U.S. 2018 elections 'under attack' by Russia - U.S. intelligence chief

[webfact]

U.S. 2018 elections 'under attack' by Russia - U.S. intelligence chief

By Patricia Zengerle and Doina Chiacu

 

(L-R) Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Christopher Wray, Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) Director Mike Pompeo, and Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Dan Coats wait to testify before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Capitol Hill in Washington, U.S., February 13, 2018. REUTERS/Aaron P. Bernstein

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Leaders of U.S. intelligence agencies warned on Tuesday that Russia will try to interfere in the 2018 U.S. midterm elections by using social media to spread propaganda and misleading reports, much as it did in the 2016 campaign.

 

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats told a congressional committee that Russia and other foreign entities were likely to attack U.S. and European elections this year and beyond, adding that Moscow believes similar efforts successfully undermined U.S. democracy two years ago.

 

Coats, a former senator appointed by President Donald Trump as Washington's top intelligence official, said he had already seen evidence Russia was targeting U.S. elections in November, when Republican control of the House of Representatives and Senate are at stake, plus a host of positions in state governments.

 

"Frankly, the United States is under attack," Coats said at the Senate Intelligence Committee's annual hearing on worldwide threats.

 

Coats' assessment runs counter to statements from Trump, who has cast doubt on the notion of Russian meddling and denied any collusion by his associates with Russia ahead of his surprise November 2016 defeat of Democrat Hillary Clinton.

 

U.S. spy agencies concluded more than a year ago that Russia used hacking and propaganda to try to tilt that election in favour of the Republican. Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly denied this and Trump has said he believes him.

 

"There should be no doubt that Russia perceives its past efforts as successful and views the 2018 U.S. midterm elections as a potential target for Russian influence operations," Coats said.

 

Coats said "persistent and disruptive cyber operations" would continue "using elections as opportunities to undermine democracy" in the United States and its European allies.

 

Coats described a range of ways in which Russia might try to influence this year's vote.

 

"At a minimum, we expect Russia to continue using propaganda, social media, false-flag personas, sympathetic spokespeople, and other means of influence to try to exacerbate social and political fissures in the United States," he said.

 

The charge of Russian meddling spawned a federal probe and congressional investigations into whether Trump's campaign colluded with Moscow, throwing a shadow over the first year of Trump's presidency.

 

QUESTIONS ON COUNTERMEASURES

 

Senators asked the intelligence chiefs during the hearing whether there was a plan in place to combat more hacking.

 

Central Intelligence Agency Director Mike Pompeo and Chris Wray, the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, also Trump appointees, said there were significant, specific efforts under way, but did not elaborate.

 

Government countermeasures likely include going public with concerns that Russian hackers will seek to influence the 2018 elections, said John Hultquist, director of intelligence analysis with the cyber security firm FireEye Inc.

 

"If we discuss this openly, then the public - who are really the targets of these operations - will be prepared and less susceptible to any influence if and when it does happen,” Hultquist said.

 

In Germany’s election last September, public discussion of a feared Russian cyber campaign, and an agreement among political parties not to exploit information gathered in cyber attacks – an accord unlikely to be replicated in the United States – appeared to help inoculate the country against outside meddling.

 

Executives from social media companies such as Facebook Inc <FB.O> and Twitter Inc <TWTR.N> have testified in Congress about Russia's purported disinformation drive aimed at U.S. voters.

 

Facebook reported that 126 million Americans may have seen Russian-backed political content on its platform over a two-year period.

 

Trump has repeatedly criticized the CIA and FBI, taking to Twitter to accuse the FBI leadership of bias against Republicans. At Tuesday's hearing, several committee members expressed support for the intelligence officials.

 

The Senate Intelligence Committee is conducting one of the three main congressional investigations into the Russia issue. An investigation by a House intelligence committee has led to partisan squabbling between Republicans and Democrats.

 

(Reporting by Patricia Zengerle and Doina Chiacu, additional reporting by Jim Finkle in Toronto and Warren Stroble in Washington; Editing by Frances Kerry and Grant McCool)

 

-- © Copyright Reuters 2018-02-14

[Scott]

Conspiracy post removed.  

 

[Khun Han]

Why can't the relevant agencies just flag up these social media attacks by Russia, and respond to them in an official way, along the lines of: "This is a response from your government. This is Russian propaganda. believe it at your peril." with an explanation of why the Russian social media posts are lies and propaganda? How difficult is that?

