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DHS Tried To Breach Our Firewall, Says Georgia's Secretary of State (cyberscoop.com)
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CyberScoop: Georgia's secretary of state has claimed the Department of Homeland Security tried to breach his office's firewall and has issued a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson asking for an explanation. Brian Kemp issued a letter to Johnson on Thursday after the state's third-party cybersecurity provider detected an IP address from the agency's Southwest D.C. office trying to penetrate the state's firewall. According to the letter, the attempt was unsuccessful. The attempt took place on Nov. 15, a few days after the presidential election. The office of the Georgia Secretary of State is responsible for overseeing the state's elections. "At no time has my office agreed to or permitted DHS to conduct penetration testing or security scans of our network," Kemp wrote in the letter, which was also sent to the state's federal representatives and senators. "Moreover, your department has not contacted my office since this unsuccessful incident to alert us of any security event that would require testing or scanning of our network. This is especially odd and concerning since I serve on the Election Cyber Security Working Group that your office created." "The Department of Homeland Security has received Secretary Kemp's letter," a DHS spokesperson told CyberScoop. "We are looking into the matter. DHS takes the trust of our public and private sector partners seriously, and we will respond to Secretary Kemp directly." Georgia was one of two states that refused cyber-hygiene support and penetration testing from DHS in the leadup to the presidential election. The department had made a significant push for it after hackers spent months exposing the Democratic National Committee's internal communications and data.
https://assets.documentcloud.org/documents/3234551/Georgia-Secretary-of-State-Letter-to-DHS-Secretary.txt
The Office of Secretary of State
23mm Kemp
SECRETARY OF STATE
December 8, 2016
The Honorable Jeh Johnson
Secretary of Homeland Security
Department of Homeland Security
Washington, DC. 20528
Secretary Johnson,
On November 15, 2016, an IP address associated with the Department of Homeland Security made an
unsuccessful attempt to penetrate the Georgia Secretary of State's firewall. I am writing you to ask whether
DHS was aware of this attempt and, if so, why DHS was attempting to breach our firewall.
The private-sector security provider that monitors the agency's firewall detected a large unblocked scan
event on November 15 at 8:43 AM. The event was an IP address (216.81.81.80) attempting to scan certain
aspects of the Georgia Secretary of State?s infrastructure. The attempt to breach our system was unsuccess-
ful.
At no time has my office agreed to or permitted DHS to conduct penetration testing or security scans of our
network. Moreover, your Department has not contacted my office since this unsuccessful incident to alert
us of any security event that would require testing or scanning of our network. This is especially odd and
concerning since I serve on the Election Cyber Security Working Group that your office created.
As you may know, the Georgia Secretary of State?s office maintains the statewide voter registration data-
base containing the personal information of over 6.5 million Georgians. In addition, we hold the information
for over 800,000 corporate entities and over 500,000 licensed or registered professionals.
As Georgia's Secretary of State, I take cyber security very seriously. That is why I have contracted with a
global leader in monitored security services to provide immediate responses to these types of threats. This
firm analyzes more than 180 billion events a day globally across a 5,000+ customer base which includes
many Fortune 500 companies. Clearly, this type of resource and service is necessary to protect Georgians'
data against the type of event that occurred on November 15.
Georgia was one of the only few states that did not seek DHS assistance with cyber hygiene scans 0r pen-
etration testing before this year?s election. We declined this assistance due to having already implemented
the security measures suggested by DHS. Under 18 U.S.C. 1030, attempting to gain access or exceeding
authorized access to protected computer systems is illegal. Given all these facts, a number of very important
questions have been raised that deserve your attention:
214 State Capitol oAtlanta, Georgia 30334 - (404) 656-2881 (404) 656-0513 Fax
Did your Department in fact conduct this unauthorized scan?
If so, who on your staff authorized this scan?
Did your Department conduct this type of scan against any other states? systems without authorization?
If so, which states were scanned by DHS without authorization?
I am very concerned by these facts provided by our security services provider, as they raise very serious
questions. I would appreciate your prompt and thorough response.
Sincerely,
Brian P. Kemp
[follows is long list of CC: Congressman, etc.]
In an online political discussion, one conservative complained about Obama's alleged excess snooping. I pointed out that Bush and Trump are pretty much pro-snoopers also.
At first (s)he seemed to argue otherwise, but after a lot of probing on my part, the truth finally came out: He was more nervous with a Democrat snooping than a Republican. It wasn't the snooping itself, but WHO was snooping.
I can see how the personal trust issue can play a part, but to keep switching the laws back and forth depending on which party is in power is not realistic.
Table-ized A.I.
The last two administrations have weaponized a lot of Federal agencies against the American people, violating the 1st, 2nd, 4th, 5th, 8th and other Amendments of the Bill of Rights, and their oath of office to "uphold and defend the Constitution of the United States".
Were they trying to break into the election computers and change the counts?
Running with Linux for over 20 years!