to 122 local officials controlling voter registration systems. the brazen scheme came just weeks after then-president obama personally told russian president vladimir putin to stop the attacks. >> i felt that the most effective way to ensure that that didn't happen was to talk to him directly and tell him to cut it out. >> reporter: law enforcement source say voter databases nationwide were targeted by ossian hackers over a six-month period ahead of the election. so you think the worst-case scenario was that they were actually trying to affect the vote total? >> i think that was their hope. >> reporter: jim lewis advises the u.s. government on cyber- t curity: >> i think that they were expecting to be able to manipulate votes in some way, maybe discredit the electoral system, which they came closer to doing. >> reporter: u.s. officials