FBI revelation conjures nightmare scenarios for how Iran and Russia could cause chaos this election

Iran and Russia are ready to pour fuel on the fire. That seems the unavoidable takeaway from the shock news that both powers have obtained US voter registration details. The claim was made by two of the top figures in US intelligence in an unscheduled press conference at 7.30pm on Wednesday. The media was alerted just moments beforehand. The briefing by John Ratcliffe, the US Director of National Intelligence, and Christopher Wray, the FBI director, lasted less than eight minutes. No questions were taken. And yet the statement prompted so many, leaving viewers with both a deep sense of unease at what was happening and a lack of clarity about the scale of the problem. Taken at face value, the statement makes a few things clear. First, that both Iran and Russia had been able to get their hands on information about registered voters.