Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
Fake news hits French race
Apparent forgeries, hacked site investigated
ALBI, France — Fake news and accusations of hacking attempts dominated France’s tense presidential campaign Thursday with just two days left for independent Emmanuel Macron and his far-right rival Marine Le Pen to win over voters before Sunday’s runoff.
Paris prosecutors began a preliminary investigation Thursday into whether fake news is being used to influence the election as the two candidates campaigned in opposite parts of the country.
The move came hours after Macron filed suit against unknown source “X” after Le Pen suggested during their only one-on-one debate Wednesday night that the former banker could have an offshore account.
“I hope we won’t find out you have an offshore account in the Bahamas,” Le Pen said.
She appeared to be referring to two sets of apparent forgeries, published just hours before their heated showdown, that purported to show Macron was somehow involved with a Caribbean bank and a firm based on the island of Nevis.
Macron’s camp said the former investment banker was victim of a “cyber-misinformation campaign.” Speaking on France Inter radio, Macron blamed Le Pen for spreading “fake news” and said he never held a bank account “in any tax haven whatsoever.”
“All this is factually inaccurate,” Macron said.
On the campaign trail, Macron visited disgruntled workers Thursday at a glass factory in Albi near the southern city of Toulouse before holding his last campaign rally in which he called on voters from the left and the right to choose his pro-European platform.
Macron arrived to booing and slogan-shouting from dozens of protesting workers. But after 15 minutes of talking, he managed to calm some of their anger. Union leader Michel Parraud called Macron “very kind and very polite,” although he said he didn’t think the pro-business centrist would do much for factory workers.
Macron pledged to “give strength back to the country” and “build a more efficient and fair society,” speaking from an open-air stage in Albi’s central square.
Le Pen, who spent Thursday in a small northern French village, quickly backed away from the suggestion that Macron might have an offshore account, but prosecutors soon opened an investigation into suspicions of forgery and the spreading of false news in order to divert votes.
The metadata embedded in the document suggested it was created just before being posted online, undermining the anonymous poster’s claim to have circulated the documents to “hundreds of French journalists” who had “all sat on this.”
Asked Thursday on France’s BFM TV whether she was formally accusing Macron of having a secret offshore account, Le Pen said: “Not at all. If I wanted to do so, I would have done it yesterday. I’ve just asked him the question. If I had proof, I would have claimed it yesterday.”
There are hints tying the faked documents to far-right circles in California. One document purports to have been drawn up under the laws of Nevis but actually draws some of its language from a guide to forming limited liability companies in California. The documents first appeared on Mixtape, a relatively new northern California-based file-sharing service.
The Macron campaign identified the first tweet referring to the documents as coming from the Twitter account of Nathan Damigo, a far-right activist and convicted felon based in northern California. Damigo is known on social media for punching a female anti-fascist in the face at a Berkeley protest.
Messages left with Damigo weren’t immediately returned.
Also Thursday, Le Pen’s campaign said a hacker confessed to repeatedly targeting its website. The statement, released Thursday, gave few details about the seriousness of the interference, which could range from attempts at defacing the website to flooding it with bogus traffic. The campaign said the arrest took place this week.
There has been intense anxiety in France over the possibility that hackers could tamper with the presidential election this year — worries stoked by Russian meddling in the U.S. election last year.
Le Pen visited Ennemain, a town of 230, for a festival Thursday to meet with the disillusioned voters at the center of her populist program. Hundreds packed a field bedecked with haystacks, food stands and an inflatable children’s ride near the small red-brick town hall.