Russian Blockchain Voting System Was Attacked This Weekend

The infamous Russian blockchain voting system which we described in our cryptocurrency news before was apparently attacked this weekend. Powered by Bitfury, the blockchain based e-Vote system meant for the constitutional amendments in the country suffered an attack via an election observer’s node.

As seen in the reports issued by the state-owned news agency TASS, this attack occurred on June 27 around 08:00 PM CET, when the government of Moscow and a representative told TASS that the attack did not cause a system malfunction, meaning that all e-votes will be successfully recorded on the blockchain.

Officials say that cybersecurity experts were working to restore access to the attacked node. Now, it is not clear whether it has been repaired. Meanwhile, the Russian blockchain voting system was put to practice from June 25 to June 30 for residents of Moscow and Nizhiy Novgorod. It is based on the Exonum blockchain platform which was developed by Bitfury.

Initiated earlier in 2020, the constitutional amendments here will theoretically allow the country’s president Vladimir Putin to serve two more six-year terms if approved, which means that he may remain the president until 2026.

Previous reports in the regulation news showed that the Russian blockchain voting system was inaccessible the first few hours after it went live. Also, it produced some unusual results in certain regions. For example, around 7,300 people assigned to a polling station in Troitsky Administrative Okrug were registered to vote online, despite the fact that the station only had a total of 2,358 residents who were eligible to vote.

Anyways, the Russian blockchain voting system was presented by the media as effective. The local journalist Pavel Lobkov spoke about the ability to vote multiple times which is something the developers did not consider. He reported and shared a video where it is visible that just like many, he initially voted offline at the polling station, and then voted online an hour later.

Other reports by Russian nationals based in Israel showed that they were able to vote three times (online through the website, at the Russian embassy in Tel Aviv as well as at the Russian consulate in Haifa).

Obviously, the Russian blockchain voting system needs to go over issues like these in order to be fully functional and accepted by the public.