Elections & Hacks - Cyberpro's Time to Get Involved?

Attention: Whigs, Republicans, Social Democrats, The Greens, Likud, Democrats, Institutional Revolutionary Party, and whatever political party you are affiliated with

 This is not a political blog but the views of someone who is concerned with national, state, and local elections around the globe.

 I was listening to a discussion about cyberattacks, phishing, spearphishing, cyber attribution, Mandiant, Crowdstrike, APT 28 (one of Russia’s cybersecurity units), etc. A cybersecurity conference? Nope, it was U.S. Congressional House Intelligence committee’s testimony from the heads of the FBI and the NSA about Russian interference in the 2016 election. I was hoping I could get continuing education credits(CEUs) for my cybersec certification. As a long-time cybersec pro, it was extraordinary testimony.

 I don’t want this blog to look back on what may or may not have happened to the U.S. elections over the past few months and probably previous elections. Let’s start with a clear thesis, could nation states and criminals be engaged in elections in the U.S. and globally, either covertly (observing to gather data for future actions) or overtly (trying to impact the result)? For me the answer is absolutely true. Is this good?. Will it happen it again? FBI director Comey’s testimony said, “And they'll [Russia and other nation states] be back in 2020, they may be back in 2018 and one of the lessons they may draw from this is that they were successful because they introduced chaos and division and discord and sewed doubt about the nature of this amazing country of ours and our democratic process.” This convinced me that I and others who are reading this should get engaged. But where/how?

 So is this just a national issue in the U.S. and probably elsewhere? Do nation-states only care about who is President or are they trying to threaten the electoral process at every level? In the testimony, “Guccifer 2.0,” the persona that FBI director Comey said was a front for Russian intelligence was continually mentioned. Back in August 2016, the Politico news site wrote about Guccifer 2.0 publishing scandalous info on candidates for Congress (“Hacked DCCC [Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee] docs dish on strategy and scandal for Florida congressional candidates” ) Nation states hacking local elections is not surprising. Over the years I have written about nation states hacking doctors’ offices in the Washington DC area looking for “dirt” that can be used against powerful people in DC. Nation states are hacking deep and wide. Congressional elections, local elections, judges, etc. Nation states have motive.

 AN APPEAL TO CYBERSEC PRO’s and SECURITY VENDORS

 As cybersec pro’s we know how difficult to stop nation states. They have resources, perhaps almost unlimited, in addition to motive. We cyberpro’s need to use the skills we know from protecting our enterprises to help protect elections around the world and at every level.

 I have no doubt that the next Presidential election in the U.S. will have plenty of involvement from the FBI, Homeland Security, and private firms. This is good but is it enough? We will find out. Getting involved at this level will probably be limited to a few volunteers.

 But let’s shift attention to the hundreds of state/local elections which are happening near your home/office. Many of these elections are running on shoestrings. They have old, donated PCs, their social media accounts are poorly protected, the staff and volunteers using the equipment/accounts/etc. are not cyber-educated, they don’t have firewalls, etc. If your business was run this way, you’d likely be hacked daily.

 How can we as cybersec pro’s help? Pick a campaign you believe in. Contact the campaign manager. Their email address and phone number is easy to find. Provide the same advice you do for your enterprise. You will find the campaigns are just as appreciative as your employer. It may take a few hours a week. You can probably get company volunteer credit for it. It is good for your resume. It is good for your country.

 Security vendors should provide their products/services to campaigns on a pro bono basis. It is good publicity but most importantly it is the right thing to do. If you don’t want to be taking a political stance, support both/all parties.

 Applause to Google who is already offering a free suite of security tools called Protect Your Election for upcoming national votes in France, South Korea and Germany, then subsequent elections as they occur. Lots more opportunity for security vendors to get involved.

 What do you think? Should cyberpro’s and security vendors get involved? What else can we do?