A federal judge has ordered Georgia election officials to allow computer experts and lawyers to review the databases used to create ballots and count votes.
The ruling came Tuesday in the lawsuit filed by election integrity advocates and voters that challenges Georgia's election system and seeks statewide use of hand-marked paper ballots.
U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg gave the state until Friday to turn over electronic copies of the databases to the plaintiffs' lawyers and computer experts.
The plaintiffs' experts had said inspection of the databases was necessary to begin to evaluate security vulnerabilities and flaws.
Lawyers for the state had argued disclosure of sensitive information in the databases could jeopardize the security of the election system. Totenberg wrote that they provided no evidence of that.