The 8-year-olds hacking our voting machines

It's been a rather grim week in the social-media-and-democracy cinematic universe, so let's end on a positive note … that starts on a grim note!

"Voting systems in the United States are so woefully hackable, even an 8-year-old could do it." So begins Issie Lapowsky's look at a competition to be hosted next week at Def Con, the venerable hacking conference in Las Vegas. The competition in question is being hosted by the Democratic National Committee, who you might remember from such previous hacks as the 2016 presidential election.

Here's Lapowsky on how it's going to work:

The contest will include children, ages 8 to 16, who will be tasked with penetrating replicas of the websites that secretaries of state across the country use to...

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