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Election Security: U.S. Government’s Efforts to Protect the 2024 U.S. Election from Foreign Malign Influence [1]

['Experts The Office Of The Director Of National Intelligence', 'Odni', 'The Cybersecurity', 'Infrastructure Security Agency', 'Cisa', 'The Federal Bureau Of Intelligence', 'Fbi']

Date: 2024-09

THE WASHINGTON FOREIGN PRESS CENTER, WASHINGTON, D.C.

MODERATOR: Good afternoon, everyone. Hello and welcome to the Washington Foreign Press Center’s briefing on election security. My name is Gini Staab at the U.S. Department of State and I’ll be the moderator for today’s briefing. This briefing is on background, and on the call today we have several experts – three ODNI officials, one CISA official, and one FBI official. They will self-identify, and you can attribute their remarks to an ODNI official, a CISA official, or an FBI official.

By participating in today’s call you are agreeing to these ground rules. We will share a transcript of the briefing later today, and for journalists joining us, please take a moment now to rename yourself in the chat window with your name, outlet, and country. And following their opening remarks, I will open the floor to questions.

And with that, I’m going to turn it over to ODNI to start us off. Thank you.

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Hello. This is ODNI. I’d like to start and note that we’re 60 days out from the election, and as we approach November, we observe IC – we observe foreign actors ramping up their election influence efforts.

In this update, we will discuss foreign election interference versus foreign election influence, and provide updates on the big three election influence actors. I’ll start with election interference versus influence.

The IC – the U.S. Intelligence Community – reserves the term “election interference” for efforts to degrade or disrupt the United States’s ability to hold an election. This is separate from election influence, which has been the focus of our updates so far. We define election influence as efforts to shape election outcomes or undermine democratic processes.

We have not observed any foreign actors seeking to interfere in the conduct of the 2024 elections. Nonetheless, this is a top priority in the IC, and our interagency election partners remain vigilant in case foreign actors change their approach. In particular, we are monitoring for any activities that could enable election interference, especially cyber or physical disruptions of election infrastructure.

It’s important to note the challenge of election interference. We assess it would be difficult for a foreign actor to manipulate the election processes at a large enough scale to impact the outcome of a federal election without detection. This detection includes intelligence collection, post-election audits, or physical and cyber security monitoring of the decentralized and diverse election infrastructure across the country.

Instead of interference, the IC assesses adversaries so far are focused on using information operations and propaganda to try to shape voter preferences or undermine confidence in the election. We continue to monitor efforts to cast doubt on the electoral process or claims that they have interfered in the process when they have not actually done so, a tactic known as perception hacking.

In addition, we’d note that reports of cyber espionage against election or campaign infrastructure do not necessarily mean that an actor is trying to affect the conduct of an election. Foreign actors sometimes use cyber tools to collect information that helps them tailor their influence messages to certain U.S. audiences, or embarrass or denigrate particular candidates through leaks. For example, we have seen foreign actors work to compromise political entities, and foreign actors – all key foreign actors have engaged in such efforts during this election cycle.

Now transitioning to the big three foreign influence actors, Russia, Iran, and China are all trying by some measure to exacerbate divisions in U.S. society for their own benefit, and see election periods as moments of vulnerability. These actors most likely judge that amplifying controversial issues and rhetoric that seeks to divide Americans can serve their interests by making the U.S. and its democratic system look weak, and by keeping the U.S. Government distracted with internal issues instead of pushing back on their hostile behavior globally.

The IC continues to assess that Russia is the pre-eminent and most active foreign influence threat to this year’s U.S. elections. Russia is looking to amplify divisive rhetoric and influence electoral outcomes, which both speak to Moscow’s broader foreign policy goals of weakening the United States and undermining Washington’s support for Ukraine. As this week’s U.S. Government actions further demonstrated, Russia is using actors such as the U.S.-sanctioned organizations the Social Design Agency and ANO Dialogue and the state media outlet RT to covertly amplify and stoke domestic divisions and push for Russia’s preferred electoral outcomes. RT has built and used networks of U.S. and other Western personalities to create and disseminate Russia-friendly narratives while trying to mask the content in authentic Americans’ free speech. These actors, among others, are supporting Moscow’s efforts to influence voter preference in favor of the former president and diminish the prospects of the Vice President. These actors use methods such as targeted online influence operations on social media and websites that portray themselves as legitimate news sites.

