The Russia connectionU.S. intel chief on Russia’s unrelenting cyberattacks: “The warning lights are blinking red”

Published 16 July 2018

Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said Friday that the U.S. digital infrastructure “is literally under attack” by Russia. “These actions are persistent, they’re pervasive, and they are meant to undermine America’s democracy on a daily basis, regardless of whether it is election time or not.” Coats emphasized that Russia’s hostile cyber activities go beyond targeting elections and sowing division, to attempts to target vulnerabilities in critical U.S. infrastructure, trying to infiltrate energy, water, nuclear, and manufacturing sectors. He compared today’s warning indicators related to Russian cyberattacks to the warning indicators in the run-up to 9/11. “It was in the months prior to September 2001, when according to then-CIA director George Tenet, the system was blinking red,” he said. “And here we are nearly two decades later, and I’m here to say the warning lights are blinking red again.”

The U.S. digital infrastructure “is literally under attack,” Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said Friday. Russia is the most aggressive foreign actor, he said, intent on undermining U.S. democracy.

Coats’s remarks, delivered Friday at the Hudson Institute in Washington, D.C., came only few hours after the Department of Justice announced charges against twelve high-level Russian intelligence officials over their successful efforts to hack into the DCCC, the DNC, and Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. The Russian intelligence operatives then closely coordinated with Wikileaks the publication of the more damaging emails and documents stolen. The publication of the stolen material was scheduled so as to inflict the maximum damage on the Clinton campaign.

The hacking campaign, for which the twelve senior GRU (Russian military intelligence) officers were indicted, was part of a broad and effective hacking and disinformation campaign initiated by the Kremlin in early 2016 to help Donald Trump, the Kremlin’s favored candidate, win the Republican nomination and, in November, the presidency.

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Also read:

“Russia’s ‘malign activity’ aims to ‘degrade our democratic values and weaken our alliances’: Dan Coats,” HSNW, 14 June 2018

U.S. intel chiefs warn Russia intending to meddle in midterm elections,” HSNW, 14 February 2018

“Trump has not ordered disruption of Russia election meddling: NSA chief Adm. Rogers,” HSNW, 28 February 2018

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Coats, referring to Russia’s sustained cyberattacks on the United States, said: “These actions are persistent, they’re pervasive, and they are meant to undermine America’s democracy on a daily basis, regardless of whether it is election time or not.”

He compared today’s warning indicators related to Russian cyberattacks to the warning indicators in the run-up to 9/11. “It was in the months prior to September 2001, when according to then-CIA director George Tenet, the system was blinking red,” he said. “And here we are nearly two decades later, and I’m here to say the warning lights are blinking red again.”

The United States is facing cyberthreats which emanate from terrorist groups, criminal organizations, and foreign states like Russia, China, Iran, and North Korea, Coats said. Every day, those countries “are penetrating our digital infrastructure and conducting a range of cyber intrusions and attacks against targets in the United States,” he said.