The European Union has ordered TikTok to freeze all its data amid reports that the Chinese-owned social platform had been instrumental in implementing a Moscow-orchestrated campaign to influence Romania's presidential and parliamentary elections.
Romania's Supreme Council of National Defense (CSAT) on December 4 declassified documents revealing the country was the target of an "aggressive hybrid Russian action" that led to last month's surprise victory of pro-Russian far-right candidate Calin Georgescu in the first round of presidential elections.
CSAT said the document showed EU and NATO member Romania was the target of various coordinated actions, most likely orchestrated by a "state actor," leading up to the November 24 election won by Georgescu, who ran as an independent.
The European Commission -- the bloc's executive arm -- on December 5 issued a "retention order" to TikTok under its Digital Services Act (DSA) that would preserve evidence "related to actual or foreseeable systemic risks its service could pose on electoral processes and civic discourse in the EU," the commission said in a statement.
It added the move was necessary in case of a further probe of TikTok's "compliance with its obligations under the DSA."
According to the declassified documents, Romania's intelligence services believe Georgescu was massively promoted on TikTok with backing from Russia through multiple methods, including coordinated accounts, algorithms to boost his presence on the platform, and paid promotion.
The documents purported to explain how Georgescu's popularity increased from 1 percent shortly before the race to 22 percent through a vast operation of manipulation that involved influencers and ensnared Romanian institutions as well as ordinary voters.
A parliamentary election a week later resulted in a surge for three pro-Russia far right parties that garnered about a third of the vote, although the pro-European parties appear to have enough votes to form a coalition government.
SEE ALSO: How TikTok Fueled The Rise Of Romania's Far-Right Presidential Candidate GeorgescuOn December 8, voters will decide the winner of the presidential election in a runoff that pits Georgescu against pro-European centrist candidate Elena Lasconi.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova denied Russia was interfering in the election.
"The campaign for the Romanian presidential election...is accompanied by an unprecedented outburst of anti-Russian hysteria," Zakharova said.
"More and more absurd accusations are being made by local politicians, officials and media representatives," she added. "We firmly reject all hostile attacks, which we consider absolutely groundless."
Ahead of the vote, the United States called for a thorough investigation into Moscow's alleged actions.
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller said that while the United States does not interfere with the Romanian people's choice or the election process, Washington is "concerned by the CSAT's report of Russian involvement in malign cyberactivity designed to influence the integrity of the Romanian electoral process."
Miller said Romania is a strong NATO ally and the United States values its contributions to the alliance's security and the country's hard-earned position in the transatlantic community cannot be reversed "by foreign actors seeking to shift Romania's foreign policy away from its Western alliances."
Such a change in policy would have "serious negative impacts on U.S. security cooperation with Romania," Miller said.
The declassified documents say influencers on TikTok were recruited to promote Georgescu directly by publicly supporting him and indirectly through neutral messages that contained labels associated with him.
Dozens of TikTok accounts were found that falsely used the intelligence service's logo and the title Anti-Terrorist Brigade, each displaying thousands of followers and over 100,000 likes.
Romania's intelligence services hinted that large sums of money would have been spent in the operation. Georgescu has told Romanian electoral authorities that he spent nothing on his campaign.
Romanian intelligence linked the operation to Russia by noting that access data for official Romanian election websites was published on Russian cybercrime platforms. The access data was probably procured by targeting legitimate users or exploiting the legitimate training server, the intelligence services said.
The State Department statement said Washington has been "closely following the elections in Romania" and that it "will continue to work together [with Romanian authorities] "to preserve the security of our nations and the prosperity and well-being of our citizens."
On December 5, three Romanian institutions, including the country's top political sciences school, and a former presidential candidate asked the Constitutional Court to annul the first round of presidential elections and repeat them.
It was not known immediately if the Court would consider the requests just hours ahead the start of the runoff abroad.