COLORADO — Colorado Governor Jared Polis and Secretary of State Jena Griswold say all of the passwords have been reset on voting systems that were affected after they were posted in a publicly accessible spreadsheet for months.
On Wednesday, Griswold confirmed partial passwords for voting systems were posted in a spreadsheet that anyone could download from the Colorado Secretary of State's website.
Politics
Partial passwords to Colorado's voting systems posted online
Griswold eluded that a civil servant was at fault for the error and said the person was no longer with her office. She released the following statement regarding this incident:
“All of the passwords in affected counties have been changed. I want to thank Governor Polis for deploying extra state resources to help in this effort. Colorado has countless layers of security to ensure our elections are free and fair, and every eligible voter should know their ballot will be counted as cast.”
Governor Polis released the following statement Friday:
“We appreciate the swift work to update these passwords. Every Coloradan can rest assured that their vote will be counted fairly and accurately. While the leaked passwords compromised just one of many layers of security that protect our election integrity in Colorado, we knew it was critical to take swift action and to work with Secretary Griswold and the county clerks to update the passwords immediately. I want to especially thank the hardworking state employees and county clerk personnel who were part of this effort.”
News5 reached out to all 12 of the county clerk and recorder offices in our direct market area and all said they were unaffected by the possible leak.
We also heard from former Secretary of State Wayne Williams who talked to us about the safeguards that are in place when something like this happens. You can watch how he and other community members reacted to the news below:
Politics
Former Sec. of State reacts to voting system password leak, safeguards in place
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Former Secretary of State reacts to voting system password leak, safeguards in place
A former state election official said the release of voting system passwords on the Secretary of State's website is a significant error but does not automatically compromise county voting equipment.
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