CISA warns against disinformation on election results, election process

WASHINGTON D.C. — The federal government is warning people not to fall for wrong information circulating about the election results and the election process.

RELATED: How to spot fake election posts on social media

“Be prepared for efforts that call into question the legitimacy of the election,” said Chris Krebs, Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) Director, in the days before the Nov. 3 elections.

CISA says bogus Twitter accounts were pretending to be the Associated Press and were calling states where the count was ongoing after the election.

Twitter has suspended the flagged accounts.

One big rumor CISA doesn’t want people to fall for is thinking that the election results have been hacked or compromised just because some results weren’t finished on election night.

CISA said COVID-19 has increased the number of mail-in ballots, so it’s expected to take longer to count than in previous years in some cases.

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CISA falls under the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) which said there have been attempts by Iran and Russia to interfere in the election but said there’s no evidence that any foreign influence has succeeded in compromising the actual vote in any way.

“We have addressed those threats quickly, comprehensively and publicly,” said Krebs.

While the federal government is warning against anonymous bad actors, there are also concerns over President Trump’s remarks in the overnight hours after the election.

“We’ve clearly won North Carolina,” President Trump said during his overnight press conference.

It was a premature call as the vote count is still ongoing in North Carolina.

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