The Late Show with Stephen Colbert responds to the recent reports that Russian hackers have been targeting US voter databases in states like IL and Arizona.
Advertisement
The flash alert released by the FBI on August 18 from the bureau’s Cyber Division did not reveal the two states that were involved and the identity of the hackers. He also noted that USA officials suspect that Russian hackers are behind the attacks.
While cyber security experts say the recent hacks show vulnerabilities in the election process, the president of the National Association of Secretaries of State says all machines have to meet specific government standards. In this case, it seems to have allowed the hackers to steal 200,000 voter records from the IL board of elections, and to cause the IL board to close registration for ten days. In Arizona, hackers unsuccessfully tried to breach the voter registration system using malicious software, reports said.
Some experts, along with Democrat Hillary Clinton’s campaign, believe that Russian Federation was behind the embarrassing email hack of the Democratic National Committee right before its national convention last month. “The signature caption and voting history were not accessed”, Menzel said. According to Reuters, earlier this month, Moscow bureau of New York Times was targeted by a cyber-attack.
Both Arizona and IL election systems were shut down for a week after the cyber attacks and both are back online with enhanced security features.
The hack, which was initially reported by Yahoo, occurred in June and was discovered in July. When registering, voters typically provide their names, home addresses, driver’s license or identification numbers, and party affiliations. Worse yet, hackers made away with personal information belonging to as many as 200,000 state voters.
The FBI “flash” alert, which is not intended for general public release, listed IP addresses and other technical fingerprints associated with the hacks. So far no sign that any of those have been compromised, but the Federal Bureau of Investigation says states should be on guard to protect against computer attacks that could jeopardize the integrity of their elections.
DHS has offered to help states increase security of their systems, but states have rebuffed federal help and largely believe their systems are secure.
Independent assessments have found that many state and local voting system are extremely vulnerable to hacking.
Advertisement
Roberts says there is no evidence that any data within the system was compromised and there was no evidence of malware present in the database. It was not clear if he was aware at the time of the FBI’s investigation into the Arizona and IL intrusions.
