MADISON, Wis. – The Wisconsin Elections Commission issued the following statement to NBC Nightly News more than a week prior to their story Tuesday about cyber security:
The Wisconsin Elections Commission has never detected a successful hacking attempt on its systems, nor has it ever been notified of one by the Department of Homeland Security or any other state or federal agency. We are not aware of any new Russian targeting of Wisconsin systems beyond the scanning attempts from 2016 we reported in September 2017 as soon as we were notified by DHS: http://elections.wi.gov/node/5265.
The State of Wisconsin’s online systems, including elections, are well-protected by the state’s Division of Enterprise Technology, which routinely deals with approximately 9 million scanning attempts annually from all over the world. The Commission is continuing to implement its election security plan in coordination with its security partners including DET and DHS.
“Wisconsin’s voter registration system and voting systems are secure,” said Michael Haas, Wisconsin’s chief election official.
“In response to NBC’s questions, we double-checked with Homeland Security and our other cyber security partners. They have assured us that they are not aware of any other attempts – successful or unsuccessful – to breach Wisconsin’s systems,” Haas said. “We have established a strong, positive relationship with Homeland Security, and have seen no reason to doubt their assurances about the integrity of our systems.”