This Hacker Rigged Elections in 9 Latin American Countries

[eridani]

http://readersupportednews.org/news-section2/318-66/36097-this-hacker-rigged-elections-in-9-latin-american-countries

A highly sophisticated Colombian hacker rigged elections across Latin America in favor of right-wing candidates for almost eight years, pulling in hefty paychecks for highly-coveted dirty work in at least nine different countries’ elections, including for Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto's rise to power.

A Bloomberg Business article published Thursday told his story for the first time, forcing the Mexican government to deny on Friday that Peña Nieto's campaign spied on rivals.

Andres Sepulveda, now in jail in Colombia, was in the business of the “whole dark side of politics that nobody knows exists but everyone can see,” he told Bloomberg Business.

He started with small jobs in 2005, but quickly ramped up to helping presidential campaigns in Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, and Venezuela smear, hack, and spy on their left-wing rivals for a bill of at least US$12,000 per month, and often more.

His first gig was for the re-election campaign of former right-wing Colombian President Alfaro Uribe in the lead-up to the 2006 election, which Uribe won. Sepulveda hacked a rival’s website and campaign database.

[Judi Lynn]

1. His employers in these countries had him "smear, hack, and spy on their left-wing rivals..."

What a shock, or maybe, NOT SO MUCH!

If right-wingers don't cheat, they can't win, people simply can't stand them. They have nothing to offer, and they'll steal the ground out from under you.

This is so disgusting, real right-wing stuff.

I am so glad this guy finally coughed up the information everyone knew he had.

[center] [/center]
Thanks for this article.

I hope he'll add more, as time goes by, so much it will be too embarrassing NOT to charge some of these greedy, dirty freaks.

Oh, yeah. He'd better watch his back. He IS in Colombia, after all. Right-wingers love to hire people to kill their enemies.

[reformist2]

4. I'm sure left-wingers are not beyond cheating as well.

[Ghost Dog]

5. Shouldn't need to, if truth can be told (and heard)... n/t

[rafeh1]

2. Elections should be tracked like credit cards

You and only you can thru your cell phone check if your vote went to the right place. An independant audit can verify the candidates got the votes correctly. The credit card companies get the payee and payor 99.99% right

[tomm2thumbs]

3. votes perhaps could be done with 3-part perforated forms - first copy goes to the poll/counter

second copy is handed to a neutral monitor outside the polling place, just to verify that inside/outside numbers align, and the third is the voter's copy (and can even be sent to voter's candidate by a simple photo-scan using phone camera (if they wish) -- so the candidates can also keep an eye out for indiscrepancies at polling locations).

I'm sure there are a lot of obvious problems with this particular silly idea, but definitely 'there's got to be a better way' - and a way to double check without slowing down the process.

__

After all, FedEx can track a gadzillion packages as they shuttle all across the country, but we can't keep a simple election straight? And lottery tickets can be flying out at millions an hour and yet by the end of the night, they know the outcome and people have a paper receipt of their choices?

[Judi Lynn]

6. How to Hack an Election

How to Hack an Election

April 2, 2016By Taegan Goddard

Andres Sepulveda tells Bloomberg he rigged major political campaigns over a period of eight years in Nicaragua, Panama, Honduras, El Salvador, Colombia, Mexico, Costa Rica, Guatemala, and Venezuela.

“With a budget of $600,000, the Peña Nieto job was by far his most complex. He led a team of hackers that stole campaign strategies, manipulated social media to create false waves of enthusiasm and derision, and installed spyware in opposition offices, all to help Peña Nieto, a right-of-center candidate, eke out a victory.”

Now serving 10 years in prison in Colombia, Sepulveda is telling his story in hopes of a reduced sentence.

On the question of whether the U.S. presidential campaign is being tampered with, he is unequivocal: “I’m 100 percent sure it is.”

https://politicalwire.com/2016/04/02/how-to-hack-an-election/

(Short article, no more at link.)