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FBI Says Foreign Hackers Breached State Election Systems (theguardian.com)
The FBI has uncovered evidence that foreign hackers breached two state election databases in recent weeks, and it has warned election officials across the country to some measures to step up the security of their computer systems. The Guardian reports: The FBI warning did not identify the two states targeted by cyber intruders, but Yahoo News said sources familiar with the document said it referred to Arizona and Illinois, whose voter registration systems were penetrated. Citing a state election board official, Yahoo News said the Illinois voter registration system was shut down for 10 days in late July after hackers downloaded personal data on up to 200,000 voters. The Arizona attack was more limited and involved introducing malicious software into the voter registration system, Yahoo News quoted a state official as saying. No data was removed in that attack, the official said. US intelligence officials have become increasingly worried that hackers sponsored by Russia or other countries may attempt to disrupt the November presidential election.
I’ve arranged with my executor to be buried in Chicago. Because when I die, I want to still remain active politically.
Time to offend someone
No one actually has to "hack" anything -- just get the thought out there. No matter who wins, stories like this will be cited by the losing side as "proof" the election was "rigged" or "hacked", and that the winner didn't win legitimately. I can think of few things more damaging to the democratic institution.
See also:
A Powerful Russian Weapon: The Spread of False Stories
We use these things called paper ballots.
So does Oregon.
We all vote by mail, so hack all you want.
We can always rerun the paper ballots again.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
Unsubstantiated rumors like the ruskies having anything to do with it?
John McAfee 'It was like that time I hired that Bangkok prostitute; to do my taxes, while I fucked my accountant'
A Better Defense.
1. Take the fucking registration systems OFF the internet.
You'd think the State IT departments never heard of something called the Intranet.
When Fascism comes to America, it will call itself Anti-Fascism, and tell you to give up your guns.
Selective service is not tied to your voter registration in any way.
In some states, there is a connection with drivers license, and with student loans, but in no US state is there any connection between registering to vote and selective service.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Defense: 1) get rid of padlock on bicycles so anyone can take them.
1) Get rid of registration and let everyone vote.
Yeah. Right. That will help remove fraud from the election process.
Please stop this nonsense and autoregister everyone who is allowed to vote.
So you send ballots to everyone, even those who have no desire to vote, and have not bothered to study any of the issues at all because of that. Why should they be voting if they really care so little about the process?
Voter registration is so easy that it is a barrier only to those who really don't care to vote, and I think that not handing them a ballot is a good answer to the question "why should I register to vote when I don't want to?"
There was a GNU project to create free software for online voting. In 2002, Jason Kitcat the project coordinator abandoned development, pointing to this quote from Bruce Schneier: "a secure Internet voting system is theoretically possible, but it would be the first secure networked application ever created in the history of computers."
I don't see anything having changed in the intervening fourteen years, other than perhaps attackers getting more sophisticated. We may not have internet voting, but the idea that voting machines or those used in the tabulation of votes are connected to the internet is madness.
So anyone who believes ANYTHING the FBI says, at this point in time especially, is a complete moron. Instead, let's apply the "FBI Says" headline filter to the text, and observe the results.
FBI Lackeys Breached State Election Systems. Blames Foreign Hackers
Now, that's much more believable, right? Sorry FBI, you have absolutely ZERO credibility. Anyone with more than a few functional neurons KNOWS that the likelihood of anything you say being an outright fabrication or lie approaches 100%.
If you're a citizen, you can go in to vote.
Go in where? I get my ballots by mail.
Non citizens have absolutely zero incentive to vote.
Really? "If I vote for someone who promises to give me free stuff, I might get free stuff." Or "if I vote against someone who wants to enforce the laws that would deport me, maybe I won't be deported." Doesn't sound like zero incentive to me.
Why bother taking the risk?
With half the people in the country denying that it does or could take place, the risk is minimal. And when the person you helped elect takes charge. the risk goes away completely.
This is why the data shows it almost never happens.
Except in Chicago where it is a running joke. And of course, few waste time collecting data on something that they actively deny ever happens.
If you think I am a Trump supporter or a racist you obviously didn't read my post history, but that's not really a concern.
That you would use those terms with such abandon is telling. It is really indicative of the level of intelligence involved in the mud-slinging meta attacks that the younger generation tries to pass off as intellectual discourse (not to be left out, there are some older generation people that have learned to do this. Its even more pathetic when they do it as they should have learned better by now.) Namely, just call someone a racist and associate them with a public figure that is held in contempt by the majority of people in the particular forum you are speaking in and you don't even have to have a cogent argument. Which is for the best I guess, because I have a hard time believing that someone who resorts to this kind of behavior can get past their own stunted emotional responses to rationally consider their own opinions, much less those of someone else.
I implore you, learn to focus on the issues at hand instead of carrying around the equivalent of a sharpened stick to poke people with. You might learn that what you accuse people of, and are convinced they are a party to, is so far from the truth that you would be utterly embarrassed that you had made that accusation when you learn the facts.
When the only tool you have is a claw hammer every problem starts to look like the back of someone's skull.