The United States authorities stated on Wednesday (September 18th) that earlier this year, Iranian hackers stole campaign data from former President of the United States and 2024 Republican presidential nominee, Donald Trump, and sent it via email to people associated with the Democratic presidential candidate, Joe Biden, who was running for reelection at that time, with the intention of influencing the U.S. election.
According to reports from Reuters, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence (ODNI) issued a joint statement saying, “Additionally, Iranian malicious cyber actors have been continuing efforts since June to send the stolen non-public information related to former President Trump’s campaign activities to U.S. media outlets.”
“This malicious cyber activity by Iran is a recent example of Iran’s multifaceted efforts to sow discord and undermine confidence in our electoral process,” these agencies stated.
The statement also mentioned that currently, there is no information indicating that the recipients responded. However, these agencies did not provide further details on the nature of the stolen materials.
In August of this year, the U.S. accused Iran of launching cyber attacks on two U.S. presidential candidates’ campaign activities and attempting to use cyber operations to influence the American public and stir political discord.
Iran has denied the accusations of interfering in U.S. affairs, stating that they have no intention of disrupting the U.S. election.
However, these U.S. agencies stated that malicious cyber actors sent unsolicited emails to some individuals in Biden’s campaign team at the end of June and early July, including a segment of text excerpted from the materials stolen from Trump’s campaign team.
Biden later withdrew from the presidential race on July 21st, with Vice President Kamala Harris taking over his campaign.
In a statement, the Trump campaign team mentioned that Harris and Biden should disclose whether they used the hacked materials to “harm” Trump. Trump later said at a rally on Wednesday night that Iran directed hackers to infiltrate his campaign team to help the Democratic Party, labeling it as foreign interference in the U.S. elections.
A spokesperson for the Harris campaign team stated after the statement by the U.S. agencies: “We are not aware of any material directly sent to the campaign. Several individuals’ personal emails were targeted, and these emails appeared to be spam or phishing.”