But in the most direct comments yet linking the Russian president to the hacking, a senior White House official said on Thursday that Putin was likely to have been aware of the cyber attacks.
“I don’t think things happen in the Russian government of this consequence without Vladimir Putin knowing about it,” Ben Rhodes, the White House’s deputy national security advisor, told MSNBC. “When you’re talking about a significant cyber intrusion like this, we’re talking about the highest levels of government,” Rhodes said. U.S. officials said on the condition of anonymity that the hacking of U.S. political groups and figures had a more general focus at first.
