Putin rejects US hacking claims
Russian President Vladimir Putin has shrugged off claims by the US intelligence community that "Russia's senior-most officials" authorised a series of cyber attacks whose sole purpose is to destabilise the US presidential elections. In a joint statement, the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Homeland Security said the attacks were "consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts". Putin dismissed the claims as "'campaign rhetoric". However, tensions between the two nations rose after Vice-President Joe Biden issued a warning of "retaliatory cyber-strikes".

Vladimir Putin has denied claims that Russia is behind a string of hacks on the US, calling them 'campaign rhetoric' by the White House.

The Russian President made the remarks during a news conference at the India-Russia Annual Summit in Benaulim, in the western state of Goa, India, Sunday.

His denial comes after the US last week officially blamed Russia for a recent series of high-profile cyber-attacks - including the hacks that led to leaks of emails from Hillary Clinton's campaign for President.

'Rhetoric': Vladimir Putin said Sunday that US intelligence claims that Russia had hacked DNC, Clinton Foundation and Clinton's campaign to sway US election were White House 'rhetoric'

Accusations: Clinton says Moscow wants Trump as President; Trump denies says he 'knows nothing' about Russia. US intelligence says DNC/Clinton hacker Guccifer 2.0 is Russian

On October 7 the Director of National Intelligence and the Department of Homeland Security announced that they were 'confident' that 'Russia's senior-most officials' had directed a number of hacks to affect the upcoming presidential election.

The statement specifically identified Guccifer 2.0, who claimed credit for hacking email accounts used by the Democratic National Convention and the Clinton Foundation, as being a front for Russia.

It's a line that Hillary Clinton has taken herself, arguing that Putin would be better served with Trump as President than her.

'We have never, in the history of our country, been in a situation where an adversary, a foreign power, is working so hard to influence the outcome of the election,' she said during the second presidential debate on October 9.

Trump, meanwhile, has denied claims that he has close ties with Russia. 'I don't know Putin,' he said. 'I think it would be great to get along with Russia.'

He added: 'They think they are going to tarnish me with Russia. I know nothing about Russia.'

Guccifer 2.0 - named in reference to imprisoned Romanian hacker Guccifer, real name Marcel Lazăr Lehel - has denied links with Russia. Moscow has done the same.

Threat: VP Joe Biden has threatened retaliatory cyber-strikes on Russia, which says Guccifer 2.0 is not its agent. Guccifer 2.0 likewise denies links with the Kremlin

Nevertheless, the US statement said Russia was behind the attempts to discredit the Clinton Foundation and campaign with targeted hacks and leaks to Wikileaks and DCLeaks.com.

It also warned that some US states 'have also recently seen scanning and probing of their election-related systems, which in most cases originated from servers operated by a Russian company.'

And Mail Online has previously reported how Russian 'troll factories' pay people to post disinformation on social media and in comments while posing as Western citizens.

While internet attacks may not seem like the biggest problem facing the West, Russia has hinted that the cyber-war could very easily spill into the real world.

On Friday Vice-President Joe Biden warned that the US would launch retaliatory cyber-strikes on Russia.

'We're sending a message,' he told NBC News. 'We have the capacity to do it. It will be at the time of our choosing, and under the circumstances that will have the greatest impact.'

Warning: Russia has warned that it will 'protect itself' against American cyber strikes, and has recently told its citizens to prepare for a possible war

Russia, which has been accused of posturing by recently telling its citizens to ready for war, responded by warning that it would protect itself from America's 'unpredictably and aggressiveness.'

'The threats directed against Moscow and our state’s leadership are unprecedented because they are voiced at the level of the US Vice President,' the Kremlin warned Saturday.

'To the backdrop of this aggressive, unpredictable line, we must take measures to protect (our) interests, to hedge risks.'

Also Friday, Russia's UN ambassador, Vitaly Churkin, said the US-Russian relationship 'is pretty bad at this point, probably the worst... since 1973,' when the two countries found themselves supporting opposite sides in the six-day Arab-Israeli War.