The 2020 United States Census will be the first to request a majority of Americans to respond online. The benefits are obvious. A digitized census is more efficient than the 230-year-old paper method, streamlining the processing of individual data for a population that has increased nearly a hundredfold since 1790, to 330 million. But connecting the country’s biggest and most important questionnaire to the internet also creates vulnerabilities to hacks. And what could be the most popular census survey station is also an underfunded and maliciously targeted American institution: the public library (and its computers).
WIRED OPINION
ABOUT
Leeza Garber is a cybersecurity and privacy attorney and Drexel University’s Kline School of Law adjunct law professor specializing in information privacy.
The Census Bureau is aware of digitization risks (and expenses, with cost projections upwards of $15 billion, including an IT budget). The bureau has responded to cybersecurity concerns with encryption, dual-factor authentication, use of the Department of Homeland Security’s EINSTEIN 3 Accelerated cybersecurity system, and a partnership with Microsoft to leverage its expertise.
Not only must census data be secured, kept private, and counted accurately, we must also feel safe providing data within an internet-connected system. When the census arrives, so will cyber scams: phishing emails from bad actors claiming to be bureau representatives, text messages with malicious links, and harassing phone calls demand ..
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