Allen County moves ahead of election dates after arrest of voting software firm CEO

ALLEN COUNTY, Indiana (WANE) – The Allen County Election Committee said Tuesday it was moving “all data” out of a data center operated by the software company whose founder and CEO was arrested on suspicion of stealing data from poll workers.

However, the election committee clarified that none of the allegations made by Los Angeles County prosecutors involve Allen County.

Eugene Yu, 51, of Konnech Corporation, was arrested earlier this month in Meridian Township, Michigan and being held on suspicion of stealing personal identification information while computer hard drives and other “digital evidence” were seized by investigators from the district attorney’s office.

Konnech is a small company based in East Lansing. In 2020, it won a five-year, $2.9 million contract with LA County for software used to track schedules, training, payroll, and communications for poll workers, according to Dean C. Logan, the county’s registrar-recorder/county clerk.

Konnech also has a contract with Allen County.

The Allen County Election Board announced that it contracted with Konnech in 2012 for software to store data from poll workers and polling stations.

“The database maintained by Konnech does not contain any confidential information about poll workers,” the Election Committee said on Tuesday. “Konnech does not store Allen County voter information, and the Konnech software does not connect to election results, polls, or voting machines.”

Nevertheless, the electoral board said it was moving to protect the data.

“In light of the allegations against Konnech, the Allen County Election Committee and IT professionals will move all data from Konnech’s data center in Lansing, Michigan to a secure cloud tenant to continue operations for the upcoming election,” he said election committee. “Our IT pros in Allen County fully approve of this tenant hosting this data. Allen County will closely monitor activity logs to ensure data security.”

The Electoral Board said it was taking the matter “seriously” and was monitoring the ongoing investigation.

“Our primary focus is maintaining the integrity of the Allen County election and the
continued security of all data related to our election process,” it said.