FEC Filing System Goes Offline After Attempted Cyberattack

The US Federal Election Commission (FEC) has taken its electronic filing system offline after an attempted cyberattack, according to an internal email sent to campaign compliance firms. The outage comes a week before the November 3 midterm elections and has temporarily stopped political groups from submitting campaign finance reports.

An FEC electronic filings officer told several compliance firms on Monday night that an unauthorised party was trying to breach the agency's systems, the email said. The FEC responded by shutting down its internet-facing services. The agency's status page puts the start of the outage at around 10pm ET on Monday. On Tuesday, a spokesperson said the system was still down while IT staff worked to restore it.

The FEC has not confirmed that a hacking attempt took place, has not said whether any data was accessed, and has given no timeline for restoring the system. Previously submitted reports can still be searched on the FEC website. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) referred questions to the FEC, and the FBI did not immediately respond.

Why it matters

The disruption does not affect voting, because US elections are run by state and local authorities rather than the FEC. But it hits the system political groups use to disclose spending in the final stretch of a campaign. Federal rules require campaigns and committees to file certain reports within 24 or 48 hours of specific spending or contributions, and those filings let voters and researchers follow the money.

"I've never seen this in 26 years," said Steven Mele, president of compliance firm MBA Consulting Group. Brendan Glavin, research director at watchdog OpenSecrets, said the outage makes it hard to see who is spending money and where.

The timing is sensitive. Ad-tracking firm AdImpact puts political advertising spending and reservations for the 2026 elections at about $11.21 billion, already above the $11.2 billion recorded for the whole 2024 cycle. OpenSecrets says super PACs and groups that do not fully disclose their funding have spent more than $50 million a day on average over the past week.

CISA, which would normally help with such incidents, faces a proposed $700 million budget cut under the White House's 2027 spending plan.