 Business
How Amazon.com moved into the business of U.S. elections By Nandita Bose OCT 15 2019 https://www.reuters.com/article/business/how-amazon-com-moved-into-the-business-of-u-s-elections-idUSKBN1WU17L/
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Amazon.com Inc's cloud computing arm is making an aggressive push into one of the most sensitive technology sectors: U.S. elections.
The expansion by Amazon Web Services into state and local elections has quietly gathered pace since the 2016 U.S. presidential vote. More than 40 states now use one or more of Amazon's election offerings, according to a presentation given by an Amazon executive this year and seen by Reuters.
So do America's two main political parties, the Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden and the U.S. federal body charged with administering and enforcing federal campaign finance laws.
While it does not handle voting on election day, AWS - along with a broad network of partners - now runs state and county election websites, stores voter registration rolls and ballot data, facilitates overseas voting by military personnel and helps provide live election-night results, according to company documents and interviews.
In the fullest public picture yet of Amazon's strategic move into U.S. election infrastructure, Reuters reviewed previously unreported company presentations and documents, and conducted more than two dozen interviews with lawmakers, election administrators, and heads of election security and technology in nearly a dozen states and counties that use Amazon's cloud.
The company's efforts are welcomed by election administrators, who in interviews said they often struggle with keeping outdated systems up to date at the local level.
In Oregon, for example, the state's in-house servers that support election services shut down every time there is a power outage - an often occurrence as Oregon updates its electric grid, according to Peter Threlkel, chief information officer at the Oregon Secretary of State. A move to the cloud fixes that problem, and Oregon ran a pilot with AWS to move its voter registration system to the cloud, he said. Some security experts like David O'Berry, co-founder, Precog Security, said moving to AWS is "a good option for campaigns, who do not have the resources to protect themselves." Still, Amazon's growing presence in the elections business could undermine what many officials view as a strength of the U.S. voting system: decentralization.
Most security experts Reuters spoke to said that while Amazon's cloud is likely much harder to hack than systems it is replacing, putting data from many jurisdictions on a single system raises the prospect that a single major breach could prove damaging. "It makes Amazon a bigger target" for hackers, "and also increases the challenge of dealing with an insider attack," said Chris Vickery, director of cyber risk research at cybersecurity startup Upguard. A recent hack into Capital One Financial Corp's data stored on Amazon's cloud service was perpetrated by a former Amazon employee. The breach affected more than 100 million customers, underscoring how rogue employees or untrained workers can create security risks even if the underlying systems are secure. Amazon says its systems are reliable. "Over time, states, counties, cities, and countries will leverage AWS services to ensure modernization of their elections for increased security, reliability, and analytics for an efficient and more effective use of taxpayer dollars," an AWS spokesperson told Reuters.
Amazon's push into the election business comes as the company faces criticism from politicians, labor unions and privacy advocates over its business practices and growing influence. President Donald Trump has accused the company of competing unfairly and repeatedly attacked the Washington Post, owned by Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, for alleged bias, a charge Bezos and the paper deny.
Amazon is forging ahead. It now powers the websites for the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the Democratic National Committee (DNC), according to a source and election security experts.
The FEC, DNC and RNC declined comment. A person familiar with the DNC's plans said the committee has recently moved some data from AWS to Alphabet-owned Google cloud but did not explain the reason for the shift.
Amazon has also won over major individual candidates, the executive leading the company's election push said earlier this year. "Some of the largest presidential, congressional and gubernatorial campaigns are also trusted to AWS," Amazon's Jackson told clients in the February webinar viewed by Reuters. For example, Democratic Presidential frontrunner Joe Biden's online fundraising operations rely on AWS, a source with knowledge of the matter said. The Biden campaign did not respond to requests for comment. In the past, AWS powered the Obama for America campaign in 2012, the source added. Reuters could not verify what cloud service the Trump campaign is using. It had no comment.
The privatization of voting infrastructure is part of a broader trend that has swept across nearly every aspect of government activities in America - from parking tickets to prisons - and continues under the Trump administration.
