Support NeoGAF

[Shard]

https://www.aol.com/article/news/20...ms-during-2016-election-us-official/22528202/

WASHINGTON, June 21 (Reuters) - Russian hackers targeted 21 U.S. states' election systems in last year's presidential race, a U.S. Department of Homeland Security official told Congress on Wednesday.

Jeanette Manfra, the department's acting deputy undersecretary of cyber security, would not identify which states had been targeted, citing confidentiality agreements. She reiterated to the Senate Intelligence Committee that there was no evidence that any actual vote ballots were manipulated.

Department officials had previously said about 20 states had been probed by hackers working on behalf of the Russian government, but recent media reports had suggested the number could have been far higher.


Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate panel, expressed frustration at Manfra's refusal to identify which states had been targeted.

"I just fundamentally disagree," he said.


Arizona and Illinois last year confirmed that hackers had targeted their voter registration systems.

Russia has repeatedly denied responsibility for any cyber attacks during the U.S. presidential election. (Reporting by Dustin Volz; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama and Lisa Von Ahn)

 

[hughesta]

I wonder which states they were 🤔🤔🤔

 

[Stinkles]

They're right that we didn't care enough. The biggest FBI announcement was on the same day as PussyGrabGate.

Which may not be a coincidence in hindsight.

 

[Prophaniti]

I really hope the next president comes down on Russia. Advanced weapons sold to Ukraine. Blow Assads brains out. Completely cripples Iran. And just demolish the Russian economy.

 

[AlphaDump]

There are hearings on it right now

On C-SPAN3 today at 10:00am (ET)

Jeh Johnson: Russia Orchestrated Election Cyberattacks, Didn't Change Tally Outcomes

Download C-SPAN Radio
iOS: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/c-span-radio/id322447301?ls=1&mt=8
Android: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.jacobsmedia.CSpan

 

[Zophar]

Trump's silence on what is arguably the biggest assault on our democracy in a decade is deafening.

 

[Ziltoidia 9]

Fake News from the Obama/Clinton deep state.

 

[Luschient]

What an absolute mess. Any chance of these systems being ready for the 2020 election? And tbh, does the GOP even want them "ready"?

 

[Particle Physicist]

So no evidence that ballots were hacked... yet. But what about voter rolls?

 

[Loxley]

Trump's silence on what is arguably the biggest assault on our democracy in a decade is deafening.

Add on top of the fact that he wants to ease sanctions on them as well and it becomes even more maddening.

 

[Earthstrike]

So no evidence that ballots were hacked... yet. But what about voter rolls?

Those were only made accesible to Russia via a GOP research firm a couple days ago.

 

[Red]

Trump's silence on what is arguably the biggest assault on our democracy in a decade is deafening.

He is not silent. He has signaled his support of the Russian efforts loud and clear. From encouraging Russia to hack and release DNC emails, to inviting Russian ambassadors and state media to the oval office, to easing sanctions... He has shown where his loyalty lies.

 

[Diablos]

Like Comey said -- they'll be back.

Trump is going to do fuck all about it. Wheeee the next three and a half years are gonna be so fun

 

[Ziltoidia 9]

Like Comey said -- they'll be back.

Trump is going to do fuck all about it. Wheeee the next three and a half years are gonna be so fun

Trump never going to do anything OR talk about it because it makes his "win" (EC Win...) not as good.

 

[Mahonay]

He is not silent. He has signaled his support of the Russian efforts loud and clear. From encouraging Russia to hack and release DNC emails, to inviting Russian ambassadors and state media to the oval office, to easing sanctions... He has shown where his loyalty lies.

 

[Wolfgunblood Garopa]

When seeing this story on TV for the first time, Trump legit probably thinks to himself how the US does bad things, too.

 

[TheRagnCajun]

I know what to do - let's ease sanctions on Russia and see how that works out.

 

[PandaPandaPanda]

Trump's silence on what is arguably the biggest assault on our democracy in a decade is deafening.

it's intentional

I believe he's never said anything about Russia and or Putin on the campaign either (someone can correct me if i'm wrong on that claim-I didn't pay attention to his campaign because I would have rather shoved my head up a hippopotamus's butt than vote for the orange turd)

and the pictures he had with the russian officials in the oval office pretty much tell the whole story too

 

[Red]

The day after firing Comey over the Russia investigation:

It kills me when people say Trump has been silent. Where you been? He could not be louder or more clear about what he thinks about this whole thing.

 

[Neuromancer]

How do they know they were Russians? It could have been a 400 lb guy on a bed in New Jersey.

 

[sturgboski]

it's intentional

I believe he's never said anything about Russia and or Putin on the campaign either (someone can correct me if i'm wrong on that claim-I didn't pay attention to his campaign because I would have rather shoved my head up a hippopotamus's butt than vote for the orange turd)

and the pictures he had with the russian officials in the oval office pretty much tell the whole story too

You are sadly mistaken. He both doesn't know Putin and is best friends with Putin depending on the interview. Hell he stroked Putin so hard he begged Russia to hack US officials.

 

[Morrigan Stark]

Wasn't it 39 states, last we heard?

 

[Foffy]

I bet they got into at least one of these systems.

