Senate Intelligence Committee report says Russia targeted election systems in all 50 states...

[nanoguy]

Why it matters: While it's common knowledge that Russian hackers attempted to interfere with the US electoral system in 2016, it turns out their efforts were more far reaching and effective than was previously believed, and - perhaps more worryingly - many states were unprepared to respond to cyberattacks.

The Senate Intelligence Committee recently released the first volume of its investigation into Russia's attempted interference in the 2016 U.S. elections. The report shows the officials concluding that all 50 states were targeted in one way or another by hackers with ties to the Russian government, and offers recommendations for 2020.

Back in 2017, news made the rounds that the extent of the attacks was limited to 39 states, and later that year the Department of Homeland Security only admitted that 21 states had been affected by the breach. Earlier this year the DHS and FBI revealed that some intelligence collected in 2018 showed that hackers did, in fact, try to probe every U.S. state's election infrastructure.

The new report is heavily redacted, so we can't know for sure how exactly the Senate Intelligence Committee came to its conclusions. It does however acknowledge that “Russian cyber actors were in a position to delete or change voter data,” confirming what Florida Senator Marco Rubio said in an interview earlier this year.

It's also worth noting that U.S. officials still aren't certain if voter data was modified, or if hackers have tampered with any actual voting machine. In a statement, both parties supported the idea of providing states with more money for election security and adjusting electoral policy to make sure hackers can no longer exploit the seams between federal and state authorities.

The Committee's recommendations include the creation of a paper trail for voting tech, implementing post-election audits, paper backup for registration systems, as well as the adoption of election security bills, an idea vehemently rejected by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.

In response, Senator Ron Wyden said "we shouldn't ask a county election IT employee to fight a war against the full capabilities and vast resources of Russia's cyber army. That approach failed in 2016 and it will fail again."

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https://www.techspot.com/news/81157-senate-intelligence-committee-report-russia-targeted-election-systems.html

 

[VitalyT]

They have released the first volume on how Russia hacked their elections 3 years ago.

Senate, expediency and efficiency. LOL. By the time they release the last volume, Russians will have changed their tactics 10 times over.

 

[ZipperBoi]

Scary coming from a Government where a lot of offices still have XP machines with office 2003 on their network. And they wonder how their data gets stolen and emails get intercepted.

 

[treetops]

"The Committee's recommendations include the creation of a paper trail for voting tech, implementing post-election audits, paper backup for registration systems, as well as the adoption of election security bills, an idea vehemently rejected by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell."

I was like good, that makes sense, then I read the end.... If it's such a problem just use the old paper system. It would be nice if we could all just vote on an app... But that's unlikely, voter suppression and security concerns wouldn't allow it. Even though we manage to bank online, apply for loans and credit cards. We have early voting with mail in ballots... No one has seen my face, I completely signed up through the mail\online. You can vote and never been seen in person. The only reason mail in ballots exist is to boost the senor citizen vote. We can't have all those young people voting on their smart phones....

It would be harder to hack an app or key log the entire countries smart phone supply then a few polling stations. With an app you could even check after the election to make sure your vote went to the right place, then click dispute or whatever if something looked fishy.

 

[wiyosaya]

"The Committee's recommendations include the creation of a paper trail for voting tech, implementing post-election audits, paper backup for registration systems, as well as the adoption of election security bills, an idea vehemently rejected by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell."

I was like good, that makes sense, then I read the end.... If it's such a problem just use the old paper system.

I am not sure the point was emphasized. Mitch McConnell IS the problem. He has outright said he could care less about what his constituents want, and that the one and ONLY thing he is interested in is forcing conservative values on everyone. Mitch McConnell knows what is best for you. Bow down at the feet of the great God Mitch McConnell. To me, that is about as communist and as against the US Constitution as a representative in the US Senate can get. If the Russians can influence elections such that conservatives win majorities, then you can bet Mitch McConnell supports it even if he does not say so publicly. Blocking this on his sole power alone, is, to me anyway, about as close to saying that he supports Russians hacking the US election system as long as conservatives continue to win. I sincerely hope Kentucky dumps this POS.

 

[JaredTheDragon]

"election systems"

"election infrastructure"

Perhaps we could get some reportage on other, more prolific mythological entities? Olympian gods, and Nessy is a fun one. Bigfoot. Climate Change. You know, the stuff we tell the children to keep them scared at night.

 

[Impudicus]

I've tired to read through those reports to see just what Russia did and what I see a lot of assumptions it's Russia. This was hacked the way Russians hack, or this Russian system either scanned or tried to penetrate voter websites, we are not sure if it's targeted or random but Russia! I don't doubt Russia was trying something but dam does this just come of like a witch hunt. OOoohhhh the Russian internet touched ours, they're trying to destroy us! It's the kind of thing that makes me question everything about it.

 

[pcnthuziast]

45 is illegitimate, but will finish his term. In other words they beat us, period.

 

[dogofwars]

"The Committee's recommendations include the creation of a paper trail for voting tech, implementing post-election audits, paper backup for registration systems, as well as the adoption of election security bills, an idea vehemently rejected by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell."

I was like good, that makes sense, then I read the end.... If it's such a problem just use the old paper system. It would be nice if we could all just vote on an app... But that's unlikely, voter suppression and security concerns wouldn't allow it. Even though we manage to bank online, apply for loans and credit cards. We have early voting with mail in ballots... No one has seen my face, I completely signed up through the mail\online. You can vote and never been seen in person. The only reason mail in ballots exist is to boost the senor citizen vote. We can't have all those young people voting on their smart phones....

It would be harder to hack an app or key log the entire countries smart phone supply then a few polling stations. With an app you could even check after the election to make sure your vote went to the right place, then click dispute or whatever if something looked fishy.

Use block chain, a lot more difficult to falsify the data since there would be to many copy to override.

 

[cliffordcooley]

45 is illegitimate.

44 was illegitimate

 

[EClyde]

Did not happen