Concerns Over Election Day Cyber Attack

With the FBI currently investigating alleged Russian efforts to undermine the Democratic Party through hacking attempts, there are concerns that the U.S. presidential election may be hacked. IT security experts from Tripwire commented below.

Tim Erlin, Director, Security and IT Risk Strategist at Tripwire:

“It will be a tragedy if the United States finds itself unable to trust the results of a Presidential election.

This is a tremendous opportunity for government and the information security community to partner around election security. It’s not a new topic for the industry, but the additional attention that a high profile election brings can help make real progress.

It’s important to consider tampering with the election itself as well as influencing the election process. While they’re not the same, both activities undermine trust in the US democratic process.”

Lamar Bailey, Sr. Director, Security R&D at Tripwire:

“Cyber-attacks will happen on Election Day, that is a given. If they are successful we will hear about them otherwise nothing will be disclosed. To pull off an attack like the DNC attacks it takes a lot of time and resources to coordinate and find a viable attack path. This is not something that can be done in a few days or weeks. If an organization is going to be successful in this style of attack they must be well funded and have started work months ago. It is much more likely that many small attacks will happen in an attempt to discredit the results from various states or counties within states. It could be like the 2000 election but with a virtual “hanging chad”.”