| | | | |  | | By Sam Sabin | Presented by App Security Project | With help from Eric Geller
| | | — Some of the few remaining jurisdictions that vote on paperless machines are finally returning to paper ballots. — As Ukraine continues to rely on automated facial recognition to identify soldiers, prisoners of war and border-crossers, both facial recognition vendors and privacy advocates are pushing for regulations on how the tech is used. — Lawmakers and Biden administration officials have a stacked cyber agenda this week as they tackle the country's cyber needs during appropriations talks, congressional hearings and media events. HAPPY MONDAY, and welcome back to Morning Cybersecurity! I'm your host, Sam Sabin. So far, we've only spotted CISA Director Jen Easterly at the White House Correspondents' Dinner over the weekend. Who else from cyber world did you see? Have any tips and secrets to share with MC? Or thoughts on what we should track down next? Send what you've got to ssabin@politico.com. Follow along at @POLITICOPro and @MorningCybersec. Full team contact info below. Let's get to it:
| | | | A message from App Security Project, an initiative of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance Foundation: Former national security officials are sounding alarms on current antitrust proposals being considered by Congress. Key leaders from the defense, intelligence and homeland security communities are warning that current proposals could open countless doors for cybercriminals and foreign adversaries to gain access to Americans' private data. President Biden is asking Americans to "shield up" to fight cyber attacks, and Congress needs to take his lead and protect American consumers. | | | | | | THE PERKS OF PAPER — As former President Donald Trump and his allies continue spreading lies about hacked voting machines, once-skeptical local election officials have begun voicing support for paper ballots as a way of increasing voter confidence, Eric reports in a story out this morning . These officials still profess confidence in their paperless voting machines — which experts call dangerously insecure — but they also acknowledge that voters riled up by disinformation about rigged elections want proof that their ballots are safe. "I understand why it's important to have the paper trail," Paula Copenhaver, the clerk of Fountain County, Ind., told Eric. "If we don't have integrity in our elections, then we don't really have a republic." Eric interviewed nine county clerks and election administrators in Indiana and Texas, the two states that are in the middle of implementing paper ballot mandates. Funding issues have stymied machine upgrades for years, and as Eric reports, different states are handling that challenge in different ways. Indiana is providing printer attachments for all of the state's remaining paperless machines, but Texas is only buying new equipment for certain counties. Two other states, Kentucky and Mississippi, also recently enacted bans on paperless machines. Here are some of the funding issues officials continue to face: — Short-sighted spending: Many election officials prefer to buy printer attachments for their aging paperless machines instead of entirely new, more secure electronic machines with paper trails. But that decision, often defended on cost grounds, could come back to bite those officials, election security experts said. Because the underlying hardware is so old, the vendors "can't replace the pieces that go out of commission," said Matt Weil, director of the Bipartisan Policy Center's elections project. Vendors that depend on components that are no longer produced "might be making promises that would be difficult for them to fulfill," said Dan Wallach, a computer science professor and voting security expert at Rice University. — Long lead times for replacing machines: Congress approved $75 million in election security grants in the fiscal 2022 spending bill, but that money won't reach counties in time to help them replace paperless machines before the midterms. And given the often-clunky government procurement process, Weil said, "we may even be past the point of any real federal funds impacting 2024 at this point." In some jurisdictions, Weil said, it could even take until 2026. — Why haven't counties already upgraded? Apart from cost issues and a preference for the paperless machines, some officials told Eric that they thought the government's recommendations might change again. After all, before recommending paper-based machines, the feds showered states with money to buy electronic machines following the 2000 election's hanging-chads debacle. "In 10 years, a lot could change," said Stuart Dowden, the clerk of Greene County, Ind. But voting security experts didn't think much of this rationale. "I don't think that the analogy there quite makes sense," said Will Adler, a senior technologist focused on elections at the Center for Democracy and Technology.
| | | | A message from App Security Project, an initiative of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance Foundation:   | | | | | | RULES OF THE ROAD — Ukraine's continued reliance on facial recognition technologies to identify dead soldiers, prisoners of war and those crossing its borders is inspiring a movement — both among facial recognition vendors and privacy advocates — to get some sort of facial recognition regulations on the books. Since the first weeks of the war, facial recognition has reportedly beena key tool for Ukrainian government's attempts to identify who was going where on Ukrainian soil. Clearview AI, a controversial facial recognition vendor, even offered its services to the Ukraine military in March. Now, Clearview and other privacy advocates are using those use cases to urge lawmakers, in the United States and beyond, to regulate how biometric data can be collected and used in these ways — although, both sides have very different ideas of what those rules should look like: — On the one hand, Clearview CEO Hoan Ton-That said last week during a Washington Post event that his company would "welcome" regulations, saying that "we do think regulation is important, and any new technology goes through that." But the regulations Ton-That envisions would be similar to those imposed on automobiles when they first came into use: guide rails for safe use of the new technology, rather than an outright ban or halt of its services. And his company has spent the last year lobbying Washington on those ideas. — But, on the flip side, privacy advocates aren't sure that facial recognition technology, overall, is even ready for law enforcement use given its tendency to incorrectly match photos to people's identities. "This isn't something that we can put guardrails on. This is something that poses a unique threat to the American people whenever it's used," said Albert Fox Cahn, executive director of the Surveillance Technology Oversight Project. "When we allow these tools to turn our bodies into tracking devices, it really is a unique danger." — View from Washington: While both sides are talking about the need for regulation around biometric data collection, U.S. lawmakers and lobbyists aren't changing their tactics much. Clearview decreased its lobbying spend from $30,000 in the fourth quarter of last year to $20,000 in the first three months of 2022. And while progressive lawmakers have criticized government facial recognition use in recent months — such as the pushback on the IRS contract with ID.me — they haven't made moves to introduce new legislation or hold hearings on the topic.
