Technology
Hackers robbed $2.3 million from the Republican Party of Wisconsin
Hackers allegedly stole $2.3 million from the Wisconsin Republican Party just weeks before the election using a hacked invoice system, says Associated Press. The organization noted the burglary on 22 October; Andrew Hitt, chairman of the Wisconsin Republican Party, said the FBI is now investigating the crime.
According to Hitt, hackers used bogus invoices from a variety of campaign contractors to work on items like election mailings and Trump products. Instead of supplying payment information to the vendor, the records relayed the money to the hackers.
This type of hack is also a fairly normal scam: in 2017, Facebook and Google were targeted by a similar phishing scheme to the tune of $100 million. Scammers regularly use bogus invoices to threaten companies , organisations, and other entities, aiming to get into phony receipts alongside genuine ones.
Seeing how frantic the political process can be in the final weeks before the election, it's easy to see how scammed bills may have slipped through.
The AP article does not mention how long hackers have been siphoning money from the account, but the number is substantial, considering that Wisconsin Republican Speaker Alec Zimmerman reports that the party's federal account reportedly holds $1.1 million (at press time — that sum is likely to change due to the accelerated speed of the election).
Wisconsin is seen as a critical state in both Trump and Biden 's upcoming election campaigns.
