The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency and the FBI issued a joint advisory stating that they were “aware of an Iranian advanced persistent threat (APT) actor targeting U.S. state websites—to include election websites”. According to their assessment, “this actor is responsible for the mass dissemination of voter intimidation emails to U.S. citizens and the dissemination of U.S. election-related disinformation in mid-October 2020… the targeting of U.S. state election websites was an intentional effort to influence and interfere with the 2020 U.S. presidential election”. Iranian Foreign Minister Javad Zarif was subsequently cited as indicating that Washington had written Tehran “warning the country not to take action around the election, and that the U.S. would not tolerate any interference”.