State and local election officials said at the RSA security conference in San Francisco on Feb. 24 that Federal election assistance funding has been vital to their efforts to shore up election infrastructure security over the past few years.

On Monday, Virginia Governor Ralph Northam issued Executive Order Nineteen, which directs the use of cloud technologies in the Commonwealth’s IT services. The executive order says Virginia must “keep pace with the marketplace” and that the order is designed to ensure the Commonwealth “aggressively incorporates the use of cloud technologies.” The order also stresses that cloud services must be deployed in a way that protects the privacy and security of Commonwealth and citizen data.