Top line
Groups linked to the Iranian government are currently attempting to interfere in the US presidential election through large-scale online disinformation campaigns and hacking attacks on high-ranking campaign officials, Microsoft researchers said in a report published Friday.
In June, hackers reportedly backed by the Iranian military attacked a senior presidential campaign official. … (+)
Key data
According to the report, an Iranian group called Storm-2035 has launched several fake news websites that target voters on both the left and right with “polarizing messages on issues such as the US presidential candidates, LGBTQ rights and the Israel-Hamas conflict.”
Examples of such websites highlighted in the report include a site called “Nio Thinker,” which targets liberals with attacks on Trump, and another site called “Savannah Time,” which targets conservatives and addresses LGBTQ issues, “particularly gender reassignment.”
Microsoft researchers say they have found evidence that these websites are “using AI-powered services to plagiarize at least some of their content from U.S. publications” and using other AI tools to increase their reach in search engines.
Another Iran-linked group called Sefid Flood began election interference operations in March and specializes, among other things, in posing as social and political activist groups to “sow doubt about the integrity of the elections” and call for violence against politicians.
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News Peg
In addition to online disinformation, the election interference campaign also included hacking attacks by groups with ties to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC). In June, the IRGC-backed hacker group Mint Sandstorm sent a spear phishing email to a senior official of an unnamed presidential campaign, using the compromised email ID of a former senior adviser. Spear phishing is a targeted attack that aims to steal sensitive information by tricking the victim into opening a malicious link or file. In this case, the phishing email contained a fake hyperlink that redirected the target to a domain controlled by the hacker before redirecting them to the actual website mentioned in the link. Mint Sandstorm also attempted unsuccessfully to access the account of an unnamed former presidential candidate.
tangent
In May, another IRGC-affiliated hacker group, Peach Sandstorm, compromised a user account at a district government in a swing state. The report notes that the compromised account had minimal access privileges and researchers did not observe any privilege escalation – which would have targeted more sensitive accounts or data.
More information
Microsoft finds Russian influence operations on US elections have begun (Reuters)
