Georgia Accuses Homeland Security Of Attempting To Hack State’s Election Database

By Tyler Durden | 8 December 2016

ZERO HEDGE —  Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp is anxiously wondering, as are we, why someone with a Department Of Homeland Security IP address would try to hack into his State’s voter registration database.  Even though DHS offered cyber security help to states prior to the election, the Wall Street Journal notes that Georgia was one of the states that specifically denied assistance.

The secretary of state of Georgia is asking the Department of Homeland Security to explain what appears to be an attempted breach of the state’s voter registration database by someone in the federal government.

In a letter to Department of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson dated Thursday, Georgia’s Secretary of State Brian Kemp said the state had discovered an unsuccessful attempt to breach the firewall of state computer systems. That attempt was linked to an IP address associated with DHS, he said.

“At no time has my office agreed to or permitted DHS to conduct penetration testing or security scans of our network,” wrote Mr. Kemp, a Republican. “Moreover, your department has not contacted my office since this unsuccessful incident to alert us of any security event that would require testing or scanning of our network.”

The alleged attempted intrusion by the federal government on a state computer system responsible for election security was detected by a third-party security firm working for the state of Georgia. The attempt was unsuccessful, according to the state.  The computers also house information about company incorporations.

According to a letter written by Kemp to DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson, the attempted intrusion occurred 1 week after the election on November 15, 2016 at 8:43AM and came from an IP address associated with DHS (216.81.81.8)

Of course, since the hacking a state’s election database it technically illegal, even for DHS, Kemp had some fairly pointed questions for Johnson on who authorized the scan and how many other states were scanned without authorization. […]