Maryland voter registration system runs on software owned by Russian-financed firm, I-Team learns

Authored by wbaltv.com and submitted by Musichead2468

The FBI has informed Maryland officials that the state's voter registration system and other online systems operate on a software platform owned by a Russian-financed firm, state officials told the 11 News I-Team Friday afternoon. There is no indication of a breach.

There is no evidence there has been any breach or fraud in voter registration or voting, election officials said.

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At a news conference Friday afternoon, House Speaker Michael Busch and Senate President Mike Miller stressed there is no evidence of voting problems, but they are concerned about the Russian connection to sensitive systems.

"The elections coming up in November are going to be fair and everything is going to work the way it's supposed to," Senate President Mike Miller said. "Nobody knew the background of this company, nobody knew that it was a Russian, nobody knew that the person had changed their name until yesterday."

Lawmakers said they did not know the company was back by Russians until the FBI informed them.

"We don't have any idea that he has meddled in any elections at all," House Speaker Michael Busch said.

The development comes the same day that Deputy U.S. Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced new federal indictments against 12 Russians accused of hacking and meddling in the 2016 election, but state election officials said the Maryland system is not mentioned in the federal indictment. Maryland's announcement is more of a disclosure, at this point, based on what they have been told by the FBI.

In a statement, officials said they have been told the software firm that hosts many of the election board's online systems -- such as statewide registration, candidacy, and election night results -- is financed by a Russian oligarch.

According to the FBI, officials said ByteGrid LLC, the web-hosting firm, is financed by AltPoint Capital Partners, whose fund manager is a Russian, and its largest investor is a Russian oligarch named Vladimir Potanin. It is a $7.6 million contract.

"We had a contract with the Sidus Group, which was an Anne Arundel County-based web-hosting firm. We signed and started a contract with them in 2014, and then we learned that in 2015, the company was purchased by ByteGrid, and then we subsequently learned this week about the investments, who finances ByteGrid," said Nikki Charlson, deputy state administrator of the Maryland State Board of Elections.

The Maryland State Board of Elections is working with the Attorney General's Office to review the contract with the company before determining how to move forward.

"We've only had 24 hours to deal with this, and we're going to invest all of our resources going forward to make sure ... nothing untoward has happened in the past or will happen in terms of the election process," Miller said.

"Republicans and Democrats, governor, speaker of the House, president of the Senate, attorney general, Board of Elections supervisors, are working together to make certain that the elections coming up in November are going to be fair and everything is going to happen the way it's supposed to happen," Miller said.

No secret about chain of ownership of firm involved with Maryland Bd of Elections--Bytegrid LLC. FBI info given to state about Russian financing comes from open source information — Jayne Miller (@jemillerwbal) July 13, 2018

Statement from Maryland BD of Elections disclosing state's election systems hosted by firm that is financed by Russian oligarch named Vladimar Potanin pic.twitter.com/7ys1JBp2xu — Jayne Miller (@jemillerwbal) July 13, 2018

Breaking..Maryland officials say FBI has informed them state's voter registration system and other on line systems operate on software platform owned by Russian financed firm. No known breaches known... — Jayne Miller (@jemillerwbal) July 13, 2018

The Maryland State Board of Elections said in a statement: "In response to today’s indictment, we want to assure Maryland voters that Maryland's State Board of Elections was not the State election office mentioned in the indictment. Additionally, no Maryland election official has used or is using services provided by the vendor referenced in the indictment."

"The FBI gave this office important information about a vendor the State Board of Election uses to host various election systems. This vendor -- ByteGrid LLC -- hosts the statewide voter registration, candidacy, and election management system, the online voter registration system, online ballot delivery system, and unofficial election night results website. According to the FBI, ByteGrid LLC is financed by AltPoint Capital Partners, whose fund manager is a Russian and its largest investor is a Russian oligarch named Vladimir Potanin."

"In response to this information, we have been working with various federal and State officials to ensure that voter data and our election systems are secure. The FBI did not state that there was evidence of any breach or fraudulent transactions, but we must act immediately to confirm that this is the case. Over the next several days, we will continue to work with our federal and State partners to develop a plan of action to audit existing data, review existing defenses, and immediately implement any changes to secure the systems and data before the 2018 General Election."

