“They’re doing this continuously, that’s a known fact,” one US intelligence official said, requesting anonymity to discuss the sensitive national security issue.

“This is beyond propaganda, that’s my understanding,” the second US intelligence official said. The official said they believed those efforts likely included the dissemination of completely fake news stories.

Neither official provided details of how they believed Russia was spreading fake news.

While they said the intelligence community was confident that Russia had engaged in spreading false or misleading information, both said the FBI had not opened a specific investigation into it.