Trump team: Data leak after cyberattack by Iranian group

The FBI is investigating a possible hacker attack on the campaign team of Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump. This was confirmed by the domestic intelligence agency on Tuesday. According to a report in the Washington Post, the FBI (Federal Bureau of Investigation) is also investigating a similar incident involving the Democratic campaign team.

"Robert" sends a dossier

The news portal Politico received data from an unknown tipster named "Robert" on the weekend. It is said to contain internal communications from Trump's election campaign team. Other major US media outlets are also said to have been contacted by unknown persons.

A 271-page internal dossier on Trump's vice presidential candidate J.D. Vance is said to have been leaked to the media, which was created as part of the internal party investigation into Vance. The media - including Politico, the New York Times and the Washington Post – have not yet published any details from the dossier.

The Trump team blamed "foreign actors hostile to the US" for the cyberattack and referred to a report by the Microsoft Threat Analysis Center on possible influence on the US elections by foreign forces from China, Russia or Iran.

"Influence by Iranian actors"

"In recent months, we have identified significant influence by Iranian actors," the Microsoft report states. For example, a group of Iranian Revolutionary Guards called "Mint Sandstorm" (also known as Phosphorus, Charming Kitten, APT35, APT42) carried out a spear-phishing attack on "a high-ranking official of an election campaign team" in June.

The same group also unsuccessfully attempted to log into an account "belonging to a former presidential candidate" in June, the report added. According to a CNN report, the FBI, which is responsible for counterintelligence, briefed US President Joe Biden's team in June about the risk of possible Iranian cyberattacks. At the time, Biden was still the presumptive Democratic nominee, but he has since withdrawn from the campaign and recommended his deputy Kamala Harris as the candidate.

The Microsoft report also states that another group with links to the Revolutionary Guards (Peach Sandstorm, APT-33) gained access to a district administration account as part of a widespread password test. According to the Washington Post, the FBI suspects Iranian actors behind the cyberattacks, but it is not clear whether they also sent the emails to the US journalists.

Trump's team is keen to ensure that the loot is not published. "Any media (...) that publishes documents or internal communications is doing the work of America's enemies and exactly what they want", a spokesman said on the weekend. In his second presidential campaign in 2016, the Republican publicly called on Russia to hack his rival Hillary Clinton. Trump celebrated the leak of internal Clinton emails and read excerpts publicly during the election campaign.

(vbr)