The Christian Science Monitor

Arming election officials: How cyber sensors are boosting ballot security

Susan Gill has never met Anatoliy Sergeyevich Kovalev.

The supervisor of elections in Florida’s Citrus County wouldn’t know Mr. Kovalev from a television repairman if he walked into her office on Election Day.

That’s the problem.

Kovalev is a Russian military intelligence officer assigned to Unit 74455. In 2016, he helped hack into the website of the Illinois Board of Elections and stole the files of a half-million voters, according to an indictment brought by special counsel Robert Mueller.

Ms. Gill has run elections for 22 years in her county northwest of Orlando. She’s one of the most experienced election supervisors in Florida. But it is highly unlikely that Gill would be able to detect a cyber-intrusion by Kovalev

An important first stepRestoring voter confidence

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