FBI says it is confident Iran was to blame for Trump campaign hack
Top US intelligence agencies believe they know who is behind the recent attack on Trump’s 2024 US presidential election campaign, which disrupted communications.
A joint statement According to the FBI, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI), and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), the latest attack has been attributed to Iranian-backed threat actors seeking to “undermine confidence in our democratic institutions.”
“Iran also has a long-standing interest in exploiting societal tensions in a variety of ways, including using cyber operations to gain access to sensitive information related to the US elections,” the statement said.
Chaos and disorder
This particular incident consisted primarily of a phishing attack, followed by attempts to break into the accounts of a “high-ranking official” campaigning for the US presidency.
Trump’s campaign said the attack only exposed information that was already public knowledge, but several news organizations claim a confidential research document on VP candidate JD Vance was leaked to them.
Trump’s campaign wasn’t the only target, as Harris’ campaign said it was also the victim of an unsuccessful spear-phishing attempt. The IC has said it believes Iranians used social engineering and other efforts to gain access to individuals from both presidential campaigns.
This is hardly new information, and US intelligence has confirmed that both Iran and Russia have used these tactics in previous US elections and in elections around the world.
The IC said it observed particularly aggressive Iranian cyber activity in what it identified as a “particularly important” election in terms of potential impact on national security. The IC also recently concluded The goals of the Iranian-backed cyberattacks were to disrupt the political process and further increase distrust within the American public sphere – targeting both high-ranking politicians and ordinary voters,
The FBI said it “continues to investigate and gather information to pursue and disrupt the threat actors responsible.” It also advises against clicking on links or opening attachments in suspicious emails and to enable multi-factor authentication.