Hackers target US campaign finance system days before midterm elections | Cybercrime news
An email from the FEC says a “bad actor” tried to hack its systems as the United States prepares for the most costly election in its history.
Published on October 28, 2026
Hackers reportedly targeted the US Federal Election Commission (FEC) website, disrupting campaign finance information just days before the midterm elections.
An FEC email sent to a campaign compliance company reportedly said: “We have a bad actor attempting to violate FEC systems. As a result, we have had to temporarily suspend our web services,” according to the Reuters news agency.
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The outage prevents organizations from filing the FEC’s 24- and 48-hour spending reports, which track spending by political groups and candidates for specific races.
A status message on the FEC website showed the system was down after 10:15 p.m. EST Monday (2:15 a.m. GMT Tuesday).
An update was posted Tuesday at 8:17 p.m. EST, stating: “The issue has been identified and a fix is being implemented. »
Both the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency referred questions to the FEC.
“A big deal”
The FEC plays no role in administering U.S. elections, but the reported hack comes as so-called Super PACs and dark money groups spend record sums in the final days before the Nov. 3 midterm elections.
Democratic FEC Commissioner Dara Lindenbaum wrote on
“We are working hard to restore systems as quickly as possible.”
The midterms are now the most expensive U.S. election in history, with an estimated $11.21 billion spent so far on advertising and future bookings, according to political advertising tracker AdImpact.
That surpasses the previous record of $11.2 billion spent in the 2024 election — including $3.2 billion for the presidential race between President Donald Trump and former Vice President Kamala Harris, according to figures from AdImpact.
Much of the spending is done by super PACs — independent political committees that can accept unlimited sums of money from wealthy individuals and corporations and spend them on campaigns, with few restrictions.
Super PACs and dark money groups have spent an average of $50 million a day over the past week, according to Brendan Glavin, research director at the nonpartisan campaign monitoring group OpenSecrets.
“It’s a big deal,” Glavin said. “In the final days of the election, this is the only way for us to know where the money is being spent.”
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