Putin on the March by Douglas E. Schoen

Author:Douglas E. Schoen
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781594039980
Publisher: Encounter Books
Published: 2017-10-20T04:00:00+00:00

Putin’s cyberwarriors have also busily intrigued in Europe, especially in the many critical elections that have taken place on the continent in 2017 and other political processes. In attacks from country to country, evidence points in the direction of Moscow’s hacking expertise. Some observers think that Russian hackers may have played a role, or tried to play a role, in Britain’s 2016 Brexit vote—an outcome favorable to Moscow.

The broad consensus among intelligence officials is that Russian hackers were quite active in the US presidential election later that year. And it seems that the warning that American intelligence officials sent in a postelection report—that Moscow “will apply lessons learned from its Putin-ordered campaign aimed at the US presidential election to future efforts worldwide”—has already come to pass in 2017.7

“German, French, British and Dutch security officials have all told me they’ve seen evidence of Russian efforts to influence their elections,” cybersecurity expert James Lewis told the Hill. “It’s not hypothetical.”8

In February 2017, the Moscow Times reported that Russia had created “a new military unit to conduct ‘information operations’ against Russia’s foes.”9 That sounds unambiguous, and Russian defense minister Sergei Shoigu helpfully offered more clarity when he said “propaganda should be smart, competent and effective.”10 There’s no concrete evidence yet, but it appears that Russia attempted to destabilize the French elections in May 2017. As I was writing the manuscript in summer 2017, much speculation surrounded what role Russian hackers might play in the critical German elections of September 2017. Already, cyberwarfare had been making its presence felt as Chancellor Angela Merkel fought for her political future and for the vision of European unity with which she is so closely associated—a vision deeply at odds with the nationalist purposes of Vladimir Putin, with whom she has had a fraught relationship.

Trend Micro, a cybersecurity firm, released a report in April 2017 detailing how Russian hackers were setting their sights on the European elections. The firm found evidence of hacker intrusion into the servers of a German think tank closely associated with Merkel’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party. The hackers’ method was the familiar one of spear phishing.

In Holland, where in March 2017 Prime Minister Mark Rutte held off the challenge of nationalist Geert Wilders, security officials reported “hundreds” of attempts by hackers to break into the e-mail accounts of government officials.11 In Bulgaria, officials believe that Moscow used fake news and other online ploys to swing the country’s November 2016 election toward the victor and pro-Putin candidate, Rumen Radev.

Moscow’s biggest focus seems to have been on the French elections, in which, by multiple accounts, the Russians took audacious steps of cybermischief. In the run-up to the general election on May 2, 2017, Moscow’s cybersoldiers tried to break into the e-mail account of the frontrunner and eventual winner, Emmanuel Macron. Again, the method was spear phishing via e-mail. Macron’s campaign manager believes that the hackers made “hundreds, if not thousands” of assaults on the campaign’s databases and servers.12 It’s not surprising that they targeted Macron, who sees the EU as a bulwark against Russian machinations.

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