Last Friday, it took an IT professor from Copenhagen less than 2 hours to hack into voting machines set up at a convention in Las Vegas, voting machines that ostensibly had the latest protections against such manipulation and were displayed as a testament to their safety and integrity. From CBS News.
Carsten Schürmann, an associate professor with IT-University of Copenhagen, successfully cracked into a voting machine at Las Vegas’ Defcon convention on Friday night, CNET reports.
Schürmann penetrated Advanced Voting Solutions’ 2000 WinVote machine through its Wi-Fi system. Using a Windows XP exploit from 2003, he was able to remotely access the machine, CNET reports.
The question all too many of us have been afraid to ask for nearly two years now looms even larger with the news of how easy it is to hack our election software, and with each new revelation from Robert Mueller. We know that Russia played a strong role in the 2016 presidential election, what if they played the decisive role? What if the vote totals from 2016 are 99% legitimate, but that peculiarly perfect pattern across three states is not legitimate? What if Russia knew all along that our “de-centralized” election infrastructure makes us pathetically vulnerable?
Synack, a San Francisco security platform, discovered serious flaws with the WinVote machine months ahead of this weekend’s convention. The team simply plugged in a mouse and keyboard and bypassed the voting software by clicking “control-alt-delete.” “It’s really just a matter of plugging your USB drive in for five seconds and the thing’s completely compromised at that point,” Synack co-founder Jay Kaplan told CNET. “To the point where you can get remote access. It’s very simple.”
It’s very simple.
We know that Russians hacked into the election computer infrastructure in 39 states prior to the 2016 election. We know this fact because it was released by our Department of Homeland Security. What do they know that they have not released to the public? Do you trust the Trump administration to be upfront about what they may or may not find with respect to tabulating votes, or suppressing voting rolls?
As you ponder that question, note that we’ve known that 39 states were hacked since at least June of 2017. (BTW, I suspect that 39=50 in this matter because the whole point of “hacking” is to not get caught, and it is at least as likely as not that the Russians got into those last 11 without getting caught as it is that they made no effort). This is akin to an act of war. Indeed, because we now KNOW that Russia sponsored one of our candidates – it IS an act of war, it is the invasion and takeover of the American government by a hostile foreign power, successfully.
And what has been done?
But current and former officials tell NBC News that 19 months into his presidency, there is no coherent Trump administration strategy to combat foreign election interference — and no single person or agency in charge. In the statement, the White House took issue with that, saying a strategy was put in motion when Trump took office. No such strategy has been made public — or even mentioned before. After terrorists struck on 9/11, the U.S. government passed laws, boosted funding, and reorganized itself with the goal of making sure such an attack could never happen again. But no wholesale changes have taken place in the nearly two years since Russia sought to manipulate the 2016 election, cyber aggression that some lawmakers have called an act of war.
We keep anticipating a blue wave, and the folks at DailyKos earnestly emphasize that nothing is more important than GOTV efforts. I humbly put forth that it is far more important that we establish, one way or another, whether or not all the votes will be properly counted, before we simply assume they will be.
I have always been bothered by the Trump election, and bothered by how the Republicans seemed to perfectly outperform polls in the last several congressional elections (conveniently, now going back as far as when we hear that Russia first became interested in Right Wing politics and nationalism, both here and in Europe. It never “felt” legitimate to me, and not just because of the candidate.
It took a hacker in Copenhagen 90 minutes to hack into the newest, bestest, election software within a computer inside a voting booth in a Las Vegas Nevada convention.
Now, tell me that the Russian military, knowing it fully owns one candidate such that Russia will never, ever, be opposed by that person, couldn’t spend whatever time and resources it needed in order to remotely hack into election software in Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania? Tell me they couldn’t do it, even if the vote were strictly protected from such an attack, and not overseen by Republican governors in each state (Russians knowing that no Republican governor is going to allow the nation to find out that his state actually went for Hillary, but for the attack from Russia).
One of the first things Trump did while in office was form an “election” committee, one that went nowhere because it was wholly partisan. Why?
Did Trump come up with that idea?
One of the first things that committee did was ask for personal voter information from each state. Why?
Did Trump come up with that idea?
Did Kris Kobach?
Kobach is into suppressing votes of large groups, through voter IDs. He doesn’t need that information. Who did?
I have always believed that the United States – though a great nation full of promise – is too immature to take on some of the scary questions that might threaten the idea of “American Exceptionalism.” I don’t think we’ll ever be allowed to know who really killed John Kennedy (look into how Oswald got the job at the School Book Depository and you will never again believe Oswald acted alone. Hint, a connection with the CIA got him the job). I don’t think we’ll ever be allowed to fully know what happened with the 2016 election. There are some things that we as a people are not mature enough to handle.
Do you think that I am just being a “conspiracy theorist”? Well, then count Robert Mueller as a “conspiracy theorist,” too, because he’s currently charging people with conspiracy to defraud the United States of a free and fair election, we’re only quibbling about the methods. The crime itself occurred.
What to do?
What we can do is fight like hell to assure accountability from the people within government right now. Robert Mueller has the street addresses of the Russian military officers who plotted to steal the election. It is possible he will bring the entire matter crumbling down. We need to support politicians who support Mueller’s investigation, no matter which side they’re on. To the extent that Mueller is supported, it makes it more likely that Russia is scared to act quite so brazenly. Perhaps we do have our 2018 opening.
But, please know this as a mature and capable people. We cannot be sure who won the 2016 election. No one has had the strength and access to really look. Hiding our heads under the pillow won’t ensure that the United States remains “exceptional” as a free, self-governing, people.
Twitter is now an essential function of self-governance, the most egalitarian platform out there, far better than Facebook at its mission. Please follow along with me, and me you, as we delve deeper into this issue and others: @MiciakZoom