"According to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, Maryland was one of the states with suspicious online activities before the 2016 General Election. In August 2016, we saw some unusual activity on the State's online voter registration and ballot request system and immediately responded. We provided log files to the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), one of the State's cybersecurity vendors, and another cybersecurity firm, and all three entities independently reviewed the transactions related to the suspicious activity. All three entities came to the same conclusion -- there were 'no suspicious artifacts.'

"In other words, there was no evidence that the online registration and ballot

request system was breached or fraudulent transactions were submitted."

The governor's office released a statement, saying: "It was with concern that I learned that information provided to the Maryland State Board of Elections by federal law enforcement this week indicates that a vendor contracted by the Board to provide a number of services, including voter registration infrastructure, had been acquired by a parent company with financial ties to a Russian national."

Read the governor's letter to U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nieslen

"While the information relayed to us did not indicate that any wrongdoing or criminal acts have been discovered, we are fast approaching an election in November, and even the appearance of the potential for bad actors to have any influence on our election infrastructure could undermine public trust in the integrity of our election system. That is why it is imperative that the State Board of Elections take immediate and comprehensive action to evaluate the security of our system and take any and all necessary steps to address any vulnerabilities.

"As an immediate step, the President of the Senate, the Speaker of the House, and I have written a letter to Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen to collectively request that the DHS Office of Cybersecurity and Communications provide the state with technical assistance to evaluate the network utilized by the Maryland State Board of Elections, including auditing the integrity of the network.

"We will continue to closely monitor the situation in the coming days and weeks to ensure that all Maryland voters can have faith in the integrity of our election system."

The Senate president and House speaker released a statement, saying: "We were briefed late yesterday (Thursday), along with Gov. (Larry) Hogan, by the Federal Bureau of Investigation that the software vendor who maintains portions of the State Board of Elections voter registration platform was purchased by a Russian investor in 2015, without the knowledge of State officials. While the FBI did not indicate that there was a breach, we were concerned enough to ask Attorney General (Brian) Frosh to review the existing contractual obligation of the State, as well as asked for a review of the system to ensure there have been no breaches. We have also instructed the State Board of Elections to complete all due diligence to give the voters of Maryland confidence in the integrity of the election system. We are also asking the federal Department of Homeland Security Election Task Force to assist the State Board of Elections for any corrective action deemed necessary."

State election officials are holding a press conference Friday afternoon to discuss the matter further. Watch the press conference in the WBAL-TV app and on WBAL-TV 11's Facebook page.

Refresh wbaltv.com and our app, and watch 11 News for late-breaking updates.

iushciuweiush on July 13rd, 2018 at 23:09 UTC »

Wow, this might be the most clickbait headline I've read in quite awhile.

"Russian-owned software" = "American companies software, bought by an American web-hosting firm, financed in part by an American private equity firm that a single Russian individual owns a partial stake in."

kilo_bravo_three on July 13rd, 2018 at 22:44 UTC »

Oh man. Playing “spot the people who didn’t read the article” is really easy with this one.

The voter registration system doesn’t “run” on Russian software, its infrastructure resides in a data center that is owned by a US company that has received funding from Russian venture capitalists.

The Maryland Board of Elections signed a hosting agreement with the Sidus Group, a Maryland-based hosting company.

https://elections.maryland.gov/pdf/minutes/2010_09.pdf

In 2015, the Sidus Group was acquired by ByteGrid, a US company in Northern Virginia that specializes in standards-compliant datacenters.

https://www.bytegrid.com/about/news/210-bytegrid-acquires-a-highly-compliant-private-and-hybrid-cloud-services-platform-2

https://www.bytegrid.com/about/leadership

ByteGrid is a startup that has received funding from AltPoint Capital, a New York-based venture capital firm.

https://altpointcapital.com/team/

The largest investor in AltPoint Capital is Vladimir Potanin, a Russian oligarch.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Potanin

The board of elections provided server logs to the FBI, a cybersecurity firm they retain on contract, and a second cybersecurity firm and none of them noted any irregularities.

http://www.capitalgazette.com/news/general_assembly/ac-cn-russian-election-0714-story.html

NachoTacoChimichanga on July 13rd, 2018 at 21:29 UTC »

No known breaches are known.

What about unknown breaches? Are any of those known?