Clinton’s charity foundation is targeted by ‘Russian government’ hackers in new cyber cold war ahead of the U.S. election
Documents released in the hack have revealed a dossier of bad news headlines for the presidential candidate's foundation
US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton’s foundation has been breached by suspected Russian hackers with the leaked information revealing her own party researched her “vulnerabilities”.
The files, among 261 documents released in the hack, revealed the Democratic National Committee had developed a list of the news stories that could threaten the presidential candidate.
One of the folders, released by the hacker Guccifer 2.0, was named: “Clinton Foundation Vulnerabilities Master Doc FINAL.”
The folder contained a 42-page document that listed negative headlines addressing Clinton’s foundation.
One headline read: “The Wall Street Journal tied foreign government donors to the Clinton Foundation's endowment fundraising under Secretary Clinton”.
Another section read: “Reports that State Department lawyers did not exhaustively vet Bill Clinton's paid speeches during Secretary Clinton's tenure raised questions about the role Clinton Foundation donations may have played in organizing those speeches.”
A third read: “The Clinton Foundation has accepted donations from individuals, some of whom had ties to foreign governments, during her tenure as secretary of state.”
The Bill, Hillary and Chelsea Clinton Foundation was just one of the suspected 4000 individuals associated with US politics to be targeted in the hack with Russian hackers blamed after similar attacks during the year.
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One DNC official reportedly said: “Our experts are confident in their assessment that the Russian government hackers were the actors responsible for the breach detected in April, and we believe that the subsequent release and the claims around it may be a part of a disinformation campaign by the Russians.”
More than 250 files were distributed, with the documents appearing to have been prepared by DNC research staff.
The breach, which is understood to have been first noticed last week, also released documents including Clinton’s tax returns, personal financial disclosure reports, and US Senate travel records.
Clinton Foundation officials said the organisation had not been informed of a breach and declined to comment.
Concerns around Clinton’s digital security have now been heightened as the FBI continues to investigate the presidential candidate’s use of a personal e-mail server while she was secretary of state.
The DNC did not comment on the authenticity of the document drop.
Self-proclaimed “hacktivist” Guccifer 2.0 claimed the attack, telling The Smoking Gun that he was an “unknown hacker with a laptop” with “a lot of fans”.
He said he was not from Russia but was from Romania, claiming he was a freedom fighter.
