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Diebold to Withdraw from E-Voting?
Posted by
ScuttleMonkey
on Mon Mar 05, 2007 01:03 PM
from the lots-of-polishing-to-do dept.
from the lots-of-polishing-to-do dept.
ICA writes "It appears after years of criticism, Diebold may be ready to withdraw from electronic voting entirely. The company is concerned that this relatively small and marginally profitable unit is hurting the company's overall image."
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News: An Open Letter To Diebold 266 comments
jcatcw writes "Computerworld's Rob Mitchell tells Diebold President and CEO Thomas Swidarski how to regain Diebold's reputation instead of throwing in the e-voting towel. He recommends full disclosure of all existing problems, a process for disclosure of future problems, hiring of some real professionals as CTO and as an advisory group, and public testing. 'Surely if Diebold can make a secure ATM there is no reason why it cannot make secure and reliable e-voting apparatus in which the public has confidence.'"
[+]
IT: Diebold Security Foiled Again 201 comments
XenoPhage writes "Yet again, Diebold has shown their security prowess. This time they posted, on their website, a picture of the actual key used to open all of their Diebold voting machines. Ross Kinard of Sploitcast crafted three keys based on this photo. Amazingly enough, two of the three keys successfully opened one of the voting machines. But fear not, Diebold has removed the offending picture, replacing it with a picture of their digital card key. Take that, hackers!"
[+]
CA Proposes Rigorous Voting Machine Testing 172 comments
christian.einfeldt writes "During her successful campaign for California Secretary of State, newly-minted California Elections Czar Debra Bowen spoke repeatedly of the need to use free open source software in voting machines to ensure the integrity of California's elections. Now that Secretary Bowen is acting on that campaign pledge, closed-source voting machine vendor Diebold worries aloud that rejecting its black-box voting machines could snarl California's elections. Diebold's concerns come at the same time that it is suing Massachusetts for declining to purchase those same voting machines." Quoting: "California's elections chief is proposing the toughest standards for voting systems in the country, so tough that they could [have the result of banishing] ATM-like touch-screen voting machines from the state. For the first time, California is demanding the right to try hacking every voting machine with 'red teams' of computer experts and to study the software inside the machines, line-by-line, for security holes."
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Latin (Score:5, Interesting)
Of the dead, speak no evil. (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:Of the dead, speak no evil. (Score:4, Informative)
"de mortuis nil nisi bonum dicendum est"
translated to
"...massive arrays of hydrogen fueled kitten engines could be the basis for a future energy economy."
Those crazy Latins!
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
When I called for support (Score:5, Funny)
The above comment was intended for amusement purposes only and in no way reflects true events.
Re:When I called for support (Score:5, Funny)
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Re:When I called for support (Score:5, Insightful)
"Those who cast the votes decide nothing.
Those who count the votes decide everything."
Err... correction: I don't like the quote, I just think that it is sadly true.
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What, a hasty switch from paper to electronic (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:What, a hasty switch from paper to electronic (Score:5, Funny)
And if that by itself is not a landmark event heralding the dawn of a new age, I don't know what is.
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Run! (Score:3, Insightful)
Ignorant Diebold managers destroyed the company. (Score:5, Interesting)
That's absurd. Diebold's voting machines have destroyed the company's image completely, in my opinion. Seriously, if you know something about the history and you have a little technical knowledge, would you ever buy anything from Diebold?
DEADbold.
--
My summary of U.S. gov corruption [futurepower.org]. Where's your's?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
The voting fiasco happened because of a bad business decision. With the entire nation in an uproar over the botched 2000 elections, Diebold saw an opportunity to capitalize on everyone's c
Then What? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
If Diebold really wants to divest itself of this division, they have two options: 1) sell it to some other sucker, or 2) spin it off as a separate corporation.
1) is the most attractive option in most cases, since Diebold would get paid for the division. However, if they can't find a sucker with the cash needed, this option's out. As you pointed out, whoever buys this division could be se
Wait, wait..... (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure lack of profitability != bad product always, but I'm not sure how dumping their problem child is going to fix the problem now.
Article summary (Score:5, Funny)
According to quoted experts, Diebold might dump its poorly-rated electronic voting division. Or it