In time for the long Presidents' Day weekend in the US there have been multiple warnings about what will undoubtedly be a challenging and potentially dangerous year for voting processes and government workers.
State and county officials have been urged to use paper ballots wherever possible over electronic ones, and ensure all election offices have procedures in place to handle potentially lethal substances, specifically fentanyl, anthrax, and ricin.
Uncle Sam and its pals sounded the alarm on election-related disinformation, which does seem to be growing faster than Sam Altman's bank balance.
There have already been robocalls spoofing US President Joe Biden telling people not to vote, which is sure to be just a preview of the deepfakes and other AI-assisted disinformation that no doubt will be amplified by good ol' fashioned social media in the run up to US, UK, and Canadian elections this year.
Foreign fake-news seeks to 'undermine democracies'.
Americans have proven we don't need Russian or Chinese trolls to push election-related fake news on social networks - we are very adept at doing this all on our own, thank you.
There's not a lot of specifics in the joint statement.
The effort does include all three countries endorsing the Framework to Counter Foreign State Information Manipulation, which includes building interoperable digital tools to detect and mitigate these threats.
In addition to disinformation, election administrators also need to worry about how completed ballots are returned to state and county offices, and whether or not they have proper training and equipment in case miscreants mail toxic substances to their facilities.
Because some voters can't cast their ballots in person or by postal mail, many states in the US offer email, fax, or web-based apps to facilitate remote voting.
This involves providing a blank digital ballot to citizens, allowing those voters to mark their choices via a web portal or other electronic interface, and then electronically sending the marked ballots back to the election offices.
A separate CISA alert [PDF] focuses on election workers' physical safety.
It indicates thugs are moving beyond leaving threatening voicemail messages and social media posts, and reverting to early 2000s tactics of sending powdery substances in the mail.
This specifically included suspicious letters mailed to election offices in California, Georgia, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington in 2023, according to the Homeland Security agency.
Because of this, all election offices should have procedures in place to handle potentially dangerous mail and respond to hazardous materials exposure, and all personnel should be trained on these procedures, it advises.
In addition to taking precautionary measures such as handling the post in an isolated area and giving mail handlers a smock, mask, respirator, and gloves, the Feds also suggested having on hand a minimum of two doses of the opiate overdose medication Naloxone for everyone handling mail.
Plus they issued ten best practices for how to respond should you come into contact with potentially hazardous substances.
This Cyber News was published on go.theregister.com. Publication date: Sun, 18 Feb 2024 16:43:06 +0000