Gen. Paul Nakasone, commander of the US Cyber Command, during a press briefing on national security at the White House in Washington, DC, on August 2, 2018.

The U.S. Cyber Command has begun contacting individual Russians to deter them from interfering with upcoming American elections, including the November midterms, The New York Times reported on Tuesday, citing officials briefed on the matter.

American defense operatives are telling the Russians that they have been identified and that their work is being tracked. But they are stopping short of issuing direct threats of repercussions, according to the Times.

The limited operation is designed to scare the operatives to prevent election interference without provoking a reprisal from the Russian government that could escalate the situation, such as a cyber-attack on the power grid.

The American cyber campaign, waged by a component of the Department of Defense, is the first known international cyber operation designed to protect American elections. The next national races in the U.S. will take place November 6.

While the operation is seeking to deter disinformation efforts, it is not clear if it is aimed at more overt cybercrimes, like hacking.

During the 2016 presidential election, Russians accused of using several tactics to interfere in American elections, ranging from provocative posts on social media from fake accounts to hacking into the servers owned by the Democratic National Committee. The U.S. intelligence committee says there is no evidence that individual votes were altered due to hacking of election machines.

The defense officials who disclosed the current operation to the Times did not provide details about how the Cyber Command is contacting the Russians it is tracking, or how many individuals it has targeted.

Other officials, according to the newspaper, said that the operation was targeting suspected computer criminals working for organizations funded by wealthy Russians as well as those employed by the country's intelligence services.

In a statement, Joseph Holstead, a spokesperson for the Cyber Command, declined to discuss "classified planning or operations."

"The U.S. government leadership has made it clear that it will not accept any foreign interference, or attempts to undermine or manipulate our elections in any way," he said. "This includes the whole of government effort to protect election infrastructure and prevent malign, covert election influence operations."

Officials have grown increasingly worried about foreign efforts to sow discord in U.S. elections following an assessment from the intelligence community that concluded that the Russian government interfered with the 2016 presidential election.

The Justice Department has obtained indictments against dozens of Russian nationals, and a number of Russian organizations, accusing them of crimes related to election interference. No verdict has been reached in any of those cases.

Last month, John Bolton, the National Security Advisor, said that the White House had loosened up Obama-era restrictions on American cyber capabilities. In August, Trump signed a secretive order that apparently reversed a number of those restrictions and granted the government more leeway to go on the offense. The White House has also delegated more power to Gen. Paul Nakasone, who took over the Cyber Command in May.

On Friday, the DOJ brought its first case related to election interference in the upcoming midterms. The government accused Elena Khusyaynova of St. Petersburg, Russia, of participating in a conspiracy engaged in "information warfare against the United States" that aimed "create and amplify divisive social media and political content."

Prosectors claim Khusyaynova is the chief accountant for a Russian company backed by the oligarch Yevgeniy Prigozhin, also known as "Putin's chef," and two companies that he controls. Those companies were named in a previous indictment obtained by the Justice Department.

In Congress, oversight of American efforts to rebuff Russian meddling has been led by the Senate Intelligence Committee.

The chair of that committee, Sen. Richard Burr, R-N.C., and its vice chair, Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., declined on Tuesday to confirm that the Cyber Command operation existed. But Warner said in a statement that the U.S. needs "an effective strategy to counter cyberattacks and influence campaigns conducted by other countries."

"If carried out in the right way, raising the costs for countries, companies, or individuals who conduct such attacks would certainly fit into such a strategy," he said.

Read the full story at The New York Times.

WATCH: Watch this Russian hacker break into our computer and take complete control in minutes</s>The U.S. Cyber Command has begun contacting individual Russians to deter them from interfering with the upcoming November elections, the New York Times reported on Tuesday, citing officials briefed on the matter.

American defense operatives are telling the Russians that they have been identified and are being monitored. However, they have stopped short of issuing direct threats of repercussions, according to the Times.

The operation is meant to scare the operatives to prevent election interference without provoking a retaliation move from the Russian government, which could escalate the situation, such as a cyber-attack on the power grid.

The American cyber campaign is being waged by a component of the Department of Defense, and is the first known international cyber operation designed to protect American elections after the Russian interference in the 2016 presidential elections.

