The website Savannah Time describes itself as “your trusted source for conservative news and perspectives in the vibrant city of Savannah.” Another site, NioThinker, wants to be “your destination for insightful, progressive news.” Online outlet Westland Sun caters to Muslims in suburban Detroit.
Nothing is what they seem. Instead, they are an intensified campaign by Iran to influence this year’s US presidential election, US officials and tech company analysts say.
Iran has long conducted intelligence operations against its adversaries, particularly Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the United States, but until now most of its activities were conducted under the shadow of similar campaigns by Russia and China. Its latest propaganda and disinformation efforts have become more brazen, more varied and more ambitious, according to the US government, company officials and Iran experts.
According to officials and companies, Iran’s efforts to prevent former President Donald J. The attacks appear aimed at undermining Trump’s campaign to return to the White House, but they have also targeted President Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, suggesting internal discord and a broader goal to discredit. The democratic system in the United States is more widespread in the eyes of the world.
“Iran is becoming increasingly aggressive in its foreign influence efforts, seeking to sow discord and undermine confidence in our democratic institutions,” said Avril Haynes, director of national intelligence. warned Recently.
Ms. Haines warned Americans to be cautious “as they engage online with accounts and actors they don’t know personally.”
Her office last month joined the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency on the issue. A statement noted that “Iran views this year’s elections as particularly consequential in terms of how they may affect its national security interests, increasing Tehran’s inclination to try to shape the outcome.”
Iran’s mission to the United Nations declined to comment on disinformation campaigns and websites targeting the United States. Addressing an earlier statement issued on 19 August Attempts to hack Mr. Trump’s campaignThe mission said the allegations were “unsubstantiated and devoid of any standing” and that Iran “neither intended nor intended to interfere in the US presidential election.”
Iran’s vast network of influential operatives and hackers includes front companies controlled by the Revolutionary Guards Corps, an Iranian official and another Iranian who works in the state’s media and information sector, both familiar with the country’s defilement campaigns. Both asked not to be named because they are not authorized to speak publicly. The Revolutionary Guards Corps is a powerful and elite force in every sphere of the country, including the economy, politics and cyberspace.
The government and the Guards also operate a network of individuals who use social media platforms to promote Iran’s views, some under assumed names. They also commission projects from tech firms and start-ups in Iran, some of whom are not fully aware of the true intentions of the projects, officials said.
Two Iranians – one a member of the Guards – said Iran’s government had already increased significant resources in its information operations since 2022, when women-led protests rocked the nation. Government agents, they said, regularly scout Iranian universities to recruit top tech graduates by offering them high salaries, research funding and office space.
“Iran’s strategy in information and propaganda is similar to how the Revolutionary Guards operate proxy militias throughout the Middle East,” said Amir Rashidi, director of digital rights and security at the Mian Group, a human rights organization focused on the Middle East. . “They are slowly but surely infiltrating and playing the long game.”
Already this year, Iranian operatives have succeeded Email hacking Roger Stone, a longtime adviser to Mr. Trump, tried to infiltrate the campaigns of Mr. Biden and Ms. Harris, with mixed results. Meta revealed last month that he had found out same effort Both against political campaigns on WhatsApp, the messaging app.
Oct. Iran’s focus on the United States intensified after Israel, an American ally, invaded Gaza after a Hamas attack on 7 Since then, Israel has also exchanged fire with Hezbollah in Lebanon. Both movements are part of a network of Iranian-backed militias across the Middle East.
Across the United States this spring, Iran also used social media to fuel student-organized protests against Israel’s war in Gaza, with operatives providing financial support and posing as students, according to American intelligence assessments.
Iran has denied joining the protests, although the country’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei encouraged them in an open letter.
Since the Islamic Republic’s inception in 1979, disinformation and propaganda have been a key part of the regime’s identity. As technology evolved, so did Iran’s tactics and ambitions, with Mr. Khamenei in 2011 describing cyberspace as a new frontier for Iran’s information “jihad,” or warfare.
That year, he ordered the formation of the Supreme Council for Cyberspace, a policy-making body. He called on the Iranian government and armed forces to work with the council – which was convened Human rights groups To further the country’s interests and Islamic ideology – as a state instrument for oppression.
“Iran basically shifted its strong existing infrastructure and mindset of disinformation from traditional media tools to cyberspace and in the process globalized its mission,” said Omid Memrian, an Iran expert for Dawn, a Washington-based advocacy group who has researched disinformation. .
