There’s a largely overlooked hacking target that could help those who want to sow doubt about vote tallies in the November midterms: cellular modems that transmit unofficial election-night results.
The modems, which send vote data from precincts to central offices using cellphone networks, help election officials satisfy the public’s demand for rapid results. But putting any networking connection on an election system opens up new ways to attack it that don’t require physical access to machines, and security experts say the risks aren’t worth the rewards.
“You’re counting on a bunch of infrastructure to deliver data back and forth, and it’s well within the capabilities of nation-state hackers to break into that infrastructure,” said Dan Wallach, a Rice University computer science professor who has repeatedly exposed flaws in election equipment.
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Source: POLITICO