Now moving to Iran, the IC assesses that Iran is making a greater effort than in the past to influence this year’s elections, even as its tactics and approaches are similar to prior cycles. Like Russia, Iran has a multi-pronged approach that looks to stoke discord and undermine confidence in our electoral process. Tehran has also sought cyber access to individuals with direct ties to the presidential campaigns of both political parties, while elements have also denigrated the former president. Iran has a suite of tools at its disposal, as demonstrated in recent reports outlining Iran’s cyber operations, including the hack-and-leak operation against the former president’s campaign. Iran is also conducting covert social media operations using fake personas, and is using AI to help publish inauthentic news articles.

China, for its part, is focused on influencing down-ballot races. The IC continues to assess that China is not attempting to influence the presidential race. China is also continuing its longstanding efforts to build relationships with U.S. officials and entities at state and local levels because it perceives Washington as largely opposed to China. This view likely informs Beijing’s greater interest in some non-presidential races. The IC is aware of PRC attempts to influence U.S. down-ballot races by focusing on candidates it views as particularly threatening to core PRC security interests. China’s influence actors have also continued small-scale efforts in social media to engage U.S. audiences on divisive political issues, including protests about the Israel-Gaza conflict, and promote negative stories about both political parties.

In closing, there’s one last point we raise in this update, and that is we are seeing a number of countries beyond these three actors that are considering activities that at minimum test the boundaries of election influence. Such activities include lobbying political figures to try to curry favor with them in the event that they are elected to office.

With that, I’ll turn to my colleague.

ODNI OFFICIAL TWO: Hi. This is ODNI. Thanks so much for joining us. As you may be aware, ODNI’s Foreign Malign Influence Center houses the Election Threats Executive and leads intelligence efforts to protect the election from foreign malign influence and interference. ODNI is working proactively to posture the Intelligence Community to address generative AI-enabled foreign malign influence campaigns; to communicate current information on election threats to critical stakeholders, including election officials, civil society leaders, and the American people. This update is part of that effort.

We’re also working to exchange information with industry on a voluntary basis regarding evolving foreign threat actor tools, tactics, and procedures to ensure that both we and they have an up-to-date perspective on the landscape. We also continue to convene interagency election security – the interagency election security community on a very regular basis and to implement the notification framework, which you’ll hear about, among other things, from my colleague in a moment.

All of this work both draws on and facilitates collaboration across the Intelligence Community and the U.S. Government in what is truly a tightly coordinated whole-of-government effort. Let me turn it now to my colleague.

ODNI OFFICIAL THREE: Good afternoon. Thank you for joining us today. The interagency election security community remains laser-focused on implementing the presidentially approved notification framework regarding election influence and interference targeting U.S. elections, which is the IC’s primary mechanism for responding to intelligence on foreign malign influence and interference threats to U.S. elections. This group is engaging to review relevant intelligence under the framework to determine best actions to mitigate threats.

The election security group has been routinely meeting to review intelligence and evaluate the need for non-public notifications to targets of malign influence operations and also public notifications. We use these meetings to inform each other of our outreach activities, whether to state and local officials, the media, Congress, or the private sector, as well as to deconflict analytic production plans. We maintain an active cadence of providing non-public notifications and general threat briefing to targets of malign influence.

In an effort to be as transparent as possible, we are routinely engaging with state and local election officials and continue to pursue opportunities to update the American people. To that end, we conducted our first public notification this election cycle regarding Iranian cyber operations targeting presidential campaigns. On receipt of intelligence, the election security group implemented an expedited process to review the information and determine the course of action, leading to a quick public notification. We remain committed to providing periodic unclassified updates.

I want to underscore that there is an extraordinarily high level of coordination on election security issues, which each organization bringing different authorities and capabilities that are useful to addressing the broad challenges we face. Thank you.

MODERATOR: Thank you for those remarks, and now I’d like to open it up for questions. A reminder for journalists: Please be sure your screenname includes your name and media outlet, and to ask a question, click the raise hand icon at the bottom of your screen. And to start, please, we’ll go to Dmitry Anopchenko from Inter TV Ukraine.

QUESTION: Oh, yeah, hello. Thank you very much for doing this. Gentlemen and lady, anyone who would like to take my questions, two short questions, if I may. Firstly, how would you describe the threats to integrity of the American elections? Would one expect that Russia may not only use the propaganda but interfere directly, like hacking the candidates, the voting machines? Are you looking to those scenarios?

And secondly, the most important: How would you describe the connection between Russia and the hackers, both who are the part of the GRU, Russian military intelligence like 29155, and so-called independent hackers like those who attacked Ukraine recently? Thanks very much.

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Hi there, this is ODNI. You had two questions. On the first question, just to reiterate that we have not observed any foreign actor seeking to interfere in the conduct of this election, but it’s something we are constantly monitoring and is a top priority, especially in case foreign actors change their approach.