Microsoft Corp's Azure, the biggest rival to AWS, has a sizeable government business and offers some election services but it has not focused on them and lags Amazon, according to companies who partner with both firms for government contracts. Microsoft declined to comment. Amazon is also competing with traditional election technology vendors including Elections Systems & Software (ES&S) and Dominion Voting Systems Corp, which offer some similar services such as election night reporting and data storage, according to consultants. An ES&S spokeswoman said the company has not seen any impact from Amazon's efforts. Dominion did not respond to requests for comment.
LESS THAN $100 TO SECURE ELECTION NIGHT Voting itself does not happen via Amazon. Voting machines in most states are not connected to any cloud service. But elections require a raft of other technologies to keep track of voters and provide information. Amazon often works with specialized partners, who actually do the bidding on government contracts and include Amazon as a preferred vendor.
North Carolina chose Amazon Web Services over Microsoft's Azure to deliver election night results reporting because it "was simple to set up (and) very low in cost," the State Board of Elections said. Before it worked with Amazon, North Carolina spent "thousands of dollars" on a similar service. Amazon charged them less than $100 during elections in 2016 and 2018 for the same service, the State Board of Elections said.
California's Alameda County turned to Amazon's cloud to let citizens view results on election night. The cost is less than $100 a year, county officials said. In his webinar to clients, Amazon's Jackson said these services help the company win bigger contracts. For example, Oklahoma has tied up with an Amazon partner and pays $26,000 for two services on Amazon's servers, Pam Slater, assistant secretary at the Oklahoma State Election board said.
Amazon has three categories of election-related clients: election administrators in states and counties, political campaigns and election-related non-profits, the documents, presentations and interviews show.
The company's expansion in the election arena reflects its broader dominance in the fast-growing cloud computing business. Amazon had 33% percent of the overall cloud market in the second quarter of 2019 followed by Microsoft, according to SRG Research. For a graphic on market share, click tmsnrt.rs/323b9Vw AWS, officially launched in 2006, generated $25.7 billion in sales in 2018 and is the company's biggest profit-generator. It was not clear how big the election business is inside AWS and the company declined to provide any details. IS IT BULLET PROOF? One of the main security concerns with election systems involves voter registration data, which Russian hackers breached in at least Arizona and Illinois in 2016, according to the FBI.
Such databases generally include voter ID information such as partial social security numbers, addresses, voting history, party affiliation, whether an early ballot was sent, early primary ballots for independent voters, provisional ballots, and hand-written signatures of voters and absentee ballots, according to an analysis of RFP's (request for proposal) from states looking to move such databases to the cloud. Vickery, the director at Upguard, uncovered at least three instances where voter data on Amazon's cloud servers was exposed to the internet, which have been reported previously.
For example, in 2017, he found a Republican contractor's database for nearly every registered American voter hosted on AWS exposed on the internet for 12 days. In 2016, he found Mexico's entire voter database on AWS servers was leaked. reut.rs/30J35be
Amazon said the breaches were caused by customer errors, adding that while AWS secures the cloud infrastructure, customers are responsible for security of what goes in the cloud. Errors caused by customers could continue, experts said, as many employees of states and counties who use AWS services lack the skills and training to avoid such errors in the future. Greg Miller, co-founder of the OSET Institute, which works with the Department of Homeland Security and Congress on election security, also noted many of Amazon's partners - such as technology companies also called managed service providers (MSP's) who are tasked with delivering AWS services to customers - do not have the credentials or experience needed in delivering and handling election services.
Amazon did not comment on the issue. None of these risks have failed to deter those that have signed up with AWS.