[alocacoc]

They are just preparing to increase their censorship. Is the great USA seriously not able to block foreign propaganda? The are capable of monitoring, tracking and whatever er every phone, computer... But they have no clue how to suppress these propaganda? What they really want to hide? What about they're so afraid? Stinky stinky behind the curtain.

Sent from a so called Smartphone using an App.

[selftaopath]

The U.S. Congress put into law various sanctions to "punish" Russia for interfering in our 2016 election/attack. Trump refuses to sign them, or to do anything to implement them. He is basically allowing Putin full access to harm our political structure. Trump spits on rule of law/democracy. He wants autocracy and nothing else; so far much of his Republican party has enabled him to get his wish. Shame on them and hopefully Trump will reap what he sews. 

[Gecko123]

[anon467367354]

this is getting old, I don't think anybody new is buying this BS. 

[isaanbanhou]

4 minutes ago, gr8fldanielle said:

this is getting old, I don't think anybody new is buying this BS. 

 

we are all getting old, I have no doubt that Putin is enjoying himself. 

 

[mania]

Quote

by using social media to spread propaganda and misleading reports

 

“the pot calling the kettle black.”

Edited February 14, 2018 by mania

[JKfarang]

Personally, as an American, I believe that voter suppression laws and other similar efforts in various US states combined with Congressional district gerrymandering (the redrawing of district boundaries to benefit whichever political party controls the state government) are a much larger problem than any propaganda regardless of the source.

 

If people are so ignorant that they can not even think for themselves or differentiate between truth and fallacy (which unfortunately too many are) then that is, in part, a reflection of the ongoing deterioration of the public education system in the US.

 

But, of course, it is all too sadly much easier to blame others than to blame ourselves, our society, our values or our state and national governments for our mistakes and failures.  And as a result, the decline of the US in so many ways will inevitably continue.

 

[thaibeachlovers]

Does anyone believe it wasn't going to happen, hasn't happened and that anything can be done to stop it?

The CIA has been interfering in foreign elections for decades, but that's OK?

 

[Credo]

12 minutes ago, thaibeachlovers said:

Does anyone believe it wasn't going to happen, hasn't happened and that anything can be done to stop it?

The CIA has been interfering in foreign elections for decades, but that's OK?

 

Whether it goes on in any other countries is not the concern of this thread.   

 

[Becker]

4 hours ago, alocacoc said:

They are just preparing to increase their censorship. Is the great USA seriously not able to block foreign propaganda? The are capable of monitoring, tracking and whatever er every phone, computer... But they have no clue how to suppress these propaganda? What they really want to hide? What about they're so afraid? Stinky stinky behind the curtain.

Sent from a so called Smartphone using an App.
 

I can smell a good 'ol conspiracy theory coming along. A real right-wing looney tunes whopper. Out with it alocacoc - give us the "facts" as seen from your alt right universe!!!

Edited February 14, 2018 by Becker

[Gecko123]

5 hours ago, webfact said:

At a minimum, we expect Russia to continue using propaganda, social media, false-flag personas, sympathetic spokespeople, and other means of influence to try to exacerbate social and political fissures in the United States," he said.

What about TVF? Does anybody else ever wonder whether Russia might be active on this forum?

[Gecko123]

55 minutes ago, JKfarang said:

Personally, as an American, I believe that voter suppression laws and other similar efforts in various US states combined with Congressional district gerrymandering (the redrawing of district boundaries to benefit whichever political party controls the state government) are a much larger problem than any propaganda regardless of the source.

 

If people are so ignorant that they can not even think for themselves or differentiate between truth and fallacy (which unfortunately too many are) then that is, in part, a reflection of the ongoing deterioration of the public education system in the US.

 

But, of course, it is all too sadly much easier to blame others than to blame ourselves, our society, our values or our state and national governments for our mistakes and failures.  And as a result, the decline of the US in so many ways will inevitably continue.

 

Whole-heartedly agree with you about the dangers of anti-democratic voter suppression and district gerrymandering, but fear you are seriously under-estimating how easily public opinion can be manipulated on the internet and social media where it is so easy for mis-information to be spread.

Edited February 14, 2018 by Gecko123

[ALLSEEINGEYE]

Trump only complains about a rigged system when it is rigged against him.

 

The republicans are just as guilty as Trump for not defending USA against these attacks. To stand by the party over the country is truly treasonous.

