The Kremlin said today that accusations from USA officials and cybersecurity firms that Moscow was responsible for a massive hack of Democratic National Committee emails are “absurd”.
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Obama says this incident aside, the Russians “hack our systems”.
Late Monday, national security officials told ABC News that federal officials also believe operatives affiliated with the Russian government were responsible for the hack and for providing the material to WikiLeaks, which published 20,000 of the leaked emails Friday.
In an interview Monday with NBC, the founder of WikiLeaks, Julian Assange, refused to confirm whether the almost 20,000 private emails his organization published came from a hack conducted by Russian state intelligence, saying it would be “immoral and unethical” to speculate about a source.
Many have particularly highlighted the frequent praise Russian officials seem to heap on the U.S Republican Party’s presidential candidate Donald Trump and Trump’s campaign chairman Paul Manafort who was once an advisor to Kremlin-ally Viktor Yanukovych.
“I’m basing this on what Trump himself has said, and I think Trump’s gotten pretty favorable coverage back in Russia”, Obama said.
Asked whether Moscow was trying to influence the presidential election, Obama said, “Anything’s possible”.
Clinton’s campaign on Monday blamed Russian Federation for the hack.
“I know that experts have attributed this to the Russians”, Obama said, according to Reuters.
“And I think that Trump’s gotten pretty favorable coverage back in Russian Federation”. Trump has dismissed the claims, calling them a joke. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, who began publishing thousands of the emails last week, said Monday there’s was “no proof” Russian Federation was behind the hack, and on Tuesday told CNN that “a lot more” material was on its way.
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Assigning blame in the world of cyberespionage is extraordinarily hard. “Anybody could be pulling the trigger”. On Tuesday, ThreatConnect, an intelligence firm based in Arlington, Virginia, said it found evidence that the hacker was communicating with journalists via a dedicated virtual private network based out of Russian Federation. The officials said they suspect it was a blatant attempt to influence the US presidential election or, at the very least, make mischief.
