Securing Democracy Dispatch

Latest from the Alliance for Securing Democracy

Democracies need a competitive offer and vision for the future internet, which includes counting 5G spending towards 2-percent goals, Fellow for Emerging Technologies Lindsay Gorman argued in Defense One.

In a Washington Post piece on Russia’s efforts to target this week’s U.K. elections, Non-Resident Fellow Clint Watts argued that although Reddit acted responsibly by investigating and exposing Russian activity, Moscow may still have been able to achieve its objectives.

Awareness of Russian trolls targeting Black Lives Matter activists is rising. That is generally a good thing, but in some cases, confusion has led to name-calling and accusations of legitimate activists, Fellow for Media and Digital Disinformation Bret Schafer explained to the Christian Science Monitor.

The Russia question will remain a central focus for NATO countries as long as the Kremlin continues to interfere in Ukraine and Western democracies, Senior Fellow Kristine Berzina told Al Jazeera. She said to Kurier that if Russia does not change its behavior, member states likely will not move to rebuild relations with its government.

Foreign actors do not have to change a single vote to create the impression that they did, which can be extraordinarily damaging to Americans’ faith in election outcomes, Head of Policy and Research Jessica Brandt told the Casper Star-Tribune.

To avoid a repeat of 2016, the United States must limit its election infrastructure’s exposure to disruption by our adversaries, including by replacing paperless voting systems and running post-election audits, Fellow for Elections Integrity David Levine wrote in an ASD blog post.

Authoritarian interference operations that exploit economic and financial channels have thrown Western governments off balance. Targeting the foreign banks that are indirectly involved in money laundering schemes is crucial to shifting back the balance of power, explained Senior Fellow Josh Kirschenbaum in a blog post.