Not buying it. In western nations, letting journalists "know" that you can access their computers is about the stupidest thing a "government-related entity" can do. It hardly ever works, produces a ton of backlash, and just imagine trying to do this with a few thousand journalists covering political topics.

I mean, granted, intelligence agencies can do things as stupid as any other governmental agency, but there is a limit to "covert" operations. Controlling western media on a useful scale is way beyond this limit.