Iran hackers have targeted Donald Trump and Kamala Harris’ election campaigns, U.S. authorities have confirmed.
Intelligence officials said they’ve “observed increasingly aggressive Iranian activity,” ahead of the 5 November presidential election.
“This includes the recently reported activities to compromise former President Trump’s campaign.”
It follows separate reports from Google and Microsoft earlier this month, showing Iran-backed hackers targeted “accounts associated with the U.S. presidential election”.
Hints of hacks
Over recent months, both major U.S. political parties (Republicans and Democrats) have expressed concern about the threat of cyberattacks.
In July, U.S. news site Politico said it received suspicious emails from an anonymous account.
The emails included documents containing sensitive information from the Trump campaign. For example, information about some of Trump’s potential running mates, including his eventual pick JD Vance.
Within weeks, Trump’s campaign said “foreign sources” had illegally obtained the documents.
Some other senior Trump advisers were also targeted in the breach.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) confirmed the Democrat campaign was separately targeted by an attempted phishing attack — when scammers try to trick victims into giving away their personal details.
Tech companies
This month, Google and Microsoft issued reports warning against Iranian cyberattacks.
The major tech firms own two of the world’s most popular email servers — Gmail and Outlook.
They said Iranian-backed hackers would lure senior American campaign advisers by sending malicious links masked as more legitimate attachments, meetings, or web pages.
Confirmation
A joint statement from the highest-level intelligence agencies in the U.S. (including the FBI and Director of National Intelligence) confirmed Iran hackers targeted the campaigns of Donald Trump and Kamala Harris during the U.S. election.
The agencies said they are “confident” that Iran-based hackers have “through social engineering and other efforts” to target “individuals with direct access to the presidential campaigns of both political parties”.
The statement did not refer to specific instances but attributed recent cyber attacks on the Trump campaign to Iran.
“Iran seeks to stoke discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions.”
It stated Iran is trying to “shape the outcome” of the November election for their own “national security interests”.
“Protecting the integrity of our elections from foreign influence or interference is our priority,” it said.
