Live News Streaming Figures for #Election2020 Highlight Misinformation Threat

Live news streaming traffic of the US Presidential election was double the peak levels observed during the 2016 election, according to data released by Akamai. The approximately 18 Tbps recorded on Akamai’s Intelligent Edge platform during coverage of the election on November 3 was around five-times higher than traffic seen on a typical day.

The figures highlight the extent to which people have digested information about this year's election at home via digital and streaming technology as a result of COVID-19 social distancing restrictions.

It fits with the trends seen throughout the entire ‘pandemic election’ season, with much more campaigning taking place digitally and people having been increasingly reliant on television and the internet for information. This has provided extra opportunities for malicious actors to spread misinformation about the campaigns and, especially in recent days, about the integrity of the election itself.

In response, social media firms like Twitter and Facebook have taken a strong line on the spread of misinformation on their sites, even leading to the suspension of the Twitter account of the president of the United States’ election campaign.

Speaking to Infosecurity about these trends, Joseph Carson, chief security scientist and advisory CISO at Thycotic, commented: “I don’t think that the security of the US election has made much difference since the attackers continued to focus cyber-attacks at the election campaigns and creating disinformation on social media, all focused at generating distrust in the system. Hacking ..

Support the originator by clicking the read the rest link below.