Undeniable: The Russian hacking pattern

Moon of Alabama
Thu, 06 Jul 2017 19:21 UTC

© Jeff Darcy, Cleveland.com

A wide review of news sources finds an undeniable patter of international "Russian hacking" claims:

• Many, if not all such accusations, are based on say-so by some anonymous "official" or self-promoting "expert".
• Many, if not all such accusations, are rebutted within a few days or weeks.
• News about any alleged "Russian hacking" is widely distributed and easy to find.
• News of the debunking of such claims is reported only sparsely (if at all) and more difficult to retrieve.

Examples:

Ukraine

• Russia hacked into Ukraine artillery units, report claims, CBCnews - Dec 22 2016
• Ukraine's military denies Russian hack attack, AFP - Jan 6 2017

United States

• Russian operation hacked a Vermont utility, showing risk to U.S. electrical grid security, officials say, WaPo - Dec 31 2016
• Russian government hackers do not appear to have targeted Vermont utility, say people close to investigation, WaPo - Jan 2 2017

Germany

• Sicherheitskreise: Russland hackte geheime Bundestagsakten (Russia hacked secret parliament papers), FAZ - Dec 11 2016
• Quelle für Enthüllungen im Bundestag vermutet (Internal source suspected in parliament leaks), FAZ - Dec 17 2016

Germany

• Russian Hackers Are Targeting Germany Now, Too, Wired - Dec 10 2016
• German Intelligence Agencies Find No Evidence Of Russian Interference, Newsweek - Feb 7 2017

France

• Cyberattack on French presidential front-runner bears Russian 'fingerprints,' research group says, WaPo - Apr 25 2017
• France Says No Trace of Russian Hacking Macron, AP - Jun 1 2017

Qatar

• CNN Exclusive: US suspects Russian hackers planted fake news behind Qatar crisis, CNN - Jun 7, 2017
• Qatar says news agency hacking linked to states boycotting Doha, Reuters - Jun 20 2017

United Kingdom

• Cyber-attack on UK parliament: Russia is suspected culprit, Guardian - Jun 25 2017
• Private not state hackers likely to have targeted UK parliament: sources, Reuters - Jul 6 2017

The undeniable pattern of "Russian hacking" is that any claim thereof is likely not true and will be debunked in due time.

These remarks on the "Russian hacking" allegation in relation to the U.S. election are therefore quite appropriate:

President Trump again cast a skeptical eye on intelligence community assessments that Russia interfered with the 2016 presidential election, saying Thursday while on a visit to Poland that "nobody really knows for sure" what happened.
...
Trump also compared the intelligence about Russian interference with the faulty assessment that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction in 2002, which provided President Bush with a justification to go to war.

"Guess what, they were wrong, and that led to one big mess," he said.