As to your second question, we have no further information on individual Russian actors engaged in this activity beyond what was released already.

MODERATOR: Thank you. For the next question, we’ll go to Farrah Tomazin from the Sydney Morning Herald, Australia.

QUESTION: Hi there. Can you hear me?

MODERATOR: Yes we can.

QUESTION: Excellent. Look, you mentioned a number of countries beyond Russia, Iran, and China considering activities that test the boundaries of election influence. Can you please elaborate a bit on which countries are they and what tactics are sort of being applied?

Secondly, to what extent are you liaising with other countries that may become targets of election influence? For example, my country, Australia, is about to go into an election within months of the U.S. presidential election. Are discussions being held between our intelligence agencies here and other countries? Thank you.

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Hi there. Thank you for the question. This is ODNI again. As to your first question about other countries engaged in this activity – as you said, that test the boundaries – we are not sharing additional countries at this time. But we’d note that the IC’s focus is on foreign election influence activity or related activity regardless of the actor’s relationship with the U.S. Government. And we focus on these three countries, the – Iran, Russia, and China – because they’re the most capable and active foreign influence actors in prior election cycles.

ODNI OFFICIAL TWO: And I can add that we have regular exchanges with partners around the world to exchange information on threats and to learn from one another about how to mitigate them.

MODERATOR: Thank you. And we’ll take one advanced question please from Mohamed Maher from Al Masry Al Youm Newspaper/ON TV in Egypt: “Can you provide insights into how the U.S. Government is collaborating with major technology companies such as Facebook and X – previously Twitter – to enhance cyber security measures and prevent the spread of disinformation related to the elections? Is there a coordinated effort between U.S. intelligence agencies and social media platforms to monitor for foreign malign influence campaigns ahead of the elections?”

ODNI OFFICIAL TWO: Hi, this is ODNI. From our perspective, our exchanges are focused on two things. One is evolving foreign threat actor techniques, tactics, and procedures; and the other is just share information on authentication and attribution approaches. These exchanges are voluntary. We don’t ask or expect that any action would be taken based on the information that we share. And these conversations happen at the strategic level.

MODERATOR: Thank you much. Next, we’ll go to Kelly Malone from the Canada press – Canadian Press. Sorry.

QUESTION: Hello. Thank you so much for taking the time today. So this week, there was the unsealed indictment against two Russian nationals accusing of them setting up a conservative media outlet as a front for pro-Kremlin propaganda, and it acknowledged the founder is Canadian and the parent company is also based in Canada. So what, if anything, is Canada doing to assist this kind of investigation and this specific investigation? Are they actively – are Canadian authorities actively investigating the parent company? Have you asked them to do that, or are you doing that yourself? And why are there no charges for the founders when in the indictment it says that – it alleges that they knew they were, quote, “the Russians,” and referred to them in the same way when they were contracted by RT.

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: This is —

ODNI OFFICIAL TWO: Or we turn to FBI.

ODNI OFFICIAL THREE: Yeah, we’ll leave it to the FBI official to answer that question.

ODNI OFFICIAL TWO: We’ll come back to that question. We think the FBI official may be having a technical problem, and so we can perhaps come back to that question if it’s okay.

MODERATOR: Absolutely. Thank you so much. One more advance question from Cristobal Vasquez Ramirez from France 24 Espanol, France: “Do you think Israeli PR and media organizations have also had considerable influence in this election process? Why is Israeli state media organizations not considered foreign actors in this case?”

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Hi there. We focus on all foreign actors that seek to influence the election, and we’re not prepared to discuss further about specific countries beyond what we released. But I would note that regardless of the country’s relationship with the U.S. Government, if they are conducting foreign election – or election influence activity, we would watch their activities and address it appropriately.

MODERATOR: Thank you. Next, we’ll go to Alex from the Turan News Agency, Azerbaijan.

QUESTION: Hi, thank you so much, Gini. And I appreciate all three officials for their time. Alex Raufoglu from Turan News Agency. On Ukraine, do all these three actors parrot same narrative when it comes to U.S. support to Ukraine? And how would you describe that? And are you aware of reflection of that narrative in international media, whether it’s bouncing back to the wider region, not only staying in the U.S.? Thank you so much.

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Hi, this is ODNI. Clarification – are you referring to Ukrainian narratives in the United States or efforts in Ukraine? Because our focus is not on Ukraine – it’s on efforts against the U.S. election, of – which, of course, Ukraine comes up in some of the influence narratives.

