Analysis & Opinions - The Washington Post

By November, Russian Hackers Could Target Voting Machines

| July 27, 2016

Russia was behind the hacks into the Democratic National Committee's computer network that led to the release of thousands of internal emails just before the party's convention began, U.S. intelligence agencies have reportedly concluded.

The FBI is investigating. WikiLeaks promises there is more data to come. The political nature of this cyberattack means that Democrats and Republicans are trying to spin this as much as possible. Even so, we have to accept that someone is attacking our nation's computer systems in an apparent attempt to influence a presidential election. This kind of cyberattack targets the very core of our democratic process. And it points to the possibility of an even worse problem in November — that our election systems and our voting machines could be vulnerable to a similar attack.

If the intelligence community has indeed ascertained that Russia is to blame, our government needs to decide what to do in response. This is difficult because the attacks are politically partisan, but it isessential. If foreign governments learn that they can influence our elections with impunity, this opens the door for future manipulations, both document thefts and dumps like this one that we see and more subtle manipulations that we don't see...

Continue reading: https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2016/07/27/by-november-russian-hackers-could-target-voting-machines/

Want to Read More?

The full text of this publication is available via the original publication source.
Read Full Article
For more information on this publication: Please contact Cyber Project
For Academic Citation: Schneier, Bruce.“By November, Russian Hackers Could Target Voting Machines.” The Washington Post, July 27, 2016.

The Author

Recommended
In the Spotlight
RSS
The U.S. and Canada must work together on Arctic climate challenges that have global impacts, from intensifying wildfires and thawing permafrost to endangered Indigenous subsistence and a changing Arctic Ocean, write John P. Holdren and Fran Ulmer.
We’re going to need every tool in the toolkit, including CCUS, to solve the climate crisis, argues Mohammed Al-Juaied. CCUS projects are already burying millions of tons of CO2 each year, but that’s a drop in the bucket compared to what’s needed, he says.
When the Boston Marathon bombing took place 10 years ago, the City’s detailed disaster preparedness plan kicked in and helped save numerous lives, Juliette Kayyem and other experts said in a recent discussion of lessons learned in the wake of the tragedy.
Most Viewed

Tags