US charges 6 Russians in vast hacking campaign

(19 Oct 2020) FOR CLEAN VERSION SEE STORY NUMBER: 4293406 Six current and former Russian military officers sought to disrupt through computer hacking the French election, the Winter Olympics and U.S. hospitals and businesses, according to a Justice Department indictment unsealed Monday that details destructive attacks on a broad range of political, financial and athletic targets. The indictment accuses the defendants, all alleged officers in the Russian military agency known as the GRU, in destructive attacks on Ukraine's power grid; in a hack-and-leak effort directed at the political party of French President Emmanuel Macron in the days leading up to the 2017 election; and to impede an investigation into the suspected nerve-agent poisoning of a former spy and his daughter. The indictment does not charge the defendants in connection with interference in American elections, though the officers are part of the same military intelligence unit that prosecutors say interfered in the 2016 U.S. presidential election by hacking Democratic email accounts. The 50-page indictment, filed in federal court in Pittsburgh, focuses instead on attacks that prosecutors said were aimed at promoting Russian's own geopolitical interests. Those include cyberattacks that targeted the 2018 Winter Olympics in South Korea, where Russian athletes were banned because of a state-sponsored doping effort. Find out more about AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/HowWeWork Twitter:   / ap_archive   Facebook:   / aparchives   ​​ Instagram:   / apnews   You can license this story through AP Archive: http://www.aparchive.com/metadata/you...