Dubbed “voter identity theft” by study authors Latanya Sweeney, Professor of Government and Technology in Residence, research analyst Ji Su Yoo and graduate student Jinyan Zang, the vulnerability could be exploited by attackers to attempt to disenfranchise many voters where voter registration information can be changed online. Armed with personal information obtained through legitimate or illegitimate sources, hackers could know enough to impersonate voters and change key information using online voter registration systems.
One tactic, researchers said, would be to simply change voters’ addresses, making it appear — to poll workers at least — as though they were voting at the wrong location. Those voters might be forced to cast provisional ballots, which in many circumstances are not counted. The study is described in a September 6 paper published in the Journal of Technology Science.
Though the researchers don’t report evidence of attackers exploiting the vulnerability, Sweeney, Yoo and Zang said the fear is that it might be used to either undermine confidence in elections or even to swing the result in favor of a particular candidate.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/09/170906103803.htm
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