Just so you know: Anyone offering alternate scenarios like Seth Rich hacking the DNC is just blowing smoke. This story is the real deal:

BERLIN — The Dutch domestic intelligence service AIVD had access to the infamous Russian hacking group Cozy Bear for at least a year starting in mid-2014, local media outlets reported Thursday. According to the reports, the Dutch government alerted the United States to Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election after Netherlands-based officials watched the hacking of the Democratic National Committee and other operations by the Russians, including a 2014 State Department hack.

The DNC hack, revealed by The Washington Post in June 2016, was considered a pivotal event in several actions believed to be undertaken by the Russian government to meddle in the U.S. presidential election that year. Two independent research firms later confirmed that the DNC’s network was compromised by Russian government hackers.

The Dutch agency’s involvement was first reported by the current affairs program Nieuwsuur and the newspaper de Volkskrant on Thursday. Reached by The Post on Friday, the domestic spy agency AIVD had no comment. The Dutch military intelligence service, MIVD, did not respond to a request for comment.

Russian presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov rejected the Dutch reports on Friday, denouncing them as untrustworthy. “If Dutch newspapers want to add fuel to the fire of anti-Russian hysteria that exists in America, this is not the most noble occupation,” he said, according to Russia's Tass news agency.

According to Dutch media, AIVD agents also watched when Russian hackers launched an attack on the State Department in 2014 and compromised unclassified systems at the White House as well as in Congress.

You can read the translation of the original story here.