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Meddle me this, G-Man: who throws in the towel, only to wrap it around his head?
AP:
Russia and Iran have obtained U.S. voting registration information, the government’s national intelligence director said at a rare news conference Wednesday night.
John Ratcliffe, the intelligence director, and FBI Director Chris Wray said the U.S. will impose costs on any foreign countries interfering in the 2020 U.S. election.
The revelation came at an abruptly scheduled news conference Wednesday night, less than two weeks before the presidential election.
Before the press conference, leaders of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence issued a joint statement about “threats from adversaries to U.S. election systems and infrastructure.”
Prior the the news conference, national security officials said Democratic voters in at least four battleground states including Florida and Pennsylvania had reported receiving threatening emails falsely purporting to be from the far-right group Proud Boys.
The emails warned “we will come after you” if the recipients didn’t vote for President Donald Trump.
The operation apparently used email addresses obtained from state voter registration lists, which include party affiliation and home addresses and can include email addresses and phone numbers.
I don’t understand this. Voter registration lists are public.
Those addresses were then used in an apparently widespread targeted spamming operation. The senders claimed they would know which candidate the recipient was voting for in the Nov. 3 election, for which early voting is ongoing.
Federal officials have long warned about the possibility of this type of operation, as such registration lists are not difficult to obtain.
“These emails are meant to intimidate and undermine American voters’ confidence in our elections,” Christopher Krebs, the top election security official at the Department of Homeland Security, tweeted Tuesday night after reports of the emails first surfaced.
He urged voters not to fall for “sensational and unverified claims,” reminding them that ballot secrecy is guaranteed by law in all states. “The last line of defense in election security is you – the American voter.”
A spokesperson at FBI headquarters did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.
Strangely, the FBI did immediately return a phone call from the Daily Stormer.
Here is the full transcript:
Andrew Anglin: Bro, what is this shit? The Iranians pretended to be the Proud Boys?
FBI: Bro…
Anglin: C’mon man!
FBI: Yeah, the Iranians were pretending to be the Proud Boys…
Anglin: To meddle in the election? Do you think I’m retarded?
FBI: You sound retarded, faggot.
Anglin: lol
FBI: roflmao
Anglin: Okay, so.
FBI: Come on dude, just f*ck off.
Anglin: Dude, you come on and f*ck off. I just watched your boy say that Iran pretended to be the Proud Boys online.
FBI: Bro, I don’t know.
Anglin: Well, I know. I just watched it.
FBI: Grow up.
He then hung up on me.
No, I’m just joking.
But I will say: this is very silly.
Is it voter intimidation on the part of Trump? Or is it fake voter intimidation to make Trump look bad?
Couldn’t it easily go both ways, meaning that it would make no sense for a foreign actor to be involved in it, since he wouldn’t know the outcome?
Why are they pretending that “obtaining voter registration” is some kind of serious business? They’re saying this alleged event happened in Alaska and Arizona – in Alaska, you can get the information online, and in Arizona, you can request it in an office (but I suspect it’s also available online, unofficially; at worst you could go on Craigslist and pay someone $20 to go pick it up and sent it to you).
And then of course, as always, you have the serious problem of any kind of “backtracing” to find out who sent what. It’s virtually impossible, especially if a state actor is involved. We know this, without any doubt. The CIA designed tools to make it look like someone else is responsible for various cyber activities – basically, false positive backtracing. And those are available on the internet. The CIA admits that the fact that they used the tools means that other actors online have the tools. It’s all in WikiLeaks CIA Vault 7, if anyone is interested in knowing more.
But that primarily involved various kinds of cyber intrusion. When it comes to just sending emails, which is what this is – I have no idea how you would even claim to have the ability to find out who did it.
But I will say: it’s impressive that the FBI is coming out with an “Iranians for Joe Biden” hoax. Apparently, this is John Ratcliffe trying to use the tools of the enemy against the enemy. He’s the first apparently legitimate pro-Trump guy to ever get into the “intelligence community.”
And hey, who the hell knows? Maybe it’s not a hoax. I might just be completely cynical.
Maybe the Iranians really are pretending to be Proud Boys.
