The leak of emails released by WikiLeaks about failed US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was a "conscious effort" by a nation state to influence the election, the country's cyber security chief has said.
Admiral Michael Rogers, the director of the National Security Agency, told a Wall Street Journal conference the hacking of emails from Mrs Clinton's campaign chairman John Podesta and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) had not been "by chance".
He did not name the state but his comments came after The Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Homeland Security in America last month accused Russia of being behind the leaks.
Read more: The World in the shadow of Trump - When fascism is a fitting word
In response to a question about WikiLeaks, Mr Rogers, who is also the commander of the US Cyber Command, said: "There should be no doubt in anybody's mind, this was not something that was done casually, this was not something that was done by chance, this was not a target that was selected purely arbitrarily.
"This was a conscious effort by a nation state to attempt to achieve a specific effect."
Read more: The World in the shadow of Trump - When fascism is a fitting word
Russia has denied any involvement while the whistleblowing website's founder Julian Assange, who has been living inside the Ecuadorian Embassy in London for over four years, previously defended the release of the emails in statements before polling closed.
He said the source of the emails was not state parties and the website had the right to "receive and impart true information".
Read more: The World in the shadow of Trump - When fascism is a fitting word
Mr Assange, who has since been interviewed by Swedish prosecutors over a sex allegation he denies, said: "No-one disputes the public importance of these publications. It would be unconscionable for WikiLeaks to withhold such an archive from the public during an election."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereLast Updated:
Report this comment Cancel