 

I hope the voters remember all of this come Nov

[mania]

35 minutes ago, ALLSEEINGEYE said:

I hope the voters remember all of this come Nov

They did ...That is why Trump is Prez & Not Hillary

[heybruce]

12 minutes ago, mania said:

They did ...That is why Trump is Prez & Not Hillary

Did you not read the post you replied to, or are you unable to understand it?

[heybruce]

3 hours ago, gr8fldanielle said:

this is getting old, I don't think anybody new is buying this BS. 

That's true.  Everybody of any intelligence knows that Russia has ongoing efforts to covertly influence elections in democratic countries, and dimwits in denial of reality continue to refuse to believe it.

[heybruce]

5 hours ago, alocacoc said:

They are just preparing to increase their censorship. Is the great USA seriously not able to block foreign propaganda? The are capable of monitoring, tracking and whatever er every phone, computer... But they have no clue how to suppress these propaganda? What they really want to hide? What about they're so afraid? Stinky stinky behind the curtain.

Sent from a so called Smartphone using an App.
 

You haven't a clue about how freedom of press in the modern world works, do you?  If identifying and removing propaganda were easy, ISIS wouldn't be able to use the internet for propaganda and recruitment.  Or do you have a conspiracy theory about the US supporting ISIS?

 

Preventing propaganda in countries with freedom of press and speech is difficult, preventing or controlling propaganda in countries without these freedoms is much easier.  Monitoring phones and computers with encryption is not possible, which is why China and other countries want to make VPN's illegal. 

 

The US government needs to justify to skeptical courts any surveillance of its citizens, social media companies constantly monitor our online communications (we gave them permission when we agreed to those incomprehensible user agreements and privacy policies), but uses this information for marketing purposes.  Social media has a financial interest in allowing click-bait "news" and outrageous claims, these things increase web traffic.

 

Your final questions reflect general paranoid BS, I won't attempt to reply to them.

[heybruce]

1 hour ago, JKfarang said:

Personally, as an American, I believe that voter suppression laws and other similar efforts in various US states combined with Congressional district gerrymandering (the redrawing of district boundaries to benefit whichever political party controls the state government) are a much larger problem than any propaganda regardless of the source.

 

If people are so ignorant that they can not even think for themselves or differentiate between truth and fallacy (which unfortunately too many are) then that is, in part, a reflection of the ongoing deterioration of the public education system in the US.

 

But, of course, it is all too sadly much easier to blame others than to blame ourselves, our society, our values or our state and national governments for our mistakes and failures.  And as a result, the decline of the US in so many ways will inevitably continue.

 

Russia attempted to steer the last election to the Republicans, the party that eagerly implements voter suppression laws and is guilty of the most blatant gerrymandering. 

 

Yes, many people are so ignorant (gullible might be a better term) that they believe anything on the internet that confirms what they already want to believe.  These same people accuse established media of "fake news" whenever anything is reported that they don't want to believe. 

 

Voter suppression, gerrymandering, and lies presented as facts all need to be addressed to ensure fair elections.  It would be foolish to ignore foreign interference on the grounds that voter suppression and gerrymandering are also bad.

[lannarebirth]

 

There is very little related to the advertising induustry that isn't propaganda, but sure, go after the Russians for their ads.  These ads weren't made by Russians.

 

 

 

As Marshall McLuhan so presciently pointed out: "The medium is the message".

Edited February 14, 2018 by lannarebirth

[heybruce]

31 minutes ago, lannarebirth said:

 

There is very little related to the advertising induustry that isn't propaganda, but sure, go after the Russians for their ads.  These ads weren't made by Russians.

 

 

 

As Marshall McLuhan so presciently pointed out: "The medium is the message".

The difference between advertising and propaganda is that advertisers don't hide their identities and motives, propagandists do.

[Khun Han]

51 minutes ago, heybruce said:

You haven't a clue about how freedom of press in the modern world works, do you?  If identifying and removing propaganda were easy, ISIS wouldn't be able to use the internet for propaganda and recruitment.  Or do you have a conspiracy theory about the US supporting ISIS?

 

Preventing propaganda in countries with freedom of press and speech is difficult, preventing or controlling propaganda in countries without these freedoms is much easier.  Monitoring phones and computers with encryption is not possible, which is why China and other countries want to make VPN's illegal. 

 

The US government needs to justify to skeptical courts any surveillance of its citizens, social media companies constantly monitor our online communications (we gave them permission when we agreed to those incomprehensible user agreements and privacy policies), but uses this information for marketing purposes.  Social media has a financial interest in allowing click-bait "news" and outrageous claims, these things increase web traffic.

