President Barack Obama specified that he has a long list of grievances with Russian president Vladimir Putin, and that the DNC hack would be added to the list.
Clarifying that federal law officials had not specifically identified the Russian government as the perpetrator of the hack, Obama commented on it.
“If in fact Russia engaged in this activity, it’s just one on a long list of issues that me and Mr. Putin talk about and that I have got a real problem with,” he said.
Obama admitted that the relationship with Russia was already difficult, thanks to Putin’s provocations in Ukraine and support of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.
He called for additional funding for cybersecurity.
“[T]here are a lot of countries out there that are trying to hack into our stuff,” Obama said.
Obama suggested that there be international rules about cyber-espionage putting some electronic communications off limits.
“In some ways the explosion of the internet and its importance to our communications systems has outstripped the legal architecture to protect them,” he said. “And we’re playing catch up.”