It’s not just voting machines that are susceptible to cyberattacks

Election security is the hot button issue these days, but the threat of cyberattacks goes well beyond voting machines. Local governments too are vulnerable and, since updating systems is costly, they will likely remain so. That’s a problem.

Unless you’re an anarchist, you probably want local services — police, fire, sanitation, transit, and yes, your county board of elections — to be up and running rather than locked out with ransomware. In towns from Alaska to Maine to California, however, hackers have successfully shut down local services and brought local government to a standstill.