The committee traditionally has advised the DNI on foreign attempts to thwart U.S. intelligence through trickery. But in the cyber era, the committee has increasingly looked at how nation states use computer attacks to conduct espionage and spread propaganda. Russia, China, North Korea, Iran are primary subjects, the officials said. The consensus among U.S. intelligence analysts is that Russia is seeking to undermine confidence in the U.S. system, using the hacks into the Democratic National Committee, state election systems and other targets that have yet to be made public, as part of a larger campaign. Whether Russia can directly manipulate voting machines or “hack” into election systems, they say, is not clear and is mainly outside the jurisdiction of U.S. intelligence. Intelligence analysts are uncertain about the Russian government’s intentions relating to U.S. politics, but they don’t believe Russia is actively trying to favor Republican Donald Trump, as some have suggested. Instead, Russia may be trying to foment chaos. “Let’s just throw some spaghetti on the wall, and whatever sticks, sticks,” said one senior Congressional aide briefed on intelligence, describing a likely scenario.
The latest Russian hacks became public this week with the news that two state election systems, in Illinois and Arizona, were targeted.
Illinois officials said in July that they shut down their state’s voter registration after a hack. State officials said Monday the hackers downloaded information on as many 200,000 people.
In Arizona, “a known Russian hacker was able to capture the user name and password of a county election employee and they posted that user name and password online,” Matt Roberts, a spokesman for the secretary of state’s office, told NBC News. The password was used in an attempt to breach the voter registration file, but it wasn’t successful, he said.
Full Article: White House Asks ‘Deception Committee’ to Study Russian Hacks – NBC News.