US military hackers took Russian troll factory offline during midterms, report claims
Staff based at the US Cyber Command reportedly blocked internet access at the organisation as a warning against interference.
Wednesday 27 February 2019 13:50, UK
US military hackers struck against a Kremlin-linked disinformation firm on the day of the midterms, according to reports.
Last February, the US filed charges against 13 employees of the so-called Internet Research Agency (IRA); a private organisation based in St Petersburg which was accused of illegally interfering in the 2016 election.
The organisation's attempts to interfere in the 2018 midterms were disrupted by a series of actions, including directly messaging its employees, culminating in the strike on the day of the midterms vote, the Washington Post reports.
These staff, as well as others who are believed to work for Russia's military intelligence agency, the GRU, have been receiving messages from US operatives warning them that their identities were known and that they should not interfere in other nations' affairs, according to another report in the New York Times.
Some of the troll factory's staff were so rattled by these messages that an internal investigation was launched to identify possible leakers.
According to several US officials who spoke to the Washington Post, the IRA's internet access was turned off on the day of voting itself by US Cyber Command personnel as a warning about the interference.
"They basically took the IRA offline. They shut them down," one official said, speaking on the condition of anonymity because the operation was classified.
President Trump had given sign-off on the general operation to tackle Russian interference during the midterms, according the report, but it is unlikely to have a significant strategic impact.
"Such an operation would be more of a pinprick that is more annoying than deterring in the long run," Professor Thomas Rid, an expert in strategic-studies at Johns Hopkins University, told the paper.
However other officials spoke highly of the operation, claiming: "Part of our objective is to throw a little curveball, inject a little friction, sow confusion.
"There's value in that. We showed what's in the realm of the possible. It's not the old way of doing business anymore," they added to the paper.
Not all of the defence officials which the newspaper quoted agreed about the value of the operation, however.
"Causing consternation or throwing sand in the gears may raise the cost of engaging in nefarious activities, but it is not going to cause a nation state to just drop their election interference or their malign influence in general," one said.
"It's not going to convince the decision-maker at the top."
According to the charges filed last February, the Internet Research Agency is funded through a catering company owned by Evgeny Prigozhin, who is among the 13 charged in the indictment and is widely considered to be close to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
The Russian government has denied everything.