The voter fraud, perpetrated on Monday in New Zealand, was real. And the contenders were, er, fowl. As the citizens slept, a hacker slipped more than 1,500 fake votes into an election database, sending one flightless bird to the top. The scandal has roiled Bird of the Year 2020, an online popularity contest among the native birds of New Zealand, and made headlines in the remote Pacific Island nation, which takes its avian biodiversity seriously. “It’s kind of disappointing that people decide to try their little tech tricks on Bird of the Year,” Laura Keown, the spokeswoman for the competition, told Radio New Zealand on Tuesday.

Source: International New York Times November 10, 2020 09:01 UTC