Colorado officials accidentally share passwords to voting machines

Colorado Secretary of State Jena Griswold accidentally shared over 600 passwords to voting machines in virtually every county in a public file uploaded to her website in August, the state’s Republican party alleged Tuesday. 

In a Tuesday interview, Griswold admitted that in the case of some pieces of voting equipment, one of two passwords had been leaked, but a bad actor would not be able to gain access to that equipment without both passwords. She did not provide the total number of passwords compromised, nor the total of counties affected. She said her office knew about the mistake days before the GOP went public. A downloadable spreadsheet on the department’s website had a hidden tab with both active and inactive passwords for accessing election equipment, Griswold explained. Despite the hidden feature, users could change a file setting on the downloaded documents to reveal the hidden tab. However, the state secretary insisted that election integrity remained intact and the error was not a security threat.

How can the state still claim to have election integrity? Colorado legally requires elections to be protected with multiple layers of security. Two passwords must be entered by two different people in two separate locations to unlock voting equipment, Griswold said. Those passwords must also be entered in-person, meaning someone would need access to badge restricted areas where election equipment is under 24/7 video surveillance, she continued.

Even if the passwords were old, it showed incompetence and negligence at some of the highest levels of state government, Colorado’s GOP Chairman Dave Williams said. Republicans demanded Griswold’s office confirm that all passwords active at the time of the leak are changed, and ensure that no actors have remotely or physically tampered with election systems. Federal and state investigators are looking into the leak, according to Griswold.

Dig deeper: Read Carolina Lumetta’s report on hundreds of ballots being destroyed in a ballot box fire.