 

Your final questions reflect general paranoid BS, I won't attempt to reply to them.

 

You're over-complicating the issue to say the least. US security services say that they've identified these social media propaganda attacks. Why don't they just respond to the posts with posts of their own? What's so difficult about that?

[heybruce]

13 minutes ago, Khun Han said:

 

You're over-complicating the issue to say the least. US security services say that they've identified these social media propaganda attacks. Why don't they just respond to the posts with posts of their own? What's so difficult about that?

So, instead of finding and shutting down the source of countless cockroaches, you think it's better to chase after each cockroach?

[Khun Han]

25 minutes ago, heybruce said:

So, instead of finding and shutting down the source of countless cockroaches, you think it's better to chase after each cockroach?

 

They've already found them. Attempting to shut them down would be pointless, even if they achieved it, because the trolls would just come back under other names. How much more cheap and simple would it be to just refute and nullify the trolls with social media posts of their own? Why complicate the issue?

[jcsmith]

It certainly will happen because the government is doing nothing to stop it, has no interest in doing so... Wonder why that is?

 

With regards to stopping bots, that is easier said than done. You can go through proxies or VPNs to try to mask their location, and there are many legitimate bots who simply retweet or share things, follow/unfollow which they really don't want to get rid of. The problem is a lot of bots retweet by hashtags and that becomes easily exploited by malicious bots. Certainly the social media sites can do more here, but it's not as easy as it sounds. It can all be traced but it's not an easily automated thing to do as there are many legitimate proxy/VPN/bot users, as well.

 

The easy solution is to punish the offenders. But when the offenders got said president elected, and he's shown absolutely no desire to punish them and has done the opposite, trying to ease sanctions and relationships... well good luck with getting that through. His own party participated in forcing him to impose stronger restrictions on Russia and he waited until the final day to impose them and balked at it, said it wasn't needed. If Trump doesn't take this seriously, it will happen again. And there is no indication that he intends to.

Edited February 14, 2018 by jcsmith

[Becker]

11 minutes ago, heybruce said:

I see.  You edited the post to the part you thought you could reply to, but even then you failed to grasp the significance of the verb tense.  You were unable to understand it.

Well, I hope you didn't expect fact based replies based on rational debating techniques. Remember who you're arguing with

[heybruce]

18 minutes ago, Khun Han said:

 

They've already found them. Attempting to shut them down would be pointless, even if they achieved it, because the trolls would just come back under other names. How much more cheap and simple would it be to just refute and nullify the trolls with social media posts of their own? Why complicate the issue?

Not cheap or simple; trolls can breed cockroaches faster than cockroaches can be caught.  Shutting down the trolls is a better option, even if it is a temporary fix.  Regardless, it would require the cooperation of the social media companies.  The big ones are reluctant to assist, and the small ones refuse.

 

The simple solution is for people to exercise a degree of rational skepticism and look into sources and motives for the "OMG" things they see on the internet.  Unfortunately many people love their OMG moments and don't ask questions when they find a good one.

Edited February 14, 2018 by heybruce

[heybruce]

6 minutes ago, jcsmith said:

It certainly will happen because the government is doing nothing to stop it, has no interest in doing so... Wonder why that is?

 

With regards to stopping bots, that is easier said than done. You can go through proxies or VPNs to try to mask their location, and there are many legitimate bots who simply retweet or share things, follow/unfollow which they really don't want to get rid of. The problem is a lot of bots retweet by hashtags and that becomes easily exploited by malicious bots. Certainly the social media sites can do more here, but it's not as easy as it sounds. It can all be traced but it's not an easily automated thing to do as there are many legitimate proxy/VPN/bot users, as well.

 

The easy solution is to punish the offenders. But when the offenders got said president elected, and he's shown absolutely no desire to punish them and has done the opposite, trying to ease sanctions and relationships... well good luck with getting that through. His own party participated in forcing him to impose stronger restrictions on Russia and he waited until the final day to impose them and balked at it, said it wasn't needed. If Trump doesn't take this seriously, it will happen again. And there is no indication that he intends to.

Largely agree, except:

 

"there are many legitimate bots who simply retweet or share things"

 

What legitimate purpose does mindless retweeting and sharing serve?

 

"The easy solution is to punish the offenders."

 

You are correct that there is a lack of political will to investigate this issue and punish offenders.  This is further complicated by the fact that the offenders are in foreign countries and operating with the consent, and sometimes funding and other assistance, of the government.  Punishing them will not be easy.