U.S. Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC), chairman of the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, on March 20 released preliminary recommendations from the panel for securing future elections in the United States.
“We’re here to express concerns, but also confidence in our state and local governments,” Sen. Burr said during a press conference the same day, noting that the committee supports continued state control of the election process following its investigation into Russian attempts to influence America’s 2016 presidential election.
Russian cyber attackers targeted voting systems in 21 states and succeeded in penetrating at least one voting center database, according to Burr, who said the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) alerted state officials to the threat. However, the warnings “did not provide enough information or go to the right person in every case,” the chairman said.
Nevertheless, despite attempts to penetrate the United States election infrastructure and undermine confidence in the nation’s voting system, the Senate Select Committee investigation determined no evidence proved that any vote was changed due to Russian meddling, Burr said. However, there needs to be changes made, he added.
“Let me say this with a great deal of confidence: it is clear that the Russian government was looking for the vulnerabilities in our election system and highlighted some of the key gaps,” Burr said. “We think there are ways the federal government can support those states, but clearly we’ve got to get some standards in place that assure every state that at the end of the day they can certify their vote totals.”
And while DHS and the FBI have made great strides, according to Burr, “they must do more.” For instance, he said DHS offers federal agencies and others a suite of cybersecurity assistance, “but we’ve heard that they do not have the resources to fulfill all the requests.”
According to a summary of the Senate committee’s draft recommendations, “the U.S. election infrastructure is fundamentally resilient. The Department of Homeland Security, the Election Assistance Commission, state and local governments, and other groups have already taken beneficial steps toward addressing the vulnerabilities exposed during the 2016 election cycle … but more needs to be done.” The committee recommended six specific steps “to better defend against a hostile nation-state who may seek to undermine our democracy.”
In summary, the committee’s draft recommendations include the need to reinforce that states have the lead in running elections and the federal government should ensure they receive necessary resources. Effective deterrence also should be created by clearly communicating to adversaries that an attack on the U.S. election infrastructure is a hostile act, and the nation will respond accordingly. In addition, improved information sharing on threats should be prioritized, the committee said, such as by DHS developing clear channels of communication between the federal government and state and local officials, and expediting their security clearances.
The recommendations also called for election-related systems to be secured by directing managers of those systems to make cybersecurity a high priority, for instance, and by directing DHS to work with election experts to develop a risk-management framework to document and mitigate risks to all components of the electoral process. States also should secure the vote by replacing outdated and vulnerable voting systems and consider implementing more widespread, statistically sound audits of election results. Lastly, the committee recommended that Congress pass legislation establishing a voluntary grant program for states to improve cybersecurity by hiring additional information technology staff, updating software and contracting vendors to provide cybersecurity services, among other steps.
“Don’t expect legislative action on these recommendations from the committee,” Burr said, “because we have no jurisdiction. It just happens to be part of the investigation. Jurisdiction within the Congress is probably with the Rules Committee within the United States Senate. We will work closely with them, sharing all of the information with them that we possibly can.”