Page 38 - Cyber Warnings

There have been many reports, stories and investigations about hackers – even some shouting
about nation-state-sponsored-hackers – who might try to penetrate the actual apparatus to
influence or steal the U.S. Presidential Election.

As everyone now knows, thanks to Bush v. Gore in 2000, the margin of victory can be a
hanging chad, the threat of external vote manipulation needs to be taken seriously.

Thanks to the Bush v. Gore vote counting issues, the majority of states have long since
implemented electronic voting procedures, citing their more accurate and timely counting. But
there is a trade-off. An all-electronic system could be hacked – some of the e-voting systems
run on older, less secure operating systems, like Windows XP(!).

Without a paper ballot to ultimately serve as an auditable record of the voting, the U.S. Election
could turn on electronic results that cannot be audited. Should this make us nervous about the
integrity of the election? Probably not, for two very important reasons.

First, only a few states use all-electronic systems that have no paper component at all. About
three quarters of the states employ a hybrid system where paper ballots are marked but are
counted electronically, or a pure paper system. In those states, there is always a paper ballot to
back up each electronic vote. In those states the results can be carefully audited and
confirmed.

But to steal the election by altering the votes, fraudsters would need to concentrate their efforts
on the swing states – Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio, etc. – the states where the races could go
either way.

Of those states, Pennsylvania is probably the most vulnerable to election hacking – they have
the most complete electronic voting implementation.

In many parts of Pennsylvania, there are no auditable paper ballots, only electronic ones. But
the risk of vote alterations is low. Even without a paper ballot audit there is plenty of other data,
exhaustive pre-election polling and day-of-election exit polling that will quickly provide election
watchers with corroboration that the voting counts reflect the will of the people.
Short of vote manipulation, targeted cyber exploits could also disable voting, or slow voting
procedures, creating chaos on election night.

Long lines at polling places reduce turnout. By strategically targeting polling places for “slow-
downs” hackers could theoretically reduce the election-day turnout for any district or
demographic they wanted.

But in 2016, according to most projections, almost half of votes in the presidential election will
be cast early, or cast by mail, bypassing polling place lines. In some highly contested states, the
percentage of early votes might approach or even exceed seventy-five percent.

38 Cyber Warnings E-Magazine – September 2016 Edition
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