© Dado Ruvic / Reuters
The FBI took months to warn Democratic Party officials that a malicious hack into the national political committee’s email network was being probed as possible Russian espionage, sources told Reuters. Agents reportedly contacted party officials last fall but did not share all of the available information, leaving them vulnerable to further hacking during a critical time in the presidential campaign, those sources said. In contacts with agents, the Democratic National Committee was reportedly told to look for signs of unusual activity within its computer network but wasn’t given more details or the context of the concerns. Agents reportedly suspected the DNC was the target of a cyberattack by the Russian government long before party leaders were aware, unidentified sources told Reuters. Had they known, staffers could have taken steps to at least significantly reduce the number of documents stolen. Attackers had access to the DNC emails and documents, as well as the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee network as recently as June. Emails acquired in the hack were leaked just before the Democratic National Convention last week.