Paris: WikiLeaks says it’s taking the roughly 20,000 emails allegedly stolen from French President Emmanuel Macron’s campaign and publishing them to its website in a searchable form.
The emails caused a stir when they were initially published just two days before France’s May 7 presidential runoff, which pitted Mr Macron against French far-right leader Marine Le Pen.
But unlike the leaks that rattled the 2016 American presidential race, the French email leak had little if any impact. Macron still handily beat Ms Le Pen. The messages have since been picked over by the French press, although WikiLeaks’ move may draw new attention to them.
The head of France’s cybersecurity agency ANSSI said in June there was no evidence tying the hacking of the Macron campaign emails to any particular actor, saying “it could be anyone.”
The leaked emails, which includes records of campaign expenses and logistics, do not yet appear to contain any obvious “bombshells” though it could take days for the media and others to properly review their contents.
According to Wikileaks, which announced the publication on Twitter and on its website, the emails span eight years and have come from thousands of people.
Wikileaks created turmoil in the US presidential election last year by leaking emails stolen from Hillary Clinton’s campaign Chair, John Podesta, and is regarded by many as a propaganda outlet for the Russian government.
In its short statement announcing the release of the Macron campaign emails, Wikileaks noted French cyber-security authorities had not attributed earlier leaks to Russia and said certain hacking attacks had come with false attribution.
Monday’s document dump comes months after hackers leaked emails from the Macron campaign days before the French election in May — a move that ultimately had little effect on the results, which saw Mr Macron win. Last week, Reuters reported that Russia had created bogus Facebook pages to spy on the Macron campaign.
