The US federal government on Friday told election officials in 21 states that hackers targeted their systems before last year’s presidential election.
The notification came roughly a year after US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials first said states were targeted by hacking efforts possibly connected to Russia.
The states that told The Associated Press they had been targeted included some key political battlegrounds, such as Florida, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia and Wisconsin.
The AP contacted every state election office to determine which ones had been informed that their election systems had been targeted. The others that confirmed are Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Minnesota, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Oregon, Texas and Washington.
Being targeted does not mean that sensitive voter data was manipulated or results were changed. A hacker targeting a system without getting inside is similar to a burglar circling a house checking for unlocked doors and windows.
Even so, the widespread nature of the attempts and the year-long lag time in notification from the department raised concerns among some election officials and lawmakers.
For many states, the Friday calls were the first official confirmation of whether their states were on the list — even though state election officials across the country have been calling for months for the federal government to share information about any hacks, as have members of US Congress.
“It is completely unacceptable that it has taken DHS over a year to inform our office of Russian scanning of our systems, despite our repeated requests for information,” California Secretary of State Alex Padilla said in a statement. “The practice of withholding critical information from elections officials is a detriment to the security of our elections and our democracy.”
US Senator Mark Warner, the top Democrat on a committee that is investigating Russian meddling in last year’s election, has been pushing the department for months to reveal the identities of the targeted states.
He said states need such information in real time so they can strengthen their cyberdefenses.
“We have to do better in the future,” he said.
The department said it recognizes that state and local officials should be kept informed about cybersecurity risks to election infrastructure.
“We are working with them to refine our processes for sharing this information while protecting the integrity of investigations and the confidentiality of system owners,” it said in a statement.
The government did not say who was behind the hacking attempts or provide details about what had been sought.
However, election officials in several states said the attempts were linked to Russia.
A spokeswoman for Indiana Secretary of State Connie Lawson, president of the National Association of Secretaries of State, said Lawson requested a list of the states where there were hacking efforts.
In most cases, states said they were told the systems were not breached.
Federal officials said that in most of the 21 states the targeting was preparatory activity, such as scanning computer systems.
The targets included voter registration systems, but not vote-tallying software.
Officials said there were some attempts to compromise networks, but most were unsuccessful.
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