In this election season, we worry about threats to the process before, during and after the elections. A post by Eleni Kallea on The New Federalist website (https://www.thenewfederalist.eu/safeguarding-democracy-in-the-digital-era-navigating-the-2024-election?lang=fr) examines the threats in the context of European elections, but it applies equally to the United States.
- Manipulation or disruption of voter registration databases. This could either deny eligible voters their rights or allow ineligible voters to vote. Election officials need to conduct regular checks and monitoring of data and establish strong access controls.
- Phishing campaigns targeting election officials, parties and candidates. Spam emails are the least of the problem; phishing emails can steal data or obtain sensitive information. Election staff, candidates and parties must have email filtering systems and require multi-factor authentication.
- Misinformation on the Internet and social media. Voters must be aware of fake articles and contacts and educate themselves on the real campaign issues.
- Malware attacks on infrastructure. Trojans, viruses, spyware and ransomware could target election software. Election systems must be resilient, using antivirus programs, regular updates and patches, firewalls and virtual private networks.
- Traffic spikes on election day. Where online voting or registration is permissible, denial of service attacks could crash the system. Traffic must be monitored in real time.
- Intentional or unintentional insider threats. Election authorities must be careful who they hire and monitor employees for unsafe or suspicious activities.
Finally, there must be an incident response plan to address these threats.