The Wake County Board of Elections is suspending its use of a software vendor after it reported a possible cyberattack.
There’s no evidence that voting machines, ballots, voter registration records or systems used to count votes were affected, according to the county board. But the incident could have exposed information about people who help run polling places and administer elections, county officials said Friday.
Wake County Elections Director Olivia McCall said a hacker gained access to a secret password used by ElectSure, a company that provides software to train and register all 9,000 election workers who were in the county’s pool. It remains unclear whether anyone actually obtained the poll workers’ information. The extent of the hacker’s access remains under investigation.
“It could be that they didn’t even compromise anything,” McCall said.
ElectSure didn’t immediately respond to WRAL’s request for comment. TElectSure is used by other North Carolina counties to help with elections. It was unclear if other counties have been affected, state officials said.
The North Carolina State Board of Elections is assisting Wake County. “We were notified last night [Aug. 13] about the incident and we are currently assisting and supporting them,” state board spokesperson Jason Tyson said in a statement to WRAL.
In Wake County ElectSure had read-only access to a county database containing precinct officials’ names, email addresses and information about their training and assignments.
It didn’t have access to Social Security numbers, dates of birth, financial information or other sensitive personal information, McCall said.
Wake County has since cut off access to ElectSure and will no longer use its platform, she said.
McCall said the worst-case scenario currently identified by the county is that someone obtained names and email addresses that could be used to send phishing messages.
“There has been no evidence that they have gotten any emails maliciously,” McCall told WRAL Friday.
ElectSure notified the county Aug. 7 that its system had been compromised. The county then revoked the company’s access to its precinct official database.
The incident comes as election security and public confidence remain concerns heading into November.
Nearly one-third of North Carolinians — 31.4% — said the state’s elections were becoming less trustworthy in an April poll conducted by Opinion Diagnostics. The Boston-based polling company is run by advisers to Republican politicians in Massachusetts and North Carolina. Only 15% said trust was rising, while 44% said their opinion had not changed.
State election officials have said they’re working to strengthen election security and public confidence ahead of November. There’s no evidence of widespread voter fraud in recent North Carolina elections.
McCall stressed that the compromised training platform is separate from the systems used to administer elections.
“No confidential, no sensitive information was accessible through the platform,” she said. “It’s not connected and it’s not possible for ballots to be impacted.”
She also said when involving a third party, the county never lets them have access to any sensitive information, especially ballots.
The county’s voting equipment is never connected to the internet, she said.
“Ballot safety is very important because our systems are air-gapped,” McCall said. “Our equipment never is attached to any internet, and cannot be accessed.”
The county plans to use a different process to register and train precinct officials.
In the meantime, officials are asking Wake County poll workers to be cautious about unexpected emails and links.
