Nevada’s Cyber Crisis: Day 5 – But Is Washoe County’s IT Chief Even in Reno?

Email we were sent by Commissioner Mike Clark on Monday, August 25, 2025.

It’s Day 5 of Nevada’s state systems being down, and the picture just got darker. Cybersecurity officials now admit data has been exfiltrated—yes, moved outside Nevada’s network—during what they call a “sophisticated, ransomware-based attack.”

Timothy Galluzi, Executive Director of the Governor’s Technology Office, gave the solemn update Wednesday, explaining:

“Our goal is to restore full functionality as quickly as possible, but we have a duty to do so safely and securely… Bringing systems back online is a meticulous process, as we must ensure the threat has been fully eradicated before we reconnect them.”

While Galluzi does damage control, here in Washoe County we can’t help but ask: Where is our own IT boss during all this?

County CIO Behzad Zamanian—who pulls in just under $240,000 a year—reportedly works less than five days a month in Reno, according to the Reno Gazette Journal. The rest of the time? Southern California.

So when the county blasted out this email update on Monday, was Zamanian even in Reno? Or was he managing this crisis from a beachside café in Laguna? Seems like the emails are originating from his cell phone. Because for that kind of salary, taxpayers might expect their IT chief to be within state lines during a major cybersecurity meltdown—not on a remote work plan that makes Bigfoot sightings look more frequent.

Five days offline. Data stolen. And a CIO who might be phoning it in from another zip code. Washoe County residents deserve answers—and a little less “out of office” during a state digital disaster.