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DNC calls FBI after attempted hack of its voter database UPDATE: Was security test

Saucycarpdog

Saucycarpdog

Member
Oct 25, 2017
16,281
Mod edit with new info:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/us/politics/democratic-hacking-voter-database-false-alarm.html

WASHINGTON — The suspected hacking attempt of the Democratic National Committee's voter database this week was a false alarm and the unusual activity that raised concern was merely a test, party officials said on Thursday.

The blunder was caused by a lack of communication between the national committee and one of its state branches, the officials said. The Michigan Democratic Party had hired hackers to simulate an attack known as phishing, but did not inform the national committee.

The Michigan Democratic Party's test had attributes similar to an actual hacking, said Bob Lord, the national committee's chief security officer. When the Democratic National Committee was contacted by cybersecurity experts earlier this week about the activity, it notified the F.B.I. out of fears that it was another Russian attempt to penetrate the committee, as Moscow did during the 2016 presidential campaign.
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https://www.cnn.com/2018/08/22/politics/democratic-national-committee-voter-database/index.html
The Democratic National Committee contacted the FBI on Tuesday after it detected what it believes was the beginning of a sophisticated attempt to hack into its voter database, a Democratic source tells CNN.

The DNC was alerted in the early hours of Tuesday morning by a cloud service provider and a security research firm that a fake login page had been created in an attempt to gather usernames and passwords that would allow access to the party's database, the source said.
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The fraudulent page was designed to look like the access page Democratic Party officials and campaigns across the country use to log into a service called Votebuilder, which hosts the database, the source said, adding the DNC believed it was designed to trick people into handing over their login details.

The source said the DNC is investigating who may have been responsible for the attempted attack, but that it has no reason to believe its voter file was accessed or altered.
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Last edited by a moderator:

Zelas

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
6,020
Right on the heels of Microsoft's revelations about how anti Trump, Republican websites were subjected to the same tactics recently. Election season is in full swing. And Republicans still aren't concerned one bit about election integrity.
 
Dennis8K

Dennis8K

Banned
Oct 25, 2017
20,161
Who would do such a thing?

And why?

giphy.gif
 
Protein

Protein

Member
Oct 27, 2017
2,030
The moment a Democrat president and Democrat congress gets into office they need to skull-fuck Russia with some crippling cyberattack and sanction them into the ground.
 
Zen

Zen

The Wise Ones
Member
Nov 1, 2017
9,655
I would loooove for the culprit to be exposed, but the likely suspects would brush it off.
 

Deleted member 30544

User Requested Account Closure
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Nov 3, 2017
5,215
I'm going to put in motion a wild theory. Maybe it was a bad, feed after midnight Kremlin and Gizmo was not around to stop them
 
Ploid 6.0

Ploid 6.0

Member
Oct 25, 2017
12,439
Russia is trying to help the DNC win and they call the FBI. Low IQ DNC.

Can't be too sure these days with the way Trump enthralled fans think.
 
Taki

Taki

Attempt to circumvent a ban with an alt account
Banned
Oct 25, 2017
5,308
Why are the Russians so brazen
 
Ponn

Ponn

User requested account closure
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Oct 26, 2017
3,171
Trump will get his joint Russian-Barron Cyber Hacking investigation team right on this.
 
zou

zou

Member
Oct 29, 2017
743
just fucking mandate proper MFA (not SMS, since that can and has been exploited). how fucking hard can it be.
 

MDS

Banned
Jun 26, 2018
120
CNN hasn't bothered to publish an update, but this story has been retracted by more credible outlets
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/22/...hwarted-attempted-hack-of-voter-database.html

Update: The suspected hack of the Democratic National Committee's voter database was a false alarm, D.N.C. officials said on Thursday, and the unusual activity that raised concern was merely a test.
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Correction: August 22, 2018

An earlier version of this article misstated what cybersecurity officials said about hackers' efforts to gain access to the Democratic National Committee's voter database. The officials said the hackers may have sent so-called spearphishing emails to D.N.C. officials, not that they did send such emails.
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Approximately 1/100th of the people who read the original are ever going to realize it was fraudulent
 
Zoe

Zoe

Member
Oct 25, 2017
14,215
LOL, sooooo many people at my work have failed those tests before...
 

Cybit

Member
Oct 25, 2017
1,326
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/23/us/politics/democratic-hacking-voter-database-false-alarm.html

WASHINGTON — The suspected hacking attempt of the Democratic National Committee's voter database this week was a false alarm and the unusual activity that raised concern was merely a test, party officials said on Thursday.

The blunder was caused by a lack of communication between the national committee and one of its state branches, the officials said. The Michigan Democratic Party had hired hackers to simulate an attack known as phishing, but did not inform the national committee.

The Michigan Democratic Party's test had attributes similar to an actual hacking, said Bob Lord, the national committee's chief security officer. When the Democratic National Committee was contacted by cybersecurity experts earlier this week about the activity, it notified the F.B.I. out of fears that it was another Russian attempt to penetrate the committee, as Moscow did during the 2016 presidential campaign.
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B-Dubs

B-Dubs

That's some catch, that catch-22
General Manager
Oct 25, 2017
32,714
I edited the thread title to reflect the new info and put the NYTimes story in the OP
 
Hecht

Hecht

Too damn tired
Administrator
Oct 24, 2017
9,722
FliXFantatier said:
How incompetent can these people be?
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I mean, that's kind of the point, isn't it? They detected a hack and called the FBI. Seems like the test worked as intended - they aren't supposed to be sitting there going "oh this is just a test, nothing to worry about."

Volimar said:
Agreed up to a point. Giving the leadership a heads up so they can manage the freak out would have been fine I think.
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Yeah, true. Still though, at least they took the steps, heh​
 
Squarehard

Squarehard

Member
Oct 27, 2017
25,821
Seems to be a pretty common thing most places are doing now.

My university constantly sends me fake phising emails that were very obviously fake, but I got bored once and clicked on it finally, and it brings you to a page that did the ol' "This was just, this was only a test" kind of thing.
 
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