Overview
- France’s Viginum detected on Wednesday a fabricated article and video accusing President Emmanuel Macron, hosted on a counterfeit France-Soir domain using .net.
- Investigators attribute the operation with high confidence to Storm-1516 and CopyCop, with CopyCop linked to American fugitive John Mark Dougan who maintains parts of the network’s infrastructure.
- The campaign relied on doctored screenshots made to resemble newly released U.S. Justice Department Epstein files, which officials say contain none of the alleged emails.
- The fake website was taken down after a complaint by the real France-Soir, while the video remains accessible on X.
- The video was first posted by @LoetitiaH, a frequent Storm-1516 relay, then amplified by accounts monitored by Viginum, as victims including Le Parisien’s Victor Cousin filed police complaints.