EC responds to more than 6.8 million cyber attacks on polling day to ensure secure vote counting

New Delhi: On the counting day of the just-concluded parliamentary polls, there were more than 6.8 million malicious clicks on the Election Commission’s online platforms, including the results portal, originating from within India and abroad. However, European Commission officials said on Wednesday that all such attacks had been successfully countered by strong cybersecurity protocols.The EC further informed that the ECINET platform, which consists of more than 40 different EC applications and portals handling individual poll-related functions, received an average of 30 million clicks per minute on the counting day (May 4) and a total of 983 million clicks on the polling days (April 9, 23 and 29).Since ECINET’s official launch in January 2026, usage of the integrated application has grown significantly, with 100 million downloads to date. A beta version of ECINET is being used in the November 2025 Bihar elections.Commission officials on Wednesday said ECINET played a central role in streamlining the electoral process, including real-time monitoring, faster reporting and greater transparency during the recent by-polls in five states/Union Territories and by-polls.On counting day, the system generated more than 320,000 QR codes to ensure that only authorized personnel could enter the counting venue, thus preventing unauthorized entry into the counting center.The new QR code based photo ID system will be used for the first time in all five states/Union Territories on counting day through ECINET, a major step towards enhancing security at counting centres. This system will now become the standard for all future Lok Sabha and state/federal assembly elections.