{"id":264116,"date":"2026-06-12T03:36:10","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T03:36:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/264116\/"},"modified":"2026-06-12T03:36:10","modified_gmt":"2026-06-12T03:36:10","slug":"french-official-accuses-israeli-firm-of-also-meddling-in-elections-in-new-york-city-scotland","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/264116\/","title":{"rendered":"French official accuses Israeli firm of also meddling in elections in New York City, Scotland"},"content":{"rendered":"

Israeli firm BlackCore, suspected of interfering in France\u2019s local elections in March, is also suspected of meddling in elections in New York City and Scotland, and operating in Angola and Togo, France\u2019s disinformation detection service, Viginum, said on Thursday.<\/p>\n

Last month, Reuters revealed<\/a> that French authorities suspected BlackCore was behind an online smear campaign targeting three mayoral candidates from the hard-left, pro-Palestine France Unbowed party (LFI) in the local elections.<\/p>\n

At a press conference on Thursday alongside French Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu, Viginum chief Marc-Antoine Brillant said technical work had led them to BlackCore. Viginum subsequently presented a detailed report on BlackCore\u2019s alleged actions around the world.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis modus operandi was not limited to municipal elections in France,\u201d he said. \u201cIt also appears to have been used to carry out foreign digital interference operations in other countries or regions, such as Angola, Togo, the elections in Scotland, and the 2025 municipal election in New York.\u201d<\/p>\n

However, Brillant said it was still unclear who had commissioned BlackCore to meddle in France.<\/p>\n

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\u201cOur investigations did not make it possible to identify the sponsor or sponsors, if indeed they exist, behind this foreign digital interference,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\t(From L) France\u2019s Prime Minister Sebastien Lecornu, Secretary-General of the SGDSN Nicolas Roche and director of the Vigilance and Protection against Foreign Digital Interference Service, Marc-Antoine Brillant, attend a press conference in Paris on June 11, 2026. (Stephane De Sakutin\/AFP)<\/p>\n

Lecornu said the French government had asked Israel for explanations on BlackCore\u2019s actions, but also for help in trying to find out who may have been behind the smear campaign.<\/p>\n

\u201cI do not doubt for a single instant that if a French private group, from French soil moreover, had engaged in foreign digital interference in Israel, they would have done the same to its ambassador on site,\u201d Lecornu said.<\/p>\n

Israel\u2019s embassy in Paris confirmed that France had reached out, saying it was waiting to receive details from the French probe to conduct its own.<\/p>\n

\u201cIsrael has of course no intention to interfere in the French political process, be it at the national or municipal level,\u201d it said in a statement.<\/p>\n

New York City, Scottish elections also targeted<\/p>\n

Brillant did not explicitly mention who was targeted in last year\u2019s New York City election, which was won by Zohran Mamdani. His victory thrilled many younger Jewish progressives but spooked more traditional pro-Israel New Yorkers with his longtime anti-Zionist advocacy.<\/p>\n

Mamdani\u2019s team did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Neither did New York City and New York state officials.<\/p>\n

The New York Police Department and the US cyber defense agency CISA did not immediately return emails seeking comment. The FBI declined comment.<\/p>\n

\t\"\"<\/a>
\n\t\tNew York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani speaks during a union rally on Park Avenue, in New York, April 15, 2026. (AP Photo\/Seth Wenig)<\/p>\n

In a subsequent report, Viginum said it detected BlackCore-linked accounts targeting John Swinney, the First Minister of Scotland. Swinney has described the situation in Gaza as a \u201cman-made humanitarian catastrophe,\u201d claiming a genocide may be unfolding during fighting between Israel and the Hamas terror group, citing civilian casualties, widespread destruction and statements by Israeli officials.<\/p>\n

Neither Swinney nor his party, the Scottish National Party, responded to requests for comment. An email seeking comment from Scottish election officials was not immediately returned.<\/p>\n

The governments of Angola and Togo also did not immediately respond to requests for comment.<\/p>\n

Before scrubbing its online presence following enquiries from Reuters, BlackCore described itself as \u201can elite influence, \u2060cyber, and \u200btechnology company built for the modern sera of information \u200bwarfare.\u201d It said it provided governments and political campaigns with \u201ccutting-edge strategies, advanced tools, and robust security to shape narratives.\u201d<\/p>\n

It \u200bhas not responded to repeated requests for comment.<\/p>\n


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\t\t\tAlready a member? Sign in to stop seeing this<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Israeli firm BlackCore, suspected of interfering in France\u2019s local elections in March, is also suspected of meddling in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":264117,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[102227,102364,7465,9,24,55,54,56,82],"class_list":["post-264116","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-york-city","tag-blackcore","tag-election-interference","tag-france","tag-new-york","tag-new-york-city","tag-new-york-city-headlines","tag-new-york-city-news","tag-ny","tag-zohran-mamdani"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264116","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264116"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264116\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/264117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264116"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264116"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264116"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}