However, prior to 2020, Iran showed little interest in directly influencing American elections A report published earlier that year by the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensic Research Lab.
That began to change after President Trump unilaterally pulled out of the 2015 nuclear deal between Iran and world powers and imposed severe economic sanctions. Mr. Trump also ordered an assassination in Baghdad in 2020 Major again. Qasim SoleimaniWho led the Revolutionary Guards powerfully Quds Force.
Since then, influence operations involving Iran have accelerated, Microsoft noted A report last year. The company’s researchers identified seven different campaigns in 2021; A year later there were 24.
Clint Watts, director of Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center, A report warned Last month that an Iranian operation has been preparing activities in the United States since March “that are more extreme.” It includes inciting violence against political individuals or groups so as to cast doubt on the outcome of the election.
At least five deceptive websites have emerged to feed American voters a steady diet of content aimed at undermining support for Israel and faith in US democracy more broadly, according to Microsoft and OpenAI, which detected the use of its artificial intelligence tools in the efforts.
Iran’s intelligence efforts have largely targeted Mr. Trump. An article on NioThinker, a liberal-leaning site linked to Microsoft’s Iran efforts, described the former president as an “opioid-peeled elephant in a MAGA china shop” and a “raving mad litigosaur.”
The Iranian campaign, however, has also targeted Democrats. A recent headline in the Savannah Times, which has no apparent connection to the city in Georgia, warned that Ms. Harris represented a “dangerous flirtation with communist-style price controls.” Its content often echoes that of conservative news outlets in the United States, which rail against policies that support LGBTQ or other gender issues.
Two Iranian officials said Iran was largely unconcerned with the eventual winner in November and believed Washington’s animosity exceeded that of any political party. The larger goal, they said, was to sow unrest, deepen polarization and position Iran as a geopolitical power alongside Russia and China.
Iran has also accused both the United States and Israel of running disinformation campaigns aimed at destabilizing the country. It has been the target of cyber attacks from both countries, including on Military ship and its countryside Fuel delivery system.
Iran’s influence efforts are recalled by Russia, which hacked Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign in 2016 and carried out influence operations on social media. In the 2020 presidential election, Iran obtained American voter registration data and used it to send. Scary, fake emails For democratic voters. Some of the messages purported to be from Proud Boys, a far-right extremist group, while others contained links to it. A misleading video which sought to dispel fans’ doubts about mail-in voting.
A Uncategorized Intelligence Assessment 2021 found that Iran sought to undermine Mr. Trump’s election prospects and discredit the democratic process with the larger aim of damaging the perception of the United States in the Middle East.
During the midterm elections in 2022, Iran tried to interfere once again, hoping to “exploit perceived social divisions,” according to another. Declassified Intelligence Report. Experts have found evidence that Iranian officials intend to use social media to strengthen nationalist groups and pit extremists against each other in 2024.
According to the intelligence assessment, Iran also considered tactics such as setting up fake news agencies and deploying “troll teams” on social media to interact with American media outlets.
Twitter, the platform later renamed X, found Three Iran-based influence networks In October 2022, according to the assessment. They were mostly made up of accounts pretending to be left-leaning Americans who espoused pro-Palestinian sentiments and attempted to raise funds for American candidates and support local politicians, usually progressives.
“They can be quite creative,” John Hultquist, principal analyst at Google’s Mendiant Intelligence, said of Iran’s information operations.
Tehran’s covert influence operations are mostly carried out by units within the Guards. The United States government has identified at least three front companies it says are controlled by the Guards: the International Union of Virtual Media, the Iranian Islamic Radio and Television Union, and the Bayan Rasneh Gostar Institute.
A help-wanted ad for Bayan Gostar doesn’t describe the type of work the company does, but it says employees can work remotely and receive government pay and benefits. Applicants should be “young and ambitious” and “familiar with cyberspace and social media platforms”.
The Treasury Department imposed sanctions on all three companies ahead of the 2020 election. It specifically accused Bayan Gostar of “exploiting social issues, including the Covid-19 pandemic in the United States, and defaming US political figures”.
Now, with the next American election just weeks away, Iran appears undaunted.
“They’re clearly not worried about a blowback,” said Brett Schaefer, senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund’s Alliance for Securing Democracy. “The risk tolerance is very high and it causes them anxiety, because if they’re not worried about getting caught or being named and shamed, it allows them to just try a bunch of stuff and be very aggressive.”
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