Security chiefs warn of more Russian meddling in 2018 elections

Russia’s attempts to meddle in US politics pose a serious threat to congressional elections this year.

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats testifies before the Senate Intelligence Committee this week. Picture: Getty Images

Russian attempts to meddle in US politics continue unabated — and pose a threat to mid-term congressional elections in November — US intelligence chiefs said yesterday.

They also said North Korea’s nuclear program poses a potential “existential threat” to the US, and the time is nearing for Washington to respond to that danger.

In a Senate intelligence committee hearing on the most urgent threats facing the country, director of national intelligence Dan Coats and the heads of the CIA, FBI, NSA and two other spy agencies were unanimous in saying Moscow’s efforts to disrupt US politics were as intense now as in the 2016 presidential election.

“Throughout the entire community, we have not seen any evidence of any significant change” in Russian behaviour, Mr Coats said. “There should be no doubt that Russia perceived its past efforts as successful and sees the 2018 US mid-terms elections as a potential target for Russian influence operations.”

CIA director Mike Pompeo said: “We have seen Russian activity and intentions to have an impact on the next election cycle here.”

National Security Agency director Michael Rogers warned: “This is not going to change or stop.”

America’s leading intelligence agencies concluded last year that Russian President Vladimir Putin had directed a broad intelligence effort to influence the 2016 election to undermine the campaign of Democrat Hillary Clinton and boost Donald Trump’s chances.

That effort included hacking and releasing emails and documents from the Clinton campaign, filling social media with posts and “news” items aimed at discrediting her, as well as targeting voter-registration operations and election databases.

Mr Trump has repeatedly dismissed the idea that Moscow helped him — and all allegations of collusion — as “fake news,” and criticised the intelligence agencies for repeating it.

But a large volume of information has surfaced on Russian use of social media to influence public opinion in US public policy debates.

As a result, leading online media companies such as Twitter, Facebook and Google have been forced to begin policing their pages for fake news reports and fake accounts.

“The Russians utilise this tool because it’s relatively cheap, it’s low risk, it offers what they perceive as plausible deniability, and it is proven to be effective at sowing division,” Mr Coats told the Senate panel.

“We expect Russia to continue using propaganda, social media, false-flag personas, sympathetic spokesmen and other means of influence to try to build on its wide range of operations and exacerbate social and political fissures in the United States.”

Mr Coats said North Korean leader Kim Jong-un continued to demonstrate a “provocative nature” and “instability” that made Pyongyang’s nuclear capability more threatening.

“This is an existential threat, potentially to the US, but also to North Korea,” he said.

AFP