Recently the cyber security company Symantec published three simple ways through which an attacker could easily hack into the upcoming Clinton versus Trump presidential election for just $15 simply by using the Raspberry Pi-like device.
A Simple $15 Device Can Hack The U.S. Presidential Elections
Symantec Corporation which is commonly known as Symantec, it is an American technology company which is headquartered in Mountain View, California, United States. The company actually produces software for security, storage, backup and availability as well as it also offers professional services to support its software.
So, recently this cyber security company Symantec published three simple ways through which an attacker could easily hack into the upcoming Clinton versus Trump presidential election for just $15 simply by using the Raspberry Pi-like device. Yes, sounds strange right, but, it is the true fact that was published by the cyber security company Symantec.
As the security firm said that “To get started, we purchased actual direct-recording electronic (DRE) voting machines off an online auction site and other equipment to simulate a real-world voting system”.
Hence, the cyber security company Symantec also claims that their research has discovered three simple and easy ways through which an attacker with the appropriate level of intelligence and motive could decay the trust that American citizens have in their election process.
Now you all might be thinking that why and how did Symantec simulate the U.S. presidential election hack?
As we all know that in a voting process voters use a chip card simply to cast their respective votes which were actually given to them at the time of entering into polling stations where it uses the electronic voting machines. Hence, the same card is again re-used by the next voter as well and it goes on.
Simply, in this type of condition, a conjectural hacker can easily use a simple and inexpensive device to re-programme the chip card which was actually used by voters to cast their poll.
Symantec Corporation said in a statement that “Just like credit cards, these cards are like a computer with their own RAM, CPU and operating system. Which means they can be exploited like any computing device”.
“In examining the election process for vulnerabilities, we discovered that there’s an opportunity for a hacker to modify the code put on a voter’s chip card. There was no form of encryption on the internal hard drive of the voting machines we purchased, which were running an outdated operating system to display the ballots and record votes,” also added the cyber security firm Symantec.
Moreover, the cyber security company Symantec claimed that “Anyone who knows how to programme a chip card and purchases a simple $15 Raspberry Pi-like device, could secretly reactivate their voter card while inside the privacy of a voting booth. We found a card reader that fits neatly into the palm of our hand and used it to reset our fake voter chip cards two different ways”.
Hence, the lack of full disk encryption on the internal hard drive as well as on the external cartridges grants possibilities for the hackers to easily reprogram and alter votes, according to the cyber security company Symantec Corporation.
However, the company also emphasized that “Potential hackers would also be unhindered by the voting machine’s lack of internet connectivity. Some types of malware, such as Stuxnet, can take advantage of air-gapped networks and vector through physical access to a machine. The lack of full-disk encryption on the DRE machine makes it easily exploitable, requiring only a simple device to reprogram the compact hard drive”.
But, cyber security company Symantec also said that these vulnerabilities can easily be fixed by installing security software at all points of the process.
