Russia played a role in Emmanuel Macron’s email hack

Hackers with connections to the Russian government played a role in the hack that captured and leaked emails from the campaign team of future French President Macron just before election day. That’s what two sources within an American intelligence agency say.

Both unspecified sources and four others familiar with US intelligence admit that they have no definitive proof that the Kremlin actually ordered the hack, or that the Kremlin directed or staged it. One of the sources says they know with certainty that the hack was carried out by a group with ties to the Russian intelligence service. That reports Reuters news agency.

Macron’s campaign manager Mounir Mahjoubi also says he has no evidence to support the claim that Russian government-sponsored hackers were behind the hack. Mahjoubi says he has no precise information about who is behind it. The Russian government denies being responsible for the hack.

Over the weekend, it became clear that hackers had managed to loot emails from the campaign team of now president-elect Emmanuel Macron. His emails were leaked just before Election Day. A user named Emleaks released the emails on Pastebin, but it remains unclear who was behind the theft.

Admiral Mike Rogers, the director of US intelligence, has warned the French that the Russians were involved in a possible hack. Rogers told the US Senate that the US was aware of Russian interference in the French elections well before the hack and leak.

An American security company, Flashpoint, previously said there was evidence that the leaking of the emails was the work of a group known as APT 28, or Fancy Bear. This group is said to have been associated with Russian military intelligence. Fancy Bear is partly responsible for the hack on the Democratic Party during the 2016 US presidential election, according to the FBI and the US Department of Homeland Security.