Cybersecurity firm Mojave Research identified significant security weaknesses while examining Dominion voting systems used in Puerto Rico’s 2024 elections. Researchers reported at least a dozen high- or critical-severity software vulnerabilities, along with reused or weak passwords, disabled firewalls, inadequate cryptographic protections, and active cellular modems that created additional pathways into systems intended to be isolated. Some of the vulnerabilities had previously been identified and patches were already available.
Mojave researchers emphasized that they found no evidence that the vulnerabilities had been exploited or that votes had been altered. The findings were presented publicly at the DEF CON cybersecurity conference after the company had submitted an unpublished report to the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. Election-security researchers cautioned that legitimate technical vulnerabilities could nevertheless be used to support unsupported claims about election manipulation, potentially undermining public confidence in election systems.
Why it matters: Election systems are designated critical infrastructure, and vulnerabilities in voting equipment require remediation regardless of whether they have been exploited. The findings illustrate the dual challenge of election security: reducing genuine technical risks while communicating vulnerabilities accurately so that legitimate cybersecurity concerns are not conflated with unsupported claims that election results were manipulated.
Source: Politico
Author: Dana Nickel
Published: August 12, 2026