Russia, or anyone else
for that matter, didn’t disrupt Rhode Island’s voting systems during the 2016
election, according to the Secretary of State’s office.
“We have not detected,
nor received reports from any of our vendors or from the federal government
regarding hacking attempts on our elections infrastructure,” said Nicole
Lagace, a senior adviser and communications director to Secretary of State
Nellie Gorbea.
To keep the system
safe, she said, “we have been working with U. S. Department of Homeland
Security to conduct a weekly cyber hygiene assessment of our online systems
since last October.”
Homeland Security
began offering this free service to states when news first started to percolate
that the Russian government was trying to disrupt American elections.
In recent weeks, news
reports and leaked classified government documents have disclosed that Russia
may have tried to gain access to local voting systems, in addition to stealing
and leaking private emails and distributing fake news.
A NSA report leaked to the The Intercept indicates that Russian hackers tried to
gain access to at least 122 government computers across the country.
“As described by the classified NSA report, the Russian plan was simple: pose as an e-voting vendor and trick local government employees into opening Microsoft Word documents invisibly tainted with potent malware that could give hackers full control over the infected computers,” according to the controversial and revealing Intercept report.
A subsequent story in Bloomberg
Politics indicates as
many as 39 states may have been hacked. The story story offers no evidence of
such a widespread attack, and some have questioned the veracity of the
reporting.
Rhode Island does not
work with VR Systems, the company mentioned in The Intercept and Bloomberg
reports, said Lagace.
She said Rhode Island
was well situated to ward off an attack, if one was attempted, because of work
Gorbea had done prior to the 2016 election season.
“She had already
stepped up her efforts leading up to the 2016 election,” Lagace said. “Since
coming into office, Secretary of State Gorbea has been working to ensure our
elections are fair, fast, and accurate so that Rhode Islanders can trust the
integrity of every vote.”
Bob Plain
is the editor/publisher of Rhode Island's Future. Previously, he's worked as a
reporter for several different news organizations both in Rhode Island and
across the country.