Colombia’s Petro accuses Israeli cyberfirm BlackCore of election interference

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Colombian President Gustavo Petro delivers a speech as he casts his vote at Polling Station No. 1, marking the start of the presidential election day, where voters head to the polls to elect the country's next president in Bogota, Colombia on May 31, 2026. [Juancho Torres - Anadolu Agency]https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/AA-20260531-41540857-41540842-COLOMBIAN_PRESIDENTIAL_ELECTIONS.jpg" style="margin-bottom: 15px;" width="1200" />
Outgoing Colombian President Gustavo Petro has accused Israeli cyber-intelligence company BlackCore of executing a massive digital disinformation campaign to manipulate the outcome of the country’s recent presidential elections, Anadolu reports.

The accusation was made on Friday following a razor-thin victory by challenger Abelardo de la Espriella, a criminal defense attorney openly endorsed by US President Donald Trump.

De la Espriella won the June 21 runoff election by a margin of less than 1% over the ruling party’s candidate, Ivan Cepeda.

Petro wrote on US social media platform X that BlackCore deployed hundreds of thousands of automated accounts to distort public perception in the run-up to the vote. “BlackCore, the Israeli company, deployed 500,000 bots—fake profiles—to manipulate the Colombian electorate with […]

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