Hackers made almost 150,000 attempts to break into the voter registration system in South Carolina, a non-competitive state, on Election Day in 2016.
Citing data from the State Election Commission, the Wall Street Journal contended that the high number of attempts could be an indicator that swing states were even more widely targeted.
“Security has been a top priority for the [State Election Commission] since implementing the statewide voting system in 2004,” the Journal cited Chris Whitmire, director of public information and training at the South Carolina State Election Commission, as saying. “However, events leading up to the 2016 General Election, including the breaches of other states' voter-registration systems, created an election-security environment that was very different."
In comparison, 113,372 hacking attempts were reported a month later and by April 11, 2017, had dropped to just under 45,000, the Journal reported.
