"This indictment details how two Iran-based actors waged a targeted, coordinated campaign to erode confidence in the integrity of the U.S.
That same month, hackers also allegedly sent intimidating emails to tens of thousands of registered Democrats, threatening them with violence if they didn't switch parties and vote for Trump. An accompanying message warned of Democratic efforts to exploit "serious security vulnerabilities," capitalizing on Trump's rhetoric against mail-in balloting during the 2020 campaign. The video was then distributed in October 2020 to Republican members of the House and Senate, White House officials, former President Donald Trump's re-election campaign, and members of the media.
As part of a broader voter intimidation effort, the department says, the pair posed as a "group of Proud Boys volunteers" and created a fabricated video depicting a person hacking state voter websites and using the information obtained to create fake absentee ballots. The indictment alleges that the duo obtained confidential voter information from at least one state website, while attempting to access several others. "As alleged, Kazemi and Kashian were part of a coordinated conspiracy in which Iranian hackers sought to undermine faith and confidence in the US presidential election," said US Attorney for the Southern District of New York Damian Williams in the press release. The pair posed as Proud Boys - a far-right, all-male American militia group - as part of a "cyber-enabled" campaign to intimidate voters ahead of the 2020 election, according to the department.Ī DOJ press release named Seyyed Mohammad Hosein Musa Kazemi and Sajjad Kashian, two young men based in Iran, as the defendants in the case. The Department of Justice announced on Thursday that it had indicted two Iranian nationals for interfering in the 2020 presidential election.