States’ voter registration systems and voter access have undergone a host of changes over the past five years, thanks in large part to the Covid-19 pandemic. Many states expanded vote-by-mail options, stepped up automatic voter registration programs, or both. Cities took action, as well – Los Angeles, for instance, has overhauled its voting system infrastructure, using open source, the cloud, and cybersecurity partnerships to updat...

The 2020 election and its aftermath provided a vivid demonstration of many of the risks faced by election officials across the country – and new dangers have emerged in 2024. Physical threats to poll workers have proliferated, AI-generated disinformation showed up in one state’s primary contest, and other AI threats, whether from partisan interests, corporate disinterest or hostile nation-states, loom large. The landscape is so dan...

California may be the home of Silicon Valley and the birthplace of many innovative technologies, but as the biggest state (by population) and the fifth-largest economy in the world (more than 14% of U.S. Gross Domestic Product), it faces nation-sized challenges. The human issues include everything from making health care and insurance more affordable to investing in expanded internet access, to name just two. The state government has embarked...