(29 May 2024)
RESTRICTION SUMMARY:
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Lulea, Sweden – 3 November 2015
1. Various tracking shots of servers in Facebook’s Lulea data center
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Athens, Greece – 28 May 2024
2. SOUNDBITE (English) Juhan Lepassaar, executive director of the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity, ENISA:
++PARTLY OVERLAID BY SHOTS 1, 3 – 9++
"This is part of the Russian war of aggression, which they fight physically in Ukraine, but digitally also across Europe. This has now been very much, emphasised by also all member states, cyber security agencies. AI enabled disinformation, information manipulation is a big threat when it comes to, elections. One of the big issues is the information manipulation, and disinformation campaigns that we’ve seen over Europe in connection with the Russian aggression, to try to portray and sway European voters in certain direction, misinform them. I do believe that we have a societal challenge ahead of us to understand digital security, in the same way that we understand, security in an everyday traffic environment. We are alert and the same kind of behaviours and habits, we need to also instil in when we operate in any kind of a digital environment."
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Brussels, Belgium – 24 May 2024
3. Tracking shot outside European Parliament showing banners reading (English) "European Elections 6-9 June 2024" and "Use your vote"
ASSOCIATED PRESS
The Hague, Netherlands – 23 May 2019
4. Wide of man casting ballot in 2019 European elections
5. Close-up of ballot box with voter’s hands seen dropping ballots
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Barcelona, Spain – 26 May 2019
6. Wide of woman voting
7. Close-up of ballot box reading (Spanish) "European"
ASSOCIATED PRESS
Brussels, Belgium – 24 May 2024
8. Various of European Parliament building
9. Wide of banner reading (English) "Use Your Vote”
STORYLINE:
Disruptive digital attacks – many traced to Russia-backed groups – have doubled in the European Union in 2024 and are also targeting election-related services, according to the EU’s top cybersecurity official.
Juhan Lepassaar, head of the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity, ENISA, told The Associated Press in an interview that attacks with geopolitical motives have steadily risen since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
Citizens from the 27 EU member states will vote June 6-9 for lawmakers in the European Parliament in elections that will also shape the EU’s executive Commission. Elections, also due in the United States, Britain and multiple other countries, have alerted security agencies to the threat of disruption campaigns funded by adversaries.
ENISA has led exercises and intense consultations to harden the resilience of election-related agencies in the EU for the past seven months. In an annual report for 2023, the agency noted a surge in ransomware attacks and incidents targeting public institutions.
Lepassaar said attack methods – while mostly unsuccessful – were often tried out in Ukraine before being expanded to EU countries.
“This is part of the Russian war of aggression, which they fight physically in Ukraine, but digitally also across Europe,” he said.
Experts warn that artificial intelligence tools now-widely available are also being used to target Western voters at accelerating speed and scale with misleading or false information, including hyperrealistic video and audio clips known as deepfakes.
Cybersecurity, Lepassaar argues, will inevitably need to become second nature to designers and consumers.
Production by Theodora Tongas
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