Mueller indicts 12 Russian military intel officers for DNC hacks
 

Mueller indicts 12 Russian military intel officers for DNC hacks
by Teri Robinson, Executive Editor - 7-13-18
RE: https://www.scmagazine.com/mueller-i...rticle/780712/

Special Counsel Robert Mueller today indicted 12 Russian military officers, part of Russia's GRU military intelligence unit, for hacking into the Democratic National Committee (DNC) systems in an effort to influence the 2016 presidential election.

The fruits of those break-ins - a trove of documents - were spread under the auspices of Guccifer 2.0 and DCLeaks, according to Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who revealed the indictments Friday, which included 11 counts, after a grand jury handed them down.

The indictments come as President Trump prepares to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Helsinki July 16. Trump who has rebuffed U.S. intelligence showing Russian interference in the election and has decried the Mueller probe as a witch hunt, has said he will again broach the issue of Russia's interference at the Helsinki summit. He has previously said he believes the Russian president's denials that he was behind the country's nefarious cyberactivities.

“President Trump should cancel his meeting with Vladimir Putin until Russia takes demonstrable and transparent steps to prove that they won't interfere in future elections,” Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.,said in a statement, noting that “glad-handing” with Putin in the wake of the indictments “would be an insult to our democracy.”
But Rosenstein said, “There is no allegation in this indictment that any American citizen committed a crime. There is no allegation that the conspiracy altered the vote count or changed any election result.”

The indictment did say that on the same day that candidate Trump at a rally called for Russia to hand over Hillary Clinton's emails, Russian operatives “attempted after hours to spearphish for the first time email accounts at a domain hosted by a third-party provider and used by Clinton's personal office.” What's more, “at or about the same time, they also targeted seventy-six email addresses at the domain for the Clinton campaign,” the document said.