July 5, 2019

No, An 11 Year Old Didn't Hack a Replica of Florida's Election Servers and Change the Vote.

https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/jul/02/tulsi-gabbard/tulsi-gabbard-exaggerates-saying-kid-hacked-replic/

Appearing on HBO’s "Real Time with Bill Maher," Gabbard, a U.S. representative from Hawaii, told Maher:

"We have to take seriously the security of our elections because of the vulnerabilities that exist — still, now — that really have the ability to undermine our democracy. There’s a hacking conference that’s held every year in Las Vegas, where I think a 14- or 15-year old-girl from Florida hacked into a replica of Florida’s election system in less than 15 minutes."

...

But two points are problematic for Gabbard’s claim.

First, there wasn’t hacking into a replica of the election system — but rather a website made to look like Florida’s Secretary of State website that reports preliminary election results. In other words, not the system that receives and counts actual votes.

And second, what was hacked into was not even a replica — as in an exact copy — of the website — because it did not contain the proprietary security features that the Secretary of State website has.

...



I was annoyed that the media is insinuating that DEFCON proved that Florida’s election could be hacked, and it was so easy to do, an eleven year old did it. This does nothing but to undermine the legitimacy of our elections.

I also cringed when Tulsi Gabbard repeated this fake news as fact during the debate. This story was highly misleading clickbait, and was irresponsible journalism...