From Business Insider, June 9:
- Top Senate Democrats are concerned about Russian interference in 2022.
- A group of senators urged leading national security and intelligence officials to stay vigilant.
- The Ukraine war has provided an avenue for Russian disinformation to flourish in the US on the far right.
Leading Senate Democrats are sounding the alarm about Russian interference in the 2022 midterm elections.
A group of 17 Senate Democrats led by Sen. Amy Klobuchar, chairwoman of the Senate Rules Committee and Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, the chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, urged some of the nation's top military, intelligence, and national security officials to stay vigilant against interference in a new letter obtained by Insider.
"As the Russian invasion of Ukraine has led to an increase in Russian disinformation and warnings of potential cyberattacks, we urge you to ensure that your agencies are prepared to quickly and effectively counter Russian influence campaigns targeting the 2022 elections," the senators wrote in Thursday's letter.
The letter also cites an Insider report from March on how Putin's missteps in Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which has staunchly united the West and bolstered the NATO alliance while isolating Moscow economically and politically, could spur the Kremlin to redouble its efforts in undermining Western democracy through both cyberhacking and disinformation operations that are far cheaper to carry out than a land war on the scale of the Ukraine invasion.
"Manipulating social media is incredibly inexpensive compared to Javelins and ammunition," Chris Rouland, the CEO of Phosphorus Cybersecurity, told Insider. "If anything, Russia would get more aggressive in its manipulation of social media because it's almost free compared to a tank."
Ex-NSA hacker David Kennedy, the CEO of TrustedSec, told Insider that "Putin and the intelligence agencies are going to look at how to cause as much damage as possible" through cyber operations.
He added that the US in particular is a "ripe target" for continued Russian interference efforts because of the major impact Russia had in influencing the 2016 election....
....MUCH MORE
Here is the letter, (4 page PDF)
