Georgia's 38-person election and back-office team is building voter trust through cybersecurity controls for 10,000 poll pads

With four locations statewide (two in metropolitan Atlanta, one in Macon, and one in Tifton), the Georgia Secretary of State (Georgia SOS) office is charged with election management, business registration, professional licensing, and regulation of securities to protect against fraud and improve financial literacy. With election integrity grabbing the headlines over the past few years, the state governing body needed a way to improve election oversight and integrity.

CIO Jonathan Reich manages a staff of 38 technical professionals who are split between election technology and back-office systems. They manage approximately 500 to 600 assets in each office and 10,000 poll pads, which are used by poll workers to check in and validate voters and issue the correct ballot for the appropriate precincts.

“In Georgia, the safety, security, and accuracy of our elections is paramount,” said Reich. “We realized that we needed a better view into the poll pads to see their cybersecurity patch levels and overall security health—that was the initial driving force behind our adoption of Armis.”

Three staff members now use Armis from ServiceNow for patching reviews, after completing an MDM integration in under six weeks

Reich first learned about Armis from ServiceNow and its ability to secure attack surfaces with AI-powered asset intelligence, from a colleague who works in the Henry County IT department in the Atlanta area. Reich also initiated conversations with the account team on his own. He was convinced that Armis was the right solution during the proof of value (POV), which focused primarily on discovery of in-office assets. Later, Armis was used to verify the security and integrity of poll pads in advance of elections.

“You don’t know what you don’t know. Armis solved that problem for us by allowing us to see what we couldn’t see or confirm with our existing toolset. Armis was the only solution that could ensure visibility into technology assets at offices and connected assets used in the election process,” Reich explained. Currently three members of his staff use Armis for patching reviews and to validate asset information against other asset inventory solutions.

Knowing that elections were on the horizon, the team fast-tracked deployment and integration with the third-party mobile device management (MDM) solution that the Georgia SOS uses to track the security posture of poll pads. “They did a stand-up job building that interface—it took less than six weeks,” said Reich.

The Georgia SOS is also in the early stages of implementing Armis to unify and prioritize asset vulnerabilities. Using AI-powered tools, it automates remediation by simplifying workflows and processes. Armis also adds another layer of protection by providing actionable intelligence to preempt potential attacks by prioritizing the vulnerabilities that threat actors are exploiting in the wild or are about to weaponize.

Armis verified Georgia's full network, documented a previously undocumented VLAN, and helped the state consolidate five point products

Before the 2024 election, it was important for Reich’s team to ensure that poll pads were properly secured and functioning as they should. Armis serves as a verification tool, allowing Reich to validate the accuracy and availability of the customer-facing side of the environment, including the voter registration tool. It shines a light on issues and anomalies so that the IT team can address them quickly and efficiently.

“Armis allows us to trust but verify the third-party vendor that is supporting the poll pads. It gave me tremendous comfort knowing that I was getting accurate and consistent information from the vendor that maintains them. Now I can validate the third-party solution with my own eyes,” explained Reich.

Reich and his team also use Armis to get a view into vulnerabilities and prioritize those that matter most, accelerating mitigation.

“I worry about a random user plugging into the environment. And even though this usually occurs without malicious intent, Armis can identify those assets and give the security team a heads-up if potential issues arise,” Reich said. For example, Armis discovered a VLAN that Reich and his team didn’t know existed. Armis documented it and, fortunately, deemed it safe.

“Without Armis, it would have been much more difficult to find that unknown VLAN,” he added. “I’d rather invest in a tool like Armis on the front-end than spend time, effort, and budget on the back end to clean things up.”

20-plus hours with Armis's CTO convinced CIO Jonathan Reich that partnership, not more tools, protects Georgia's elections

Armis helps maximize the security team’s time, increasing their efficiency and effectiveness while minimizing the exposure window.

“We’re a relatively small group with a big job. Anything that optimizes the team’s time is beneficial and justifies itself,” said Reich.

Armis has also reduced security spend on unnecessary and ineffective security solutions. “Armis allows me to reduce the cost and implementation of other tools, as I get more out of Armis than I would out of multiple disparate point products,” said Reich. “My job is to keep us out of the press. I can’t stop the bad guys from doing bad things, but we will make the right decisions based on the amount of funding authorized for our use. I take pride in making best use of every penny we are allocated—and Armis helps us do that.”

Apart from the technical strengths of Armis, Reich also appreciates the accessibility and openness of Armis leadership. He spent more than 20 hours in total on one-on-one technical discussions with the CTO.

“Having access to someone at that level in the organization made me feel that I was important. It showed me that they understand the level of risk and scrutiny I deal with during elections. I value partners like them who help us assure citizens that their participation in elections is treated with respect and honesty,” concluded Reich.