That's just the next shoe to fall.

 

[dramatis]

Wasn't it 39 states, last we heard?

That was the grapevine rumor, this is the confirmed number.

You also have to consider the wording, as in which states might have had their election systems breached while others have had other breaches that may only be tangentially related, etc.

 

[Knurek]

What an absolute mess. Any chance of these systems being ready for the 2020 election? And tbh, does the GOP even want them "ready"?

Do you think GOP wants to have a 2020 election?

 

[DietRob]

Our pathetic leader has not been silent. As others have pointed out his actions speak much louder than any words he could vomit out.

 

[Shadow Puppetry]

He never said that! It's the FAKE MEDIA lying as usual! /s

 

[Meowster]

this is terrifying and the fact that the other side just plugs their ears and says "who cares, our side won" is mind boggling.

 

[4Tran]

Trump's silence on what is arguably the biggest assault on our democracy in a decade is deafening.

Aside from Trump not being silent on this subject, the biggest assault on American democracy is the GOP's concerted effort to suppress voters. That's the one you don't hear Trump saying anything about.

 

[ZealousD]

So the official basically just confirmed the Reality Winner memo, right?

 

[FullMetaltech]

So the official basically just confirmed the Reality Winner memo, right?

Seems like it.

 

[cameron]

From yesterday's WH press briefing:

The election was 7 months ago. Trump was sworn in as president 5 months ago. And/but…

— Bradd Jaffy‏ (@BraddJaffy) June 20, 2017​

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer declined to definitively answer when asked if President Donald Trump believes Russia interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.

"I have not sat down and talked to him about that specific thing," Spicer told reporters at the daily press briefing Tuesday. " Obviously we've been dealing with a lot of other issues today. I'd be glad to touch base."

When a reporter followed up by noting that 16 intelligence agencies believe that the Russians did interfere, and former FBI Director James Comey said as much in his congressional testimony, Spicer reiterated that he couldn't answer because he hadn't spoken with Trump.

"I have not sat down and asked him about his specific reaction to them, so I'd be glad to touch base and get back to you," he said.

http://time.com/4826069/sean-spicer-donald-trump-russian-interference-2016-election/

Maybe he'll get back to us after today.

 

[cameron]

WaPo: Trump: Russian interference is ‘all a big Dem HOAX!'

President Trump on Thursday called Russia's meddling in the 2016 election ”all a big Dem HOAX" and accused former president Barack Obama and his administration of not doing enough last year to ”stop" Russian interference.

In morning tweets, Trump opined on the Russia probe and sought to assert his innocence, even as special counsel Robert S. Mueller III expands the investigation of possible collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia to look at possible obstruction of justice by the president.

Trump tweeted, ”Why did Democratic National Committee turn down the DHS offer to protect against hacks (long prior to election). It's all a big Dem HOAX!"

The president appeared to be referring to Wednesday's congressional testimony by Jeh Johnson, Obama's former homeland security secretary, who said that after the Democratic National Committee's email servers were hacked, the DNC declined an offer by the Department of Homeland Security to help the party committee, which also had been in touch with the FBI, identify intruders and patch vulnerabilities.

DNC officials said it did not hear from DHS until months after the hack had been made public and after the FBI had worked to close the intrusion, and that the DNC provided the DHS a detailed report on the incident.

”The DNC has and will continue to cooperate with law enforcement on Russia's interference in our election," DNC spokeswoman Adrienne Watson said in a statement responding to Trump's tweet. ”The DNC has been in regular contact with the FBI for many months and the FBI confirmed the DNC has provided all the information it needed to make its assessment."

In another Thursday tweet, Trump wrote, ”If Russia was working so hard on the 2016 Election, it all took place during the Obama Admin. Why didn't they stop them?"

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump

 

[Jeremy]

The weird thing is that it almost feels like whether Trump believes something or not is now the defining characteristic of whether it's perceived to be true or not by moderates and conservatives.

 

[TS-08]

WaPo: Trump: Russian interference is ‘all a big Dem HOAX!’

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump

I would quibble with the idea that Trump is accusing Obama of not stopping the interference, which implies Trump accepts that it happened. His overall point is that it didn't actually happen and is a "hoax" concocted to explain away his victory. The Obama tweet and the subsequent two are just variations of an argument he is using to support this conclusion: "If X happened, then Y should have happened, and the absence Y indicates the absence of X." This is nothing but further confirmation that Trump doesn't believe the essentially undisputed conclusion that Russia interfered in the election, that it was serious, and that they will keep doing it.

 

[Ekai]

The weird thing is that it almost feels like whether Drumpf believes something or not is now the defining characteristic of whether it's perceived to be true or not by moderates and conservatives.

Centrists are too willing to give Republicans a chance, tbh.

 

[The Albatross]

In case anybody's wondering, the FBI does not release which states because it's covering those states under 'victim disclosures,' the same way that it wouldn't release the names of victims of another investigation.

I hadn't thought of it that way but it's an interesting concept, mentioned on PBS Radio last night in an interview with a Senate intelligence chair who had been briefed by the FBI. The names of the states will probably eventually come out, but only if the states ('victims') themselves disclose that they are part of the investigation or working with the FBI on the investigation.