The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) of Russia communicated this Saturday the detection of a "powerful cyberattack" directed against the electronic voting system of Moscow during the past night, although it emphasized that it was "successfully neutralized."
The president of the body, Ella Pamfilova, explained, in statements disseminated by the Russian agency TASS, that "according to updated information received very recently, the Moscow system was the target of a very powerful and practically continuous attack throughout the night. (...) This attack continues almost constantly and is of great scale and intensity; that is to say, it currently has Moscow as its target."
In this sense, Pamfilova highlighted that "everything is fine and no one has noticed" the incident, since "it was successfully neutralized, thanks to the fact that we have very effective protective means."
The head of the CEC added that "we have not received any information about incidents or complaints related to the DEG," referring to the remote electronic voting system used in these elections.
For Pamfilova, the cyberattack suffered by the Moscow system "is clearly a coordinated attempt to disrupt the normal functioning of the system and exert negative pressure on the entire electoral process in the Russian capital."
Russia has been holding parliamentary elections since Friday and until this Sunday, in which voters elect the 450 deputies of the State Duma, as well as the governors of eleven regions. In these elections, United Russia, the party of President Vladimir Putin, seeks to reaffirm a new majority in the lower house in the absence of effective political competition.