Hackers have tried to breach the systems of the US Federal Election Commission (FEC), forcing it to temporarily suspend its web services and disrupting campaign finance disclosures just days before the November 3 midterm elections.
According to sources, an FEC email sent to a campaign compliance firm said: "We have a bad actor trying to breach FEC systems. As a result, we've had to temporarily suspend our web-facing services." The commission's website went down after 10:15pm Eastern time on Monday, and an update on Tuesday evening said the issue had been identified and a fix was being implemented. The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency referred questions to the FEC.
The outage stops political groups and candidates from filing the 24- and 48-hour reports that show how much is being spent on specific races. FEC Commissioner Dara Lindenbaum stressed that the incident had nothing to do with voter files or voter registration, which are kept by the states, as the commission only handles federal campaign finance filings.
The breach attempt comes as the midterms have become the most expensive US elections in history, with about $11.21bn spent on advertising so far. Super PACs and dark money groups spent an average of $50m a day over the past week, according to a campaign finance watchdog, making the loss of disclosure in the final days a serious concern.