QUESTION: I apologize; I had some audio issue. Fair point. No, I was talking about the foreign actors pushing their narrative within the United States, whether it’s through social media or other means. So that narrative are – is Iran, Russia, and China – are they parroting same narrative, or they have different ways of approaching U.S. support to Ukraine? Thank so much.

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Hi there. Thank you for that clarification. Russia is the primary actor focusing on amplifying narratives in an effort to diminish Washington’s support for Ukraine. It is not a primary narrative of the other actors you mentioned.

MODERATOR: Thank you. So we’ll take one more advance question, please, from Fouad Youcefi, the Swedish Broadcasting SVT from Sweden: “Briefing will focus on foreign malign influence, but would love to hear briefers briefly discussing domestic threat environment as well, if possible.”

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Yeah.

ODNI OFFICIAL THREE: All right, if FBI is on the line, we’d love to have you chime In. If not, we can also have CISA proceed.

CISA OFFICIAL: Hi there. This is CISA. I’m happy to jump in, but I do apologize. We only heard part of the question. Could they repeat the question, please?

MODERATOR: Yes, absolutely. Sorry. Fouad Youcefi from Swedish Broadcasting in Sweden asks: “The briefing will focus on foreign malign influence, but would love to hear briefers briefly discuss domestic threat environment as well, if possible.

CISA OFFICIAL: Okay, thanks, Gini. So this is the CISA official. So what I would say is with respect to the work that we are doing with election infrastructure partners across the country, we are working with them to identify and mitigate the full range of threats they may be facing, from the physical to the cyber to the operational security, and really ensuring the security and resiliency of our nation’s election infrastructure. And I say that just to clarify a bit of CISA’s role for those who are not as familiar. CISA serves as the United States’s civilian cyber defense agency, and we also serve as the U.S. federal government’s national coordinator for critical infrastructure security and resilience.

Within that mission space, we also serve as the federal government lead for ensuring the security and resiliency of our nation’s election infrastructure. And so in that capacity, we do a tremendous amount of work with election officials at the state and local level, as well as our election vendors who provide the election infrastructure and utilization across the country, to identify, defend against, and ensure effective response to, again, that full range of cyber, physical, and operational security risks that they may encounter.

And we do this through a variety of ways to ensure their readiness, so our stakeholders understand the threats they are facing, most importantly the steps they can do to mitigate those, and then providing not just services but also trainings to ensure they’re able to really practice and rehearse those key steps, to include their incident response plans, for that effective response during any point of the election cycle. And so when we talk about the domestic threat landscape, it really is a comprehensive approach to security and resiliency that matches the complexity of the threat environment.

MODERATOR: Thank you so much. Next we’ll go to Sang-ho Song from the Yonhap News Agency, Korea.

QUESTION: Thank you very much for doing this. You mentioned three countries – China, Russia, and Iran – as foreign actors. But have you detected any signs or any possibility of North Korea trying to influence the U.S. election in any way, given North Korea’s notorious for malign cyberspace activities and so on? Or are you ruling out that possibility of North Korea’s potential influence operations? Thank you.

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: This is ODNI. We have no further information to share on that.

MODERATOR: Thank you so much. And likely our last question is going to Shinichi Akiyama from Mainichi Newspapers, Japan.

QUESTION: Hi, thanks for doing this. My question is about China. You said that China is more focusing on the local election, like state or county or this kind. And what is the aim, what is the purpose, what is their method, why they are doing that locally?

ODNI OFFICIAL ONE: Hi there, this is ODNI. Our update discusses that China is working to build relationships at local levels to oppose individuals that it perceives as particularly anti-Beijing. And this perception that most of Washington is anti-Beijing is one of the drivers to push them to try to influence down-ballot races.

We would note that this view of China’s activity is consistent with our assessment of their activity in 20 – the 2022 midterms, where we similarly assessed that China had tacitly approved efforts to try to influence a handful of midterm races involving members of both U.S. political parties. Beijing’s focus was to counter U.S. politicians viewed as anti-China and to support others viewed as pro-China, and that activity that we saw in 2022 is similar to that which is included in today’s update.

MODERATOR: Thank you so much. I realize that’s all the time that our briefers have for today, so this ends our Q&A session. And we’ll try to get a written response back to you for Canada, please.

As a reminder, this briefing has been on the record and you can attribute their remarks to an ODNI official, a CISA official, and an FBI official, as noted. I wanted to give a very special thanks to our briefers for sharing their time with us today, and to the journalists who’ve joined us. Thank you so much. This concludes today’s briefing.

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[1] Url: https://www.state.gov/briefings-foreign-press-centers/protecting-the-2024-election-from-foreign-malign-influence

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