Iran responsible for hacking the Trump campaign

Iran is responsible for cyber attacks on the election campaign of US Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and efforts to release the information obtained, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and other US intelligence agencies said on Monday.

Trump announced this hacking attack last week, which he had already linked to Iran. Iran is also known to have attempted to hack Democratic candidate Kamal Harris’ campaign emails.

The US election is important for Iran

US intelligence agencies have “confirmed that Iran sought through social engineering and other efforts to gain access to individuals in the presidential campaigns of both political parties.” Such activities, including theft and leaks, are done to influence the US election process,” the FBI, the National Intelligence Service said on Monday.

“It is important to remember that this tactic is not new. Iran and Russia have used this tactic not only in the United States in this and previous federal election cycles, but in other countries as well, ”

he emphasized US intelligence. With such actions, Iran tried to create discord in the US society and take advantage of the existing division, according to the intelligence services. Iran may also be hoping to influence the results of the presidential election, which Tehran “considers particularly important to its national security interests,” US intelligence agencies said, without reveals what information the hackers got from Iran.

Iran’s diplomatic mission to the UN on Monday dismissed the US intelligence report as “baseless”. CNN, however, points out that Iran has already tried to influence the US election process in 2020, including targeting election officials. According to US investigators, Iranian hackers compromised the personal email account of longtime friend Roger Stone in June and used that account to access the Trump campaign, according to CNN.

Iranian hackers also tried to break into the Harris campaign’s email accounts, but those attempts have not been proven successful, according to US media.

The Iranian hacking operation comes at a tense time in relations between Washington and Tehran. The United States is currently trying to prevent Iran from turning against Israel after the assassination of Ismail Haniyeh, the political leader of the terrorist group Hamas, in Tehran. US media have also reported on Tehran’s plans to kill Trump in retaliation for the assassination of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard chief Qassem Soleimani in a drone strike in Iraq in 2020.

The media will not publish stolen content

The Republican candidate’s campaign documents were leaked to several US media organizations following the Trump campaign’s investigation. It is known that these materials were obtained by the newspapers “Politico” and “New York Times” and “Washington Post”. These media, however, have not made public the information obtained through cybercrime. “Politico” has just announced that the leaked information relates to Trump’s chosen vice-presidential candidate, James David Vance. A 271-page document was released in which the campaign appeared to favor the Ohio senator as a possible candidate for Trump’s vice presidency.

These materials contain publicly available information, including Vance’s one-time criticism of Trump. Materials about Florida senator Marco Rubio were also leaked.

He was also considered a reliable candidate to fight for victory in the election with Trump. Citing informed sources, “Politico” reports that the documents are real, however, the publication has decided not to publish them. “Politico” representative Brad Dayspring announced that the editors of the publication had decided not to make the materials public, because “questions about the origin of the documents and how they came to be available are more important than the material contained in those documents.”

This cautious behavior of the US media is very different from what was seen in 2016. At the time, after the hack and drop of the Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton and the emails of the Democratic Party, which was blamed on the Russian intelligence services and the “WikiLeaks” website created by Julian Assange, the media rushed to publish that information. unpleasant for the Democrats. US President Joe Biden’s domestic policy adviser Neera Tanden, whose emails were released in 2016, now accuses the media of applying double standards.

“Either they admit they did wrong in 2016, or the rules require that stolen emails be released only when it hurts Democrats.”

Tandena expressed her anger on the “X” platform. Experts in the field have also drawn attention to the responsibility of the media. “News organizations should be wary of broken documents. If they are recognized as real and relevant, they can be published, but the reason is also important,” Dan Kennedy, a professor of journalism at Northeastern University, told CNN. “In 2016, many news sites reported Democratic National Committee emails without asking why WikiLeaks, which had ties to Russia, were released,” the expert said.