‘Aggressive posture’ defines election security work, DHS official tells senators

A senior Department of Homeland Security official on Tuesday defended its work to help secure voting systems before midterm elections, but a top Democratic lawmaker worried those efforts were insufficient. DHS has “adopted an aggressive posture” to help state officials secure their voting infrastructure and will do all it can ahead of Election Day, DHS’s Jeanette Manfra told the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. At the same time, she said, the department has yet to detect Russian cyber-activity on state systems this election season. DHS will use the $26 million in additional election-security funding provided by the March omnibus to increase vulnerability assessments and other services it offers states, Manfra told CyberScoop after the hearing. That money is separate from the $380 million the bill allocated directly to individual states to do things like upgrade their computer systems and train officials in cybersecurity. But Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., the committee’s […]

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