'Yikes': Unsealed docs reveal CIA officials, Trump advisors 'let hackers into their email accounts'

27 September 2024

On Friday, September 27, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) announced federal charges against three members of Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corp in connection with a cyber attack against members of GOP nominee Donald Trump's 2024 presidential campaign.

DOJ prosecutors allege, in now-unsealed documents, that defendants Masoud Jalili, Seyyed Ali Aghamiri and Yasar Balaghi were part of a "wide-ranging hacking campaign that used spearphishing and social engineering techniques to target and compromise the accounts of current and former U.S. government officials, members of the media, nongovernmental organizations, and individuals associated with U.S. political campaigns."

The charges include, among others, wire fraud, identity theft, and conspiracy to provide material support to a terrorist organization.

The indictment is inspiring a lot of discussion on X, formerly Twitter.

Politico's Kyle Cheney listed "people/organizations" who "the hacking operation successfully compromised" — to which U.S. News & World Report's Olivier Knox responded, "there but for the grace of God and all that but the former US national security folks yikes."

Cheney also explained, "The Iranian operation got debate prep material, info on Trump's potential VPs and contacts with an official of another (suspended) GOP presidential campaign." And the Politico reporter tweeted descriptions of "the Trump campaign-related victims of the hacking/phishing operation."

CNN's Edward-Isaac Dovere, meanwhile, tweeted, "among the people who inadvertently let hackers into their email accounts: a former homeland security advisor to a president, a former senior official at the CIA, a former deputy director of the CIA."

John Bresnahan, co-founder of Punchbowl News, posted, "CIA officials!"

The Democratic group Blue Georgia said of the people described in DOC documents, "Curious which one is Roger Stone?"

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