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As Hillary Clinton supporters fret about a WikiLeaks “October surprise,” dozens of defense and security experts from both parties are urging the Obama administration to take tough action if it concludes that Russia orchestrated a series of cyberattacks on the Democrat Party.
But based on past U.S. handling of foreign-sponsored cyberassaults, it could take months or even years to mount such a response — action that could encompass anything from public shaming or economic sanctions to indictments or retaliatory hacking.
Even the most optimistic timeline, according to interviews with former security and law enforcement officials, could delay a forceful U.S. reprisal until just weeks before the very presidential election that the hackers may be trying to influence.
The prospect of a lengthy wait is unnerving for Clinton supporters, who see potential repeats of last month’s mass release of Democrat National Committee emails as one of a handful of unpredictable curveballs that could still toss the White House to Donald Trump. Democrats have charged that the website WikiLeaks dumped the emails as part of a Russian effort to aid Trump, who has praised Putin and expressed doubts about U.S. commitments to allies in Eastern Europe.
Russia has denied having anything to do with the DNC hacks or a separate breach aimed at donors to the Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee.
Clinton supporters worry that Russian-backed hackers may indeed have free rein to try to influence the November election, depending on what information they’ve stolen and when they plan to release it. (Hackers may “salt the files they release with plausible forgeries” to worsen the fallout.)
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange, whose site released the DNC emails July 22, has refused to confirm or deny their origins but has told CNN that he might release “a lot more material," noting that “they are having so much political impact in the United States.”
Democrats like veteran political strategist Craig Varoga can easily see the worst-case scenario. “In all likelihood, Russia and Assange are already planning an October surprise to influence our election and otherwise destabilize the Western alliance,” he said.
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/08/clinton-democrats-hacking-dnc-october-surprise-226743