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Democratic National Committee cyber attacks

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Democratic National Committee cyber attacks

The Democratic National Committee cyber attacks took place in 2015 and 2016, in which two groups of Russian computer hackers infiltrated the Democratic National Committee (DNC) computer network, leading to a data breach. Cybersecurity experts, as well as the U.S. government, determined that the cyberespionage was the work of Russian intelligence agencies.

Forensic evidence analyzed by several cybersecurity firms, CrowdStrike, Fidelis, and Mandiant (or FireEye), strongly indicated that two Russian intelligence agencies separately infiltrated the DNC computer systems. CrowdStrike, which removed the hacking programs, revealed a history of encounters with both groups and had already named them, calling one of them Cozy Bear and the other Fancy Bear, names which are used in the media.

On December 9, 2016, the CIA told U.S. legislators that the U.S. Intelligence Community had concluded Russia conducted the cyberattacks and other operations during the 2016 U.S. election to assist Donald Trump in winning the presidency. Multiple U.S. intelligence agencies concluded that specific individuals tied to the Russian government provided WikiLeaks with stolen emails from the DNC, as well as stolen emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, who was also the target of a cyberattack. These intelligence organizations additionally concluded Russia hacked the Republican National Committee (RNC) as well as the DNC, but chose not to leak information obtained from the RNC.

Cyber attacks that successfully penetrated the DNC computing system began in 2015. Attacks by "Cozy Bear" began in the summer of 2015. Attacks by "Fancy Bear" began in April 2016. It was after the "Fancy Bear" group began their activities that the compromised system became apparent. The groups were presumed to have been spying on communications, stealing opposition research on Donald Trump, as well as reading all email and chats. Both were finally identified by CrowdStrike in May 2016. Both groups of intruders were successfully expelled from the DNC systems within hours after detection. These attacks were part of a group of attacks targeting U.S. government departments and several political organizations, including 2016 campaign organizations.

On July 22, 2016, a person or entity going by the moniker "Guccifer 2.0" claimed on a WordPress-hosted blog to have been acting alone in hacking the DNC. He also claimed to send significant amounts of stolen electronic DNC documents to WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks has not revealed the source for their leaked emails. However, cybersecurity experts and firms, including CrowdStrike, Fidelis Cybersecurity, Mandiant, SecureWorks, ThreatConnect, and the editor for Ars Technica, have rejected the claims of "Guccifer 2.0" and have determined, on the basis of substantial evidence, that the cyberattacks were committed by two Russian state-sponsored groups (Cozy Bear and Fancy Bear).

According to separate reports in The New York Times and The Washington Post, U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded with "high confidence" that the Russian government was behind the theft of emails and documents from the DNC. While the U.S. intelligence community has concluded that Russia was behind the cyberattack, intelligence officials told The Washington Post that they had "not reached a conclusion about who passed the emails to WikiLeaks" and so did not know "whether Russian officials directed the leak." A number of experts and cybersecurity analysts believe that "Guccifer 2.0" is probably a Russian government disinformation cover story to distract attention away from the DNC breach by the two Russian intelligence agencies.

President Obama and Russian President Vladimir Putin had a discussion about computer security issues, which took place as a side discussion during the then-ongoing G20 summit in China in September 2016. Obama said Russian hacking stopped after his warning to Putin.

In a joint statement on October 7, 2016, the United States Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence stated that the US intelligence community is confident that the Russian government directed the breaches and the release of the obtained material in an attempt to "… interfere with the US election process."

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