The COVID pandemic has created a paper trail for ballots.
The integrity of the 2020 elections can be improved as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, according to a leading cybersecurity expert.
Christopher Krebs, director of the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, said Friday that increased reliance on absentee and mail ballots, which have an associated paper record, may be a blessing in disguise. Paper records, he said, are critical to the security of elections because they lead to auditability.
“Auditability is a key element in determining the integrity of a vote,” said Krebs. “To reverse it, be sure to get the right results and, most of all, demonstrate, through a post-election audit process, that the votes cast are counted as cast.”
Krebs spoke as part of an online forum on electoral security organized by the Brookings Institution, an expert group based in Washington, DC. She said that in the 2016 election, about 82% of the votes cast had a paper record associated with them. Looking ahead to November 4, he said that figure may be above 92% due to the expected increase in COVID-related absentee ballots.
“Once again, the ability to conduct post-election audits is critical to establishing the integrity of the election,” he added.
President Donald Trump has routinely criticized voting by mail in recent weeks, claiming that it will increase electoral fraud without providing much evidence.
“You will have tremendous fraud if you mail these ballots,” Trump said at a news conference Tuesday in Rose Garden. “Now, absentee ballots are fine, because absentee ballots have to get applications, you have to go through a process.”
Election officials across the United States interviewed by ABC News disagree that mail ballots are a risk to electoral integrity.
Krebs said CISA has taken a number of steps to improve the “cyber hygiene” of electoral databases, including ensuring that every state electoral network has intrusion detection sensors. He said that Florida’s 67 counties were equipped with these sensors.
“We have the best comprehensive visibility in the entire electoral infrastructure sector than any other sector, so if there is a tremor in the force, we will feel it and we will be able to act accordingly,” he added.
Compared to things in 2016, Krebs said, “We are not seeing that level of coordinated and determined cyber activity from adversaries.”
Despite that, he added, “We are not fooling ourselves, there are bad guys who want to do bad things.”
“Russia wants to destabilize, China wants a more compliant state, and Iran probably wants a bit of both, so let’s be prepared. We have defenses up and ready for that,” he said.
Fiona Hill, the former National Security Council official who testified at Trump’s impeachment hearings, moderated the panel on which Krebs spoke. Hill emphasized that low turnout was also a threat to electoral integrity and that voting was a privilege granted to all American citizens.
“This is the fundamental agency act that we all have as citizens in the United States,” he said. “Everyone should go out and vote and do their part.”
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