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| | | CYBER IN THE SPOTLIGHT — Biden administration officials and lawmakers are preparing to spend the week diving into several cybersecurity issues: budget appropriations, the role of cyberattacks in the war in Ukraine and the future of emerging technologies in military cyber operations. From congressional hearings to media events, here's what's MC will be looking out for this week: — Biden administration meetings: The Department of Homeland Security and the Coast Guard will host a two-day meeting starting Tuesday of its advisory committee focused on maritime security issues, which will include discussions about cyber threat information sharing and feedback on the industry's ongoing cyber vulnerability assessments. Anne Neuberger, deputy national security adviser for cyber and emerging threats, will also give remarks Wednesday at The Wall Street Journal's CEO Council Summit about the private sector's cyber challenges. — Congressional hearings: Members of the Senate Armed Services cybersecurity subcommittee will discuss uses of artificial intelligence tools in military cyberspace operations during a hearing Tuesday with executives at Microsoft and Google. The Pentagon hasn't been shy about the central role it expects artificial intelligence to play in these operations, and lawmakers are highly expected to focus on how AI is already being used. The Senate Appropriations Committee and the Senate Homeland Security Committee will also hold back to back hearings Wednesday about how to properly fund the Department of Homeland Security for fiscal 2023, continuing the appropriations conversation started in the House last week.
| | | | INTRODUCING DIGITAL FUTURE DAILY - OUR TECHNOLOGY NEWSLETTER, RE-IMAGINED: Technology is always evolving, and our new tech-obsessed newsletter is too! Digital Future Daily unlocks the most important stories determining the future of technology, from Washington to Silicon Valley and innovation power centers around the world. Readers get an in-depth look at how the next wave of tech will reshape civic and political life, including activism, fundraising, lobbying and legislating. Go inside the minds of the biggest tech players, policymakers and regulators to learn how their decisions affect our lives. Don't miss out, subscribe today. | | | | | | | | INVESTING IN IT MODERNIZATION — A group of tech industry associations led by the Information Technology Industry Council sent a letter Friday to congressional appropriators requesting they, at least, match the president's request for $300 million in funding for the Technology Modernization Fund, which provides agencies with money for one-off modernization projects like switching to zero trust security frameworks. The associations, including TechNet, CompTIA and the National Defense Industrial Association, also requested that appropriators dedicate funding to agencies for completing the tasks laid out in last year's cybersecurity executive order.
| | | — Duston Williams has been named chief financial officer at cybersecurity firm Arctic Wolf. Most recently, he was the CFO of enterprise cloud company Nutanix.
| | | A novel attempt by malware analysis group vx-underground: "If you're a ransomware affiliate like this tweet."
| | | — "Hacking Russia was off-limits. The Ukraine war made it a free-for-all." (The Washington Post) — The FBI conducted as many as 3.4 million searches of previously collected data from the National Security Agency , according to an annual report from the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. (The Wall Street Journal) — Romania's intelligence agency attributed a distributed denial of service attack on its government websites and other institutions Friday to a pro-Russian political hacking group known as Killnet. — "You Can Now Ask Google to Remove Your Phone Number, Email or Address from Search Results." (KrebsonSecurity) — Thomson Reuters told its shareholders it will conduct an independent human rights assessment of its products and services, which includes its database contracts with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. (The Verge) Chat soon. Stay in touch with the whole team: Eric Geller (egeller@politico.com); Konstantin Kakaes (kkakaes@politico.com) ; Maggie Miller (mmiller@politico.com); Sam Sabin (ssabin@politico.com); and Heidi Vogt ( hvogt@politico.com).
| | | | A message from App Security Project, an initiative of the Taxpayers Protection Alliance Foundation: Former national security officials are sounding alarms on current antitrust proposals being considered by Congress. Key leaders from the defense, intelligence and homeland security communities, including Jeh Johnson, Leon Panetta and Michael Morell, are warning that current proposals could open countless doors for cybercriminals and foreign adversaries to gain access to users' private data. Congress' antitrust proposals would undermine America's national security and damage companies' ability to ensure integrated security tools are as effective as possible. Without a review of these bills and their security implications, American citizens could be at an increased risk of cyber and national security threats. With these attacks growing in number and severity, it's more important now than ever to ensure technology companies have the ability to protect both our national security and the privacy of American consumers. | | | | | | | Follow us on Twitter | | | | Follow us | | | | |
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