As the 2018 elections approach, the American intelligence community is issuing increasingly dire warnings about potential interference from Russia and other countries. D.H.S. has now conducted remote-scanning and on-site assessments of state and county election systems. These [measures] don't address core vulnerabilities in voting machines or the systems used to program them. And they ignore the fact that many voting machines that elections officials insist are disconnected from the internet and therefore beyond the reach of hackers " are in fact accessible by way of the modems they use to transmit vote totals on election night. Add to this the fact that states don't conduct robust postelection audits ... and there's a good chance we simply won't know if someone has altered the digital votes in the next election. How did our election system get so vulnerable, and why haven't officials tried harder to fix it? The answer, ultimately, comes down to politics and money: The voting machines are made by well-connected private companies that wield immense control over their proprietary software, often fighting vigorously in court to prevent anyone from examining it when things go awry. The stakes are high. But the focus on Russia, or any would-be election manipulators, ignores the underlying issue " the myriad vulnerabilities that riddle the system and the ill-considered decisions that got us here.