Last week, Congress reauthorized a controversial surveillance authority, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. While legislators considered reforms to FISA that would restrain the federal intelligence and law enforcement community’s abilities to spy on American communications without a warrant, they in fact expanded these surveillance powers to subject more electronic communications service providers, such as U.S. cloud computing data centers, to data collection.

On April 10, Apple sent users in 92 countries warning of mercenary malware attacks targeting the iPhone. The notification did not provide details about the identities of the attackers. According to TechCrunch, Apple warned, “This attack is likely targeting you specifically because of who you are or what you do. Although it’s never possible to achieve absolute certainty when detecting such attacks, Apple has high confidence in this warning — please take it seriously.”

Throughout this year, our digital security training team will share our thoughts on navigating security issues during the 2024 election season. Elections around the world experience distinct security issues that may change from year to year, but in the U.S. we look to 2020 for lessons on how to get ahead of likely issues, from surveillance of our sensitive communications to perennial phishing attacks and harassment for political reporting.