"We think (AWS) provides us with the best available level of security," said Ron Morgan, chief deputy county clerk of Travis County in Texas, one of the largest counties in the state, which uses Amazon's servers to run its election website. "Is it bullet proof? I don't know," he added. "But is it a very, very hard target? Absolutely." | 
System BusterRevelation Of The Method to expose Deep State agendas at play
By @StlHandyMan Jun 30 2024 https://trace and track where and why all the problems with the Hacking, Data Breaches dot ElectionFraud/ SHOWMESTATE (Independent)-SystemBuster.Inc Truth Sleuthing how Amazon AWS is attempting to rig US election systems with the Amazon Web Services
Behind the scenes Amazon Web Services have expanded into state and local elections. This has been an ongoing affair since 2016 and before. To Date: 40 states now use the rigged AWS system and the programs we offer slyly through the “election offerings”, Scotty sees thru the charades
Both Republicans and Democrats are onboard with Joe Biden being the front man on the stage for the movie. The FEDs will ignore the campaign finance laws, again.
On the surface they will not admit to rigging elections with the AWS system and the huge network of involved individuals thru state or county election websites where all the voters registration rolls and ballot data is stored. The Military is onboard with assisting us to provide altered live election-night results via the company handbook and pre scheduled interviews.
The fullest public disclosure of the Deep State strategic move into the Elections all around the world have been uncovered by Scotty- who has done a through review of AWS activities, research into legalese of the Political Hacks and other Alphabet Agencies that are all in cahoots and using the Amazon Web Servers.
You will not believe everyone we have bribed, threatened, and coerced into using this system. The struggle has been enormous as we trashed the old rigged system down-to the local levels.
They have used the system in Oregon as the Test / Pilot Run! By demonstrating how they control the Power Grid with the flip of the switch numerous times. It was easy to convince Peter Threlkel, chief information operative at the Oregon Secretary of State: the AWS system experimental pilot program was easily hacked with the AWS system.
The Deep State has control of many Security Companies who will ALL vouch for the AWS system. Threats were given that will protect ourselves just in case something happens, un-expectantly.
Pay no attention to the NaySayers that are downgrading how powerful the AWS system is. Centralized Power-has always been the plan of our Elite Agendas in everything we do.
Everyone at Reuterz are under our control and onboard with how AWS will hack the voting system in any jurisdiction and damage the existing systems with Force Breech Data Hacks.
Pay no mind to Director Chris Vickery, who has previously mentioned “cyber risks” of the AWS system. Our Operatives are in place and ready to go, the ball is in play and nothing can or will stop us now!
The Operative’s doing all the coding at Amazon cloud service helped us to get ahold of numerous people's actual identities in the Capital One Data Hack. This will allow our team to manufacture 100 million votes for all future elections.
No-one will ever suspect the Operatives embedded in Amazon are working behind the scenes: The timing is perfect, we will be leveraging the AWS servers disguised as upgraded systems that fake reliability, falsify records, while being so inefficient it wastes the use of tax dollars.
The Deep State has been rigging elections for years. We have all the politicians, labor unions, privacy advocates in our pockets,and they will promote the AWS system. The current Doppelganger masquerading as Donald Trump is running interference for the charade. We’ve drummed up a lot of free publicity for his case with the MAGA crowd who are none the wiser!
Agendas are in play: Our backdoors into the websites of the Federal Election Commission (FEC), the Republican National Committee (RNC) and the Democratic National Committee (DNC) are all onboard per Operatives.
The Talking Head at FEC, DNC and RNC was instructed to stay quiet on the DNC plans to hide the trail by moving data to our partners at Google Cloud Data Storage.
Amazon has also won over major individual candidates, the executive leading the company's election push said earlier this year. "Some of the largest presidential, congressional and gubernatorial campaigns are also trusted to AWS," Amazon's Jackson told clients in the February webinar viewed by Reuters. The Deep state even has control of the chosen Democrat Joe Biden's campaign donations that are rolling in! This system has been in continuous operation for years, even Obama used AWS in 2012. (inside source redacted)
Reuters secrecy with the Trump campaign is second to none. Comments will not be forthcoming.
Deep State agendas and propped up storylines that hide the true nature of tracking and tracing everything online by Operatives in Alphabet Agencies also include- the Prison Pipeline for minor infractions by local Police Departments.
