Security News > 2021 > March > U.S. Says Russia, Iran Attempted Interference in 2020 Presidential Election
A declassified joint report from several United States agencies assesses that Russian and Iranian threat actors did attempt to meddle in the 2020 U.S. presidential election, but claims that the technical integrity of the voting process wasn't affected.
The joint report is meant to provide information on the extent to which foreign actors attempted interference with the 2020 U.S. elections, along with details on whether these adversaries targeted political organizations, campaigns, or election candidates, and an assessment on whether the attacks were able to successfully compromise the targeted infrastructure.
Without attempting to assess the effect of foreign interference on public perception or on the behavior of voters, the joint report reveals that there's no evidence that foreign government-affiliated actors were able to prevent or alter votes, or disrupt the ability to tally votes or deliver election results, or compromised the integrity of voter registration information.
There were no persistent attempts from Russian actors to compromise the election infrastructure, the report reveals.
China, on the other hand, "Did not deploy interference efforts and considered but did not deploy influence efforts intended to change the outcome of the U.S. Presidential election," the report reads.
"We have no evidence-not through intelligence collection on the foreign actors themselves, not through physical security and cybersecurity monitoring of voting systems across the country, not through post-election audits, and not through any other means-that a foreign government or other actors compromised election infrastructure to manipulate election results," the DoJ and DHS say.