Georgia Claims to Have Successfully Defended Against Foreign DDoS Attack on Absentee Ballot Website
On October 14, 2024, Georgia's Secretary of State’s office claimed it successfully defended against a significant cyberattack targeting the state’s absentee ballot request website. The attack, identified as a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack, involved over 420,000 simultaneous attempts to flood the site with bogus traffic from numerous global IP addresses, intending to overwhelm the system and knock it offline. While the attack temporarily slowed down the site, voters experienced no disruption in their ability to request absentee ballots. Georgia’s cybersecurity team, with the support of Cloudflare, quickly detected and mitigated the threat.
Despite the lack of noticeable impact on users, election officials chose to report the attack for several reasons. Given the heightened sensitivity surrounding election security, transparency is key to maintaining voter trust. Publicizing the incident reassures the public that defenses are in place and that even attempted disruptions are taken seriously. Moreover, by framing this as a successful defense, officials aim to deter future attacks and demonstrate that Georgia’s systems are resilient. Gabe Sterling, the Deputy Secretary of State, suggested the attack likely came from a foreign entity, though this remains unconfirmed. The incident, while potentially just another background cyber event, ties into broader concerns about foreign interference from nations like Russia, China, and Iran ahead of the 2024 presidential election.