Chairman of Ukraine's Central Election Commission (CEC) Mykha i lo Okhendovsky has confirmed that there was a hacker attack on the CEC computer system on May 22.
“The technical irregularities that were identified in the operation of the Elections system on May 22 were caused by a computer program, quite sophisticated, so sophisticated that it definitely could not have been developed by one person,” he said at a briefing on Saturday.
“At present, we have a ground to believe that this software or a virus was designed by special services of one of the developed countries,” he said.
He stressed that the functionality of the system was restored on the following day.
“Now the Elections system is operating quite normally. I would want to refute the media reports that the interference in the Elections system could in any way hinder the outcome of the Ukrainian presidential election,” Okhendovsky said.
He said that CEC determines the results of elections solely on the basis of original hard copies of acts of district elections commissions.
“That is precisely what CEC will do this time too,” he said.
He said that CEC “does not expect any abnormities in the Election s system in the future.”
“However, we don’t rule out obstructions to the normal operation of the system and are duly preparing for that taking all permitted measures to make any unlawful and unauthorized influence on the operation of the Elections system as well as all other computer systems used by CEC impossible,” Okhendovsky said.
