and the implementation of security sector reforms.
• Promote International Norms for Platform Accountability: The problem of coordinated inauthentic behavior is a global threat. Diplomatic bodies like the United Nations should work to establish international norms and standards for platform accountability, framing the weaponization of social media to incite violence as a clear threat to international peace and security. This would provide greater leverage to pressure platforms to adopt the necessary safety measures outlined above.

Comprehensive Report on Online Narratives and Inauthentic Influence during the Nepal Protests (September 2025)

This report draws exclusively on the findings detailed in the Cyabra report, “Nepal protests 2025: online narratives and fake profile influence.pptx.pdf,” focusing on metrics, methodologies, and specific framings unique to this analysis.

The Cyabra analysis focused specifically on the online discourse surrounding the Gen Z–led protests in Nepal between September 6 and September 9, 2025.

The movement was defined as much by its digital presence as by events in the streets.

The analysis covered conversations across multiple platforms, including X, Facebook, and TikTok, with the goal of examining the narratives that shaped the movement, the authenticity of participating profiles, and the strategies used to influence public perception.

Key details regarding the research sample and analysis tools include:

• The research sample utilized 3,935 profiles that collectively generated over 7,213 posts and comments.
• Online conversations reviewed began on September 6, 2025, the specific day the protests erupted.
• The analysis was conducted using Cyabra’s AI-powered social intelligence platform, which analyzes posts, comments, and engagements, categorizing them by sentiment, narrative themes, platform behavior, and authenticity.

The Shift in Discourse and Content Power

The online discourse was marked by rapid mobilization, generational identity, and mounting outrage. Content shifted notably after September 8–9, when violence and casualties transformed online discussions from calls to mobilize into collective outrage, grief, and demands for accountability.

Initially, the discourse saw a surge of posts urging people to join demonstrations on September 8. During this mobilization phase, short-form video content proved especially powerful, with some posts reaching hundreds of thousands to millions of views, underscoring Gen Z’s ability to leverage social media for mass mobilization.

Dominant Narratives and Framing

Three narratives consistently dominated the conversation, framing the protests as both a generational demand for change and a broader indictment of state institutions:

• Youth-led Democratic Struggle: This framing positions youth not merely as participants, but as the legitimate voice of change. Viral posts described young Nepalis as “the defenders of democracy,” highlighting their courage. The discourse emphasized a moral contrast where the youth are celebrated as authentic and fearless.
• Police Brutality and State Repression: This narrative was fueled by first-hand testimonies and viral visuals of clashes. The framing cast security forces not as protectors of public order, but as enforcers of political power, creating a sharp moral divide between citizens demanding reform and institutions defending the status quo.
• Political and Leadership Crisis: This theme centered on demands for Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli’s resignation. The tone was largely critical, portraying the government as ineffective and unresponsive. Engagement with this narrative was significant, reinforcing the idea that the state’s leadership vacuum is central to Nepal’s instability.

Inauthentic Activity and Disproportionate Influence

The presence of inauthentic activity added a crucial layer of complexity to the digital ecosystem. While authentic voices drove the majority of engagement, sophisticated fake accounts blended seamlessly into real discussions to amplify protest messaging and intensify criticism of the government.

Key metrics quantifying the impact of this coordinated inauthentic activity (CIA) include:

• Cyabra detected 1,288 inauthentic profiles operating on X, representing 34% of the sampled accounts on that platform.
• In total, the protest conversation generated approximately 1.4 million total engagements.
• Although a minority in number, fake profiles accounted for 11.5% of all engagements in the conversation, successfully generating over 164,000 interactions.
• The content from these fake accounts reached an estimated 326 million potential views, representing 14% of the total potential reach of the protest discourse.

This activity demonstrates how fake actors strategically inserted themselves into discussions with real users, ensuring their narratives spread widely and appeared more organic. Their coordinated use of hashtags and deliberate engagement with real users underscore how fake actors can reshape narratives and extend the visibility of protest messaging well beyond organic audiences.