It’s ‘likely’ that other countries tried to hack Canada’s elections
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After the FBI and CIA both concluded that Russian hackers influenced the American presidential election, is it worth asking if this threat of interference exists in Canada?
Yes, says former Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) director Richard Fadden, and it has probably already happened.
The former spy agency head told the Globe and Mail that he believes “that it is likely a couple countries might have tried to influence our elections.”
He continues:
“I cannot comment on how. Given our system, I suggest that it is more likely than not that such attempts would have occurred at the constituency level… An influence campaign in a Westminster system country would likely require effort at the level of constituencies – where MPs are elected and whose numbers by party determines who will be the head of government.”
Russian specialist Hannah Thoburn was quoted as saying that “it’s certainly possible that the Russians could do the same kind of things that they would do [in the United States] … They’ve done it in many other countries, from Ukraine to Sweden to Macedonia. It’s certainly possible in Canada.”
Fadden added that swaying elections no longer happens through corruption, money, or crime like it used to – but rather through cyberwarfare.
Given Canada’s natural resources and strong intellectual property sectors, the risk may be high.
So what can politicians do? They can learn from the mistakes of their American counterparts, especially the Democratic National Committee: stop using email.
The hacking that caused havoc for Hillary Clinton was a simple spear-phishing message that tricked her campaign chairman into giving cybercriminals access to the party’s most sensitive information.
In Canada, a politician using one of the parties’ centralized databases could theoretically open the data to the world if they become a victim of cyber-intrusion. An unnoticed spy in a party’s network could collect data for years, unleashing it in the eventuality that the hacker wants to cause the party harm – such as during an election.
The simple solution is to use Evizone’s products, which ensure that hackers pull their hair out trying to scratch the surface of our military grade encryption.
About Evizone Ltd.
Evizone Ltd. is a revolutionary secure communications, encryption and compliance software and service provider based in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. Evizone offers innovative enterprise solutions in secure messaging (next generation beyond encrypted e mail) and encryption, encryption at rest, regulatory compliance, compliance archiving, WORM compliance, 17a-4 compliance, document life cycle management and communications governance and risk management. Evizone’s services protect organizations through best in class security, encryption, recipient controls, document life cycle management, discovery management, compliance management, compliance archiving, tamper proof WORM and 17a-4 compliance archiving and complete audit records against the enormous damage caused by communications breaches. Evizone’s patented technologies offer a level of security impossible to obtain with conventional or encrypted email and fast, powerful, user friendly compliance archiving. Evizone’s services are immediately available on multiple platforms and provide the strongest commercially available communications security and compliance archiving. You can follow Evizone on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.
Contact:
Tom Kott, HATLEY Strategy Advisors, 514.316.7082, tkott@hatleystrategies.com