The harsh reality is that computers can do more untraceable damage to election campaigns — and most candidates and their high-priced consultants are oblivious to the threats and therefore do nothing to protect themselves from cybercrime. The article below focuses on federal elections but the same kinds of dirty tricks can impact any political campaign — from proverbial dogcatcher on up to those with aspirations of occupying the Oval Office. Some of these threats are so insidious that it would be hard to prove that they ever happened. But others like “typosquatting” should be addressed by every campaign that uses the internet.

Cybercrime Threats to the 2008 Federal Elections

http://blog.ironkey.com/?p=227

Oliver Friedrichs of Symantec chaired a panel at last week’s APWG e-Crime Research Summit in Pittsburgh. He has now published much of his work in a chapter from the forthcoming “Crimeware” book.

Here is Oliver’s summary of what is covered:

Abuse of Candidates’ Internet Domain Names and Typo Squatting - In order
to determine the current level of domain name speculation and typo
squatting in the 2008 federal U.S. election, we performed an analysis of
17 well known candidate domain names in order to seek out domain
speculators and typo squatters. Our results were interesting to say the
least. Candidates have not done a good job at protecting themselves.
Some of the examples of infringement are quite interesting and humorous.

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