Free and Fair

In February of 2018 I published an essay We Are at War, about the vulnerability of our elections.  Little has been done in the year and a half since then to change the situation.

Rigged Elections

This is not my usual “political” essay.  It’s about elections, but not necessarily about who should win or who should lose. It’s about an attack on a core value of the United States democracy:  free and fair elections.  

American history is replete with “rigged” elections.  The $2 bill is unpopular still today because of election buying.  In the late 19^thcentury, American politicians used the $2 bill to “purchase” votes.  Voters who had that bill were assumed to have sold their vote. No one wanted that, so they stopped carrying them.  By the way, the $2 is still a legal and circulated currency, though the Treasury Department hasn’t printed new ones since 2003.

But today we are beyond politicians handing out money for votes.  America is faced with hostile foreign nations who are willing to use their advanced computer knowledge to attack the electoral process.  And it’s not just foreign nations, private companies have some of the same skills and abilities, and are putting themselves up for the highest bidder. 

Way Back in 2016

The 2016 Presidential election was fully attacked from multiple angles and sources.  Whatever you think about the Mueller Report or Mr. Mueller himself, his testimony to the House Intelligence Committee on Wednesday made one point very clear:  we were attacked, and we are being attacked, and we will be attacked again.  And we have done very little to be ready for it.

“Trumper” or “Resistor,” either way you surely must want the election system to be legitimate.  Protecting our electoral process is not a partisan issue. It is an American one.

Breaking In

The ultimate election “cheating” of my generation was the Watergate break-in in 1972.  Burglars working for the Nixon Presidential Re-Election Campaign broke into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee in the Watergate Office complex.  They bugged the phones of the Chairman of the DNC, Larry O’Brien, and other high-ranking Democratic officials.  They broke in the first time successfully, and planted listening devices. One of those devices failed, and the Nixon operatives went in a second time to replace it.  That’s when they were caught, and the Watergate crisis began.

What did they hope to get from the bugs?   Strategies, inside information, and maybe some scandalous gossip, all to be used against the Dems. They wanted inside information, and they were willing to commit felonies to get it.

Stealing by Remote

Today it’s unlikely that one campaign would commission burglars to break-in and get information. Why would they do that, when all the information anyone would ever want is on computer drives.  From polling data to strategic planning, from gossip on emails and “chats” to the most secret opposition research files:  they’re not on paper anymore.   

When the Russian military wanted to find out what the Democrats were doing, they used sophisticated “phishing” attacks to gain access to the DNC computers.  They didn’t have to hurry, they had months to explore the files, rummaging around in the electronic depths to find information.  The operatives did so from the safety of their Russian headquarters. Just like the Watergate burglars of old, they weren’t interested in disruption, they wanted the information to just keep coming.  And it did, for months:  strategies, numbers, and ultimately the personal e-mails of the highest officials.

The Russian’s hacked the Republican computers as well.  But they didn’t use the data; that wasn’t their mission.  They aimed their attacks at the Democrats, specifically Hillary Clinton, and they were undeniably successful.

Today we hope that the computers are better defended, both Democrat and Republican.  We hope that the leaders and strategists of both parties have returned to making phone calls about the critical stuff, rather than writing e-mails.   But we are all so used to using electronic media, from emails to tweets, from computers to cell phones.  It will take a lot of “habit breaking” to keep important information safe from attack.

Pizza and Sex

The second attack was more insidious because it was an attack on all of us, or at least all of us who use social media.  The Russians, and private companies like Cambridge Analytica, used the “new” way we communicate with each other:  Facebook, Twitter, Instagram and all of the other “apps” to try to influence our thoughts.  

They pretended to be “Americans” (in fact they pretended to be the Tennessee Republican Party) and they created false stories.  Hillary was sick and dying, she sold children for sex from a pizza restaurant in Washington, and cheated Bernie Sanders in the primaries.  We were told over and over again about how bad, evil, awful she was. 

Did it change anyone’s mind, anyone’s vote?  Of course it did.  Millions of dollars are spent on social media advertising, aimed directly at us by using our data to target our likes and dislikes.  Of course it works and of course people are influenced.  If it didn’t work, no one would spend the money. Over 120 million American Facebook users saw Russian posts.  And that was just Facebook.

Facebook Friends

Did you support Bernie? Ads were aimed at you saying Hillary and the DNC cheated.  You saw posts from other “Bernie supporters” about how they weren’t going to vote for that cheater.  

Are you a factory worker? Hillary was sending your job to Guatemala and you’ll end up serving burgers at the local fast food place. That’s what happened, there was someone the same as you, on Facebook.  That the story came from a Russian troll farm in St. Petersburg, there was no way you could know.

The Russians invaded our “discourse.” The private companies did the same.  And, despite Congressional hearings and public outcry, the social media giants really haven’t done much about any of that.  Their “community standards” haven’t changed and there are still bots and trolls all around.  Facebook, Twitter and the rest make their money on data and readership; nothing encourages more people to join in than controversy.  That business model supports the invasion still today.

Counting the Votes

Hack computers and emails, and use the information.  Invade social media, and influence millions.  But the third line of attack was a direct assault on the US voting system.  We know that Russia hacked into voting systems around the country.  At present we are still told that, “…no votes were changed.”  But keep in mind, up till a few months ago, we were told only nine states were hacked.  Then it was twenty-one.  Today we are told that all fifty states were targeted, so it’s hard to know what the real impact of the incursions were.

Surely political campaign and parties are taking steps to harden their computer operations.  That will reduce their vulnerability to attack. But while there has been a lot of “noise” from the social media companies about “improving” their product, it doesn’t seem like much has really happened.  Our own awareness of influence campaigns and willingness to fact check may be the only way to prevent the broad influence attacks.

But there’s still the “black box” of election security.  No one is talking about it, not the Federal government or the state and local entities. We don’t know if they are preparing, or simply waiting for the next shoe to drop.  And it won’t necessarily be Russia; China, Iran and North Korea all are capable of attacks.  We may not know who is changing our votes.

Elections are America

This is not about politics; it’s about America.  We shouldn’t be concerned about Trump, Clinton, or whoever runs in 2020.  We need to worry about the sanctity of the voting booth.  America needs to protect it.  It’ll take more than $2, and more than just lip service from the government.