Top US Cyber Agency to Monitor US Midterm Elections Amid Security Concerns
CISA, or the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, America’s top cybersecurity agency said it plans to monitor and issue warnings about Tuesday’s congressional elections, amid concerns about possible attempts to disrupt the vote. Election security has emerged as a key issue in the United States after officials found Russia interfered in the 2016 US election with a campaign of hacking and propaganda aimed at hurting Hillary Clinton’s chances of defeating Donald Trump.
The top US cybersecurity agency plans to establish an “Election Day Operations Center” with public and private sector partners across the country to monitor the midterms, it said in a statement Monday.
“In recent years, election officials have had to deal with an increase in disrespect from foreign adversaries, which can cause confusion about the election infrastructure and erode voter confidence in the process,” said Kim Wyman, CISA’s senior election security adviser, in a statement last week. . .
“Now, if something goes wrong – and with 8,800 polling stations across the country, something will go wrong somewhere – innocent people can be made to look disrespectful.”
Meanwhile, the Associated Press reported Tuesday that Twitter is struggling to respond to political disinformation and other dangerous posts on the social media platform after Elon Musk fired nearly half of his staff just days before the US midterm elections, according to workers who survived the layoffs. and out-group voting rights.
The recent mass layoffs have saved many people whose job it is to keep hate and misinformation on social media. Musk has fired only 15 percent of those front-line employees measuring content, compared to about 50 percent of the job cuts across the company, according to the executive. But in preparation for the layoffs, employees say the company is also significantly reducing the number of employees who can look at the history and behavior of a particular account — a practice needed to investigate abuse and take action to stop it.
The incidents are causing concern as the US midterm elections reach a climax on Tuesday. While millions of Americans have already voted early and are absent, millions more are expected to go to the polls and vote in person. Election observers fear that the platform may not be equipped to handle hate speech, misinformation that may affect voter safety and security, and actors seeking to cast doubt on the legitimate winners of elections across the country.
© Thomson Reuters 2022
