On November 5th Arizona federal officials raided a home in the Fountain Hills area in Maricopa County.
The agents confiscated eight hard drives, three computers and a bag of USB sticks.
The house belongs to 56-year-old Elliot Kerwin.
The agents were looking for evidence of a cyberattack on an unnamed organization and stolen voter data.
On the morning of November 5, as the 2020 election hung in the balance, Arizona federal agents raided a two-story house in Fountain Hills, Maricopa County, a county that had become a key battleground in the presidential race. The agents were looking for evidence of a cyberattack on an unnamed organization and stolen voter data. They left with eight hard drives, three computers and a bag of USB sticks. The resident of the property, a 56-year-old IT expert named Elliot Kerwin, was served the warrant. He is not yet facing charges and was unreachable for comment at the time of publication. There is no indication that anything other than voters’ information, which can be acquired for a few hundred dollars in Arizona counties, was taken from the affected office.
The warrant, discovered by Forbes this week, reveals investigators have been looking into a computer intrusion at an unnamed “victim office,” which occurred from October 21 to November 4. At the Kerwin residence, they were looking for any evidence within the seized computers that showed they’d been used to access the IT network at the office, as well as “protected voters’ information” and any indication that it had been disseminated to other people.Of the 15 county recorder’s offices contacted by Forbes about the investigation, only one, Maricopa County, confirmed voter data had been stolen, noting that a federal investigation was under way. The Maricopa County Recorder’s office, which is just 30 minutes’ drive south from Kerwin’s home, did not confirm whether or not the investigation was the same as that referred to in the search warrant.
AZ Central has more.
According to the warrant, investigators were looking for records, information and communications related to the office’s:
- Login credentials and accounts.
- Voter registration records and information, including protected voters’ information.
- The transfer, sharing or dissemination of voter registration records and information, including protected voters’ information.
- Unauthorized access to the office’s website and computer systems.
- Attempts or threats to damage computer systems.