CNBC reports that the defense officials who disclosed the current operation to the New York Times did not provide details about how the Cyber Command is contacting the Russians it is tracking, or how many individuals it has targeted.</s>The United States Cyber Command has started an operation that involves contacting Russians to prevent them from meddling in the upcoming midterm election.

The targeted Russians are being told that they have been identified and the US military have been tracking their activities to prevent them from disrupting the American electoral process.

The defense officials, who provided information about the current operation, however, did not provide details about how the Cyber Command contacts the Russians. They did not also disclose the number of individuals the operation has targeted.

This is the first operation under a new presidential order that relaxes restrictions on offensive cyberspace actions against foreign networks. The campaign, first reported by the New York Times, is also the first known overseas cyber operation aimed at protecting the US elections from Russian interference.

“The US government leadership has made it clear that it will not accept any foreign interference or attempts to undermine or manipulate our elections in any way,” Cybercom spokesman Joseph Holstead said, according to CNBC. “This includes the whole-of-government effort to protect election infrastructure and prevent malign, covert election influence operations.”

The operation seeks to deter disinformation efforts but it is not yet clear if it is also aimed at more overt forms of cybercrimes such as hacking.

During the 2016 presidential election, the Russians were accused of employing several tactics, which include using fake accounts to post provocative posts on social media and hacking into the servers of the Democratic National Committee.

The US government has launched a campaign to protect the midterm elections which has so far led to last week’s indictment of Russian national Elena Alekseevna Khusyaynova.

As the Inquisitr earlier reported, Khusyaynova served as chief accountant for a disruption campaign funded by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s close associate businessman Yevgeniy Viktorovich. Khusyaynova became the first person to be charged by the United States for conspiring to interfere in the midterm elections.

Earlier this week, President Donald Trump’s national security adviser John Bolton said that he told Moscow officials that he considered Russian meddling in the American election process as “intolerable.”

“It’s a major obstacle to achieving agreement on issues where our national interest may converge,” Bolton said, according to The Guardian. “So I said, just from a very cold-blooded cost benefit ratio, that you shouldn’t meddle in our elections because you’re not advancing Russian interest, and I hope that was persuasive to them.”</s>WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States has launched a cyber campaign aimed at Russian operatives in an effort to curb misinformation ahead of the Nov. 6 congressional elections, the New York Times reported on Tuesday, in what it said was the first known such operation to protect American elections.

The Times, citing unnamed defense officials briefed on the operation, said the US Cyber Command, the military's cyber warfare division, was using direct messages to target individuals behind influence campaigns in an effort to deter them from spreading propaganda and fake information.

While the United States was not directly threatening any individuals, its previous sanctions and indictments could help deter the Russian operatives once they realized they had been identified, according to the Times report.

US intelligence agencies have concluded that Kremlin-backed entities meddled in the 2016 presidential election campaign to try to boost Republican candidate Donald Trump, an accusation Moscow has repeatedly denied. Intelligence officials have said that Moscow remains a threat to US elections.

On Friday, the US government unveiled what one official said was the first criminal charges linked to attempted interference in next month's midterm elections. Elena Alekseevna Khusyaynova, a 44-year-old Russian national, was charged with playing a key financial role in a Kremlin-backed plan to conduct "information warfare" against the United States, including ongoing attempts to influence American voters.

The Times said the protective operation included missions taken in recent days, but has been limited in part to prevent Moscow from escalating its response beyond election-related actions that could target the US power grid or other targets.

US Cyber Command has also sent teams to Europe in an effort to help allies fight Russian intrusions, officials told the Times.

Reuters could not immediately confirm the Times report, and representatives for the Pentagon did not immediately reply to a request for comment.

US national security adviser John Bolton, in Moscow for meetings this week, told Russian officials on Monday that its election meddling sowed distrust.

More than a dozen Russians and three Russian entities have been indicted as part of a US investigation into the 2016 interference and possible collusion by Trump's campaign, including 12 Russian intelligence officers and a St. Petersburg-based group known for its trolling on social media.
The United States Cyber Command contacts individual Russians with the hope to deter them from interfering with upcoming American elections, including the November midterms.