United Kingdom - August 2023

The Electoral Commission has reported a cyber-attack on its electoral registers, targeting the names and addresses of 40 million voters registered since 2014. A whistleblower has revealed that the Commission failed a basic cybersecurity test shortly before the cyberattack started in August 2021. The security breach was only discovered over a year later in October 2022 and it is unclear who is behind it. Given the largely paper-based electoral system and public availability of much of the hacked data, the fallout is limited. Concerns for the rights of hacked voters have been voiced, alongside criticisms of the delay in public reporting of the attack. The hack also jeopardizes public trust in the elections watchdog, which already received a blow in April 2022, when legislation was passed strengthening oversight arrangements over the Commission, which was criticized for limiting the body’s independence. Experts demand an upgrade to the democratic safeguards of the Commission, to ensure that it can operate as a robust regulator without any kind of interference.

Sources:  Electoral Commission (1), Electoral Commission (2), The Conversation, The Guardian (1), The Guardian (2), British Broadcasting Corporation

On 8 August, the first asylum seekers boarded the barge ‘Bibby Stockholm,’ chartered by the Home Office to house 500 people. In an open letter to Bibby Marine, the shipping operations company that owns the barge, over 50 organizations led by the Refugee Council criticized the detention-like conditions on board, which limit movement to a secure compound within the port and constrain travel beyond it. The Fire Brigades Union has called the barge, which is only designed to house 222, a “potential death trap” and has threatened legal action. In a letter to the Home Secretary, Suella Braverman, asylum seekers have described the barge as an “unsafe, frightening and isolated place,” reporting that one man attempted suicide. The barge was evacuated less than a week after its first occupants arrived, due to the contamination of its water supply with potentially deadly legionella bacteria. The Home Office has been criticized for its plans to move asylum seekers back on board before the necessary plumbing repairs are completed.

Sources:  Refugee Council, British Broadcasting Corporation (1), British Broadcasting Corporation (2), The Guardian (1), The Guardian (2), The Conversation