CISA Reports No National Threat to Election Security
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has reported routine types of Election Day disruptions scattered across the United States, but it has not tracked significant incidents impacting election security at the national level as of 1:34 p.m. on November 5.
Cait Conley, the senior adviser to the director of CISA, which is part of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, said the intelligence community is observing a greater scope and scale of foreign influence operations in the 2024 election cycle than prior cycles. Additionally, CISA, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence and the FBI released a joint statement on November 4, identifying Russia as the most active propagator of false narratives and warning the American public that Russia is spreading manufactured content and false rumors of election fraud.
However, CISA expected this increased amount of adversarial influence, knowing that adversaries like Russia are equipped with sophisticated tactics across numerous platforms to reach the American public with disinformation.
“We do have foreign adversaries with two objectives: one to undermine the American people's confidence in our democratic institutions, and the second to stoke partisan discourse,” Conley said. “And so, we should expect to continue to see narratives around those types of objectives both today and in the days and weeks to come.”
Russia is spreading false information about election administration to make Americans question the validity of the 2024 presidential election as well as “undermining American democracy and pitting Americans against one another,” Conley said. CISA is monitoring adversarial tactics like creating false social media narratives, establishing websites pretending to be run by media organizations and fabricating media organizations to reach Americans through chat applications.
According to Conley, CISA is aware of the noncredible bomb threats at polling places in Georgia that disrupted the voting process, and the agency is in contact with federal government partners and the Georgia secretary of state’s office. While Russia is thought to be behind the threats, Conley said these disruptive events are expected, and election officials routinely prepare for these scenarios to ensure that, at the end of the day, every vote is counted.
“While incidents may occur and things like this may cause temporary disruptions to be processed, there are measures in place that election officials have implemented to ensure the security and resilience of the overall election administration process,” Conley said.
To determine whether a disruption is a local incident or national occurrence, CISA is in constant communication with election security partners, law enforcement officials and the intelligence community, Conley said. The flow of information between all parties helps them understand the bigger picture behind each threat.
“We feel like the levels of communication that are occurring with respect to the election security mission is really the best it has ever been from the local to state to federal level, because we all recognize the importance of this mission and that election security is national security,” Conley said.
Conley said some of the adversaries’ messages are intended to incite physical violence between Americans, and the best that CISA can do is communicate to the public that adversaries are spreading misinformation.
“Given the various methods of information distribution and the 2024 information environment, we think it’s most important for people to understand that with all of the noise and disinformation out there, what Americans need to really realize is that your state and local election official is the signal through that noise,” Conley said. “That is your source for authoritative information on election security, on election administration, and so if there are questions, that is who the American people should be turning to for the authoritative answers."
