Washington, Oct 22,2020: United States national security officials have reported Iran and Russia have obtained some of the country’s voter registration information and held the former responsible for sending threatening emails to Democratic voters.
The emails appeared to come from a far-right pro-Trump group and were meant to “incite unrest”, BBC quoted National Intelligence Director John Ratcliffe said.
The announcement comes 13 days before the presidential election.
The unusual intelligence briefing this close to the vote is seen as a testament to the government’s concerns over voting interference and disinformation campaigns from foreign actors.
Mr Ratcliffe said Iran’s “spoof emails” claimed to be sent by the Proud Boys in order to “intimidate voters, incite unrest and damage” President Donald Trump.
The emails in question were addressed to registered Democratic voters in several states, including the key battleground of Florida, and urged them to vote for Mr Trump – or else.
“You will vote for Trump on Election Day or we will come after you,” the emails said, according to US media.
“Change your party affiliation to Republican to let us know you received our message and will comply,” the message further read.
As of Wednesday, over 40 million Americans have cast early votes in the presidential contest between Mr Trump and Democrat Joe Biden.
In many states, voter data is available upon request, though each state has different requirements on who can request voter information, what data is available and how this data might be used, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
“If you receive an intimidating or manipulative email in your inbox, don’t be alarmed and do not spread it,” Mr Ratcliffe said, calling the actions to influence US voters “desperate attempts by desperate adversaries”.
This announcement inevitably has shades of the 2016 Russian interference in the US election.
In that election thousands of fake bots were created on social media pretending to be American voters.
Democrat computer systems were also hacked.
From this announcement though it’s unclear how Iran and Russia obtained the information – and exactly what info they have.
