Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes testifies before a Senate hearing earlier this month. During a May 15 hearing, he called Russia the top foreign threat to this year's U.S. elections.
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Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes testifies before a Senate hearing earlier this month. During a May 15 hearing, he called Russia the top foreign threat to this year's U.S. elections.
Win McNamee/Getty Images.
The nation's top intelligence official told lawmakers on Wednesday that US elections face more threats than ever from foreign actors, made possible by rapid advances in artificial intelligence.
Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes told the Senate Intelligence Committee during a hearing on threats to the 2024 election that federal, state and local officials charged with protecting voting integrity face a “diverse and complex” threat. is facing But he also said the federal government has “never been better prepared” to protect elections, thanks to Russia's efforts to influence voters in 2016.
This year, “Russia remains the most active foreign threat to our elections,” Haynes said. Using a “vast multimedia influence apparatus” involving state media, intelligence services and online trolls, Russia's goals include “undermining trust in American democratic institutions, deepening sociopolitical divisions in the United States. , and includes reducing Western support for Ukraine.”
But it's a crowded field, Haynes added, with China, Iran and other foreign actors also trying to sway American voters.
In addition, he said, the rise of new AI technologies that can create realistic “deepfakes” targeting candidates and commercial firms through which foreign actors can launder their activities has become increasingly sophisticated. Enabling actions of influence that are difficult to attribute.
Committee Chairman Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) said Wednesday's hearing was the first in a series focused on the election, as lawmakers try to avoid a repeat of 2016, when Russian meddling in lawmakers, officials and Social media executives were caught. – Guard
Since then, “the barriers to entry for foreign harmful influence have unfortunately become incredibly small,” Warner said. He added that foreign adversaries have greater incentives to interfere in American politics to advance their own national interests, and at the same time, Americans' trust in institutions in the political arena has eroded.
Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, the top Republican on the committee, questioned how election security officials would be accepted in an environment of self-reliance. He raised the specter of a fake video targeting himself or another candidate in the days leading up to the November election.
“Who is responsible for telling people, this thing is fake, it's not real?” he asked. “And I ask myself, whoever is in charge, what are we doing to protect the credibility of the entity that's saying it, so that the other side doesn't come forward and say, 'Our own government is interfering? Is it in the election?”
Haynes said that in some cases it would make sense for him or other federal agencies to deny false claims, while in others it might be better to speak to state or local officials.