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22:13 GMT
WASHINGTON, Sept 17 (KUNA) -- Director of the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Christopher Wray said Thursday that Russian agents were trying to undermine Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden in the lead-up to the November election.
Wray said during testimony before the House Homeland Security Committee that "the intelligence community's assessment is that Russia continues to try to influence our election, primarily through what we would call malign foreign influence."
"We certainly have seen very active efforts by the Russians to influence our elections in 2020 through what I would call more the malign influence side of things, social media, use of proxies, state media, online journals, etc.
In an effort to both sow divisiveness and discord, and primarily to denigrate Vice President Biden and what the Russians see as an anti-Russian establishment.
I think in many ways what concerns me the most is the steady drumbeat of misinformation and amplification of smaller cyber intrusions that contribute over time, I worry they will contribute over time to a lack of confidence of American voters and citizens in the validity of their vote," Wray added.
Meanwhile, former FBI director James Comey, whose investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails shook the final days of the 2016 presidential campaign, will testify to Congress later this month about his role in a probe of Russian election interference. (end)
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