Russia Says It Was Never Involved in Hacker Attacks Against U.S.

The Kremlin on Monday refuted accusations of Russia’s involvement in hacker attacks during the U.S. 2016 presidential election, saying that it was a “tiresome witch-hunt.’’

“We continue to categorically rule out any involvement of Moscow and Russian officials and agencies in any hacker attacks,’’ Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said.

Earlier this month, the U.S. intelligence community published the declassified part of the report.

“Assessing Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent U.S. Elections,’’ claiming that “Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the U.S. presidential election.’’

The report said Moscow’s action aimed to “undermine public faith in the U.S. democratic process,’’ via Russian government agencies, state-funded media, paid social media users as well as hackers, in order to secure Donald Trump’s victory in the presidential election.

Peskov said that the allegations in the U.S. intelligence community publication had no proof and had been prepared at an “amateur, emotional level,’’ which was hardly applicable to the highly professional work of high-quality security services.

On Sunday, the Trump team said Trump had accepted the U.S. intelligence community’s findings that Russia was behind the cyber attacks targeting the presidential election, accusations that Trump had also repeatedly rebuffed.

But Trump has said that the alleged hacking activities have no impact on the election results and he didn’t directly acknowledge Moscow’s responsibility.

WikiLeaks has also rejected the intelligence report that Russia passed on leaked information to the whistle-blowing site as part of efforts to influence the recent U.S. elections.

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange dismissed a report published on Friday by the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency as “embarrassing’’ and said it lacked evidence.

The report was an example of how “the U.S. intelligence services have been politicised by the Obama administration,’’ Assange said.

Assange said WikiLeaks was careful to protect its sources, however, the information it published, including emails and documents from the U.S. Democratic Party and John Podesta, Head of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, were from sources that “were not a state party.’’

“If our source were a state, we would have a lot less concern in attempting to protect them,’’ he said.

Assange urged current members in charge of U.S. government computer servers to download and protect materials that otherwise risked “mass destruction’’ during the transition to the new administration under Donald Trump.

“Our philosophy is that such information is a part of history,’’ he said.

Assange also said he doubted that whistle-blowers would be safe under a Trump administration, and rejected claims that WikiLeaks had refrained from publishing leaked information from the Republican National Committee.