ABSTRACT
This chapter considers the cyber attacks used as part of the Russian interference in the 2016 United States (US) presidential election and international law on the use of force and non-intervention. It examines whether and to what extent the non-use of force and non-intervention principles apply to the incident. The chapter demonstrates that through an informational approach to the incident, the spear-phishing attacks against US political and electoral organizations, and the subsequent release of information obtained from Democratic National Committee's (DNC) networks, can be considered in terms of the increases in entropy they produced. It looks at the various ways in which the incident has been characterized under international law. The chapter shows how the non-material cyber attacks used against the US election process can be seen to constitute a form of informational violence against the US. The release of information obtained from DNC networks was deliberately designed to disrupt the proper functioning of the US as an information system.
