National: How The U.S. Fended Off Serious Foreign Election Day Cyberattacks | Tim Mak and Dina Temple-Raston/NPR
On Election Day, Geoff Brown watched lines of text flow by on monitors at New York City Cyber Command in downtown Manhattan. Brown, the head of the city’s cybersecurity operation, was plugged into a bank of virtual conference rooms, checking in with partners at the local, state and federal levels working together to monitor election systems for any security breaches or disinformation campaigns that might target the voting process. After all the waiting, after months of hardening defenses, the serious threats never came. “It was a long night. It was sort of a lonely night, perhaps, because we’re all in our own rooms in this day and age,” Brown reflected. He singled out for particular praise his counterparts at the Department of Homeland Security, especially Christopher Krebs, “who I think has done an absolute, tremendous job in their mission.” President Trump’s Tuesday evening firing of Krebs, director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency at DHS, which oversaw federal efforts on election security and countering voting system disinformation, highlights a broader point: After all the concerns raised about foreign adversaries hacking into systems and launching disinformation campaigns such as those that marred the 2016 presidential election, the 2020 race went smoothly on both fronts.
Full Article: Foreign Hacking In 2020 Election Averted; Domestic Disinformation Still A Threat : NPR