Ever since Donald Trump became the President of the United States, the United States intelligence establishment announced that there had been Russian interference in the elections; almost all hacks related to elections are suspected to be Russian in nature. The recent FBI investigations into Russian collusion related to the Trump campaign has been a hot button issue for a long time now.
No Russian hacking connection in French elections
In the French Presidential election that took place earlier this year, there was a widespread belief that the leaks emanating from Emmanuel Macron's camp were linked to Russian hackers.
However, those fears have now been dismissed by the French cyber security authorities.
Russian hackers hacked the servers of the Democratic National Committee and leaked e-mails that many believe eventually led to the loss of Hillary Clinton last November. In such a climate, it was only natural to think that Emmanuel Macron, whose politics are not aligned with that of Russia, would be targeted, and sure enough, there were leaks from inside his campaign. However, the French authorities have cleared Russia of any wrongdoing in this matter and stated that the hacks were probably conducted by an amateur who did not have the sort of expertise that the Russian hackers are known to possess.
A widespread belief laid to rest of potential Russian hacking
The chief of the cyber security agency of France, Guillaume Poupard, spoke to the Associated Press, saying that Russia was not involved in the hacking that recently took place. At the time, it was widely believed that the leaked documents from Macron's campaign was the handiwork of the dreaded Russian group of hackers, who go by the moniker Apt 28.
It was the same group that has been accused by US security agencies of having coordinated the DNC hack.
The cyber security experts working under Guillaume Poupard got to work as soon as the leaks took place toward the concluding stages of the election, and hence, there was the belief that Apt 28 could be responsible. However, Poupard stated that the whole thing was done in a way that was too easy for the cyber security experts to track and it is impossible for them to trace the hack to any particular country. More importantly, he stated that the hack was conducted by one person and a hacking group was not involved in any way whatsoever. Macron won the election handsomely.