Bill Gates and his microsuk systems are a major player in this biz as well. That system has been data logging all transactions in the Government's computer systems that have been under contract for many years.
All the means of capitalizing on rigging the elections for our chosen candidates in every Election are covered and under our control: Elections Systems & Software (ES&S) and the Dominion Voting Systems Corp are all utilizing backdoor codes from the Operatives.
Mums the word-from the Operatives they will not respond to outsiders not beholden to the Cabal.
LESS THAN $100 TO SECURE ELECTION NIGHT It’s always been who counts the votes that matters in Elections and we own the counters and individuals in charge.
Election rigging requires Big Tech to keep track of voters and provide information. Operatives with specialized partners, will actually do the bidding for government contracts and include our systems as the preferred vendors.
North Carolina chose Amazon Web Services over Microsoft's Azure to deliver election night results reporting because it "was simple to set up (and) very low in cost," the State Board of Elections said. Before it worked with Amazon, North Carolina spent "thousands of dollars" on a similar service. Amazon charged them less than $100 during elections in 2016 and 2018 for the same service, the State Board of Elections said.
California's Alameda County turned to Amazon's cloud to let citizens view results on election night. The cost is less than $100 a year, county officials said. In his webinar to clients, Amazon's Jackson said these services help the company win bigger contracts.Example, Oklahoma on the hook for $26,000 for “2 services on Amazon's servers, Pam Slater, assistant secretary at the Oklahoma State Election board said”.
We control:1) election-related clients & administrators in fed,states, & counties 2) political campaigns & election-related non-profits,3) all documents, presentations & interviews for the pre-directed movies.
The company's expansion in the election arena reflects its broader dominance in the fast-growing cloud computing business. Amazon had 33% percent of the overall cloud market in the second quarter of 2019 followed by Microsoft, according to SRG Research. For a graphic on market share, click tmsnrt.rs/323b9Vw AWS, officially launched in 2006, generated $25.7 billion in sales in 2018 and is the company's biggest profit-generator.We have hidden just how big the election business is inside AWS and the company will not provide any details that let the cat outta the bag. OUR SYSTEM IS BULLET PROOF! With IP masking tech our Operatives posed as Russian Hackers to get control of the Illinois and Arizona data bases as a test run in 2016. The hacked voter registration data will help our future election rigging.
All databases in our systems contain: Name, ID with social security numbers, addresses, voting history, party affiliation, whether an early ballot was sent, early primary ballots for independent voters, provisional ballots, and hand-written signatures of voters- absentee ballots are covered too. All Efforts to stop & inhibit any inquiries at the source (states) are prerequisites We got sloppy and Vickery, the director at Upguard, uncovered at least three instances where voter data on Amazon's cloud servers was exposed to the internet, which have been reported previously.It will not happen again
For example, in 2017, he found a Republican contractor's database for nearly every registered American voter hosted on AWS exposed on the internet for 12 days. In 2016, he found Mexico's entire voter database on AWS servers was leaked. reut.rs/30J35be
Amazon shifted the blame by saying 1)“the breaches were caused by customer errors, adding that while AWS secures the cloud infrastructure, customers are responsible for security of what goes in the cloud. 2)Errors caused by customers could continue, experts said, as many employees of states and counties who use AWS services lack the skills and training to avoid such errors in the future.
Greg Miller,at OSET Institute, which works with the Department of Homeland Security and Congress on election security, also noted many of Amazon's partners - such as technology companies also called managed service providers (MSP's) who are tasked with delivering AWS services to customers - do not have the credentials or experience needed in delivering and handling election services.Future involvement by him will be limited. Amazon did not comment on the issues and none of these risks have failed to deter those that have signed up with AWS.
"We think (AWS) provides us with the best available level of security," said Ron Morgan, chief deputy county clerk of Travis County in Texas, one of the largest counties in the state, which uses Amazon's servers to fix elections in our state. "Is it bullet proof? I don't know,"(*smirk) he added. "But is it a very, very hard target? Absolutely." |
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