US election regulator works to restore its offline filing system
The outage blocks 24-hour and 48-hour spending disclosures ahead of the November 3 elections as staff work to bring filing back online.
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The outage blocks 24-hour and 48-hour spending disclosures ahead of the November 3 elections as staff work to bring filing back online.
The US Federal Election Commission (FEC) is working to restore electronic filing after an outage blocked campaign-spending disclosures ahead of the 3 November elections. The commission said on 27 October that it had identified the issue and was implementing a fix.
An FEC status message initially placed the start of the outage at around 10 p.m. Eastern Time on 26 October, or 0200 GMT on 27 October. An agency email seen by Reuters said attempts to breach its systems had prompted the suspension of services accessible through the web.
The FEC posted its repair notice at 8:17 p.m. EST on 27 October, Al Jazeera said. The notice described work in progress, not completed restoration.
The issue has been identified and a fix is being implemented.
The FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency both referred questions to the FEC.
Organizations cannot submit the FEC’s 24-hour and 48-hour spending reports, which show how much political groups and others spend on specific races. The FEC said previously filed reports remained searchable on its website.
Steven Mele, a partner at political-finance compliance firm MBA Consulting Group, said the outage would mean less public disclosure about election spending until the system was fixed.
The agency says most affected services are back, allowing campaign groups to submit pre-election spending reports again after managers reset their passwords.
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The FEC tracks spending by candidates and political committees but does not administer US elections. The outage should therefore have no effect on voters’ ability to cast ballots. FEC Commissioner Dara Lindenbaum said the disruption had nothing to do with voter files or voter registration, which states maintain.
The FEC’s website said staff were continuing work to resolve the outage. Restoring electronic filing would allow organizations to submit the time-sensitive spending reports again.
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The FEC said it had identified the issue and was implementing a fix, while a commissioner said voter files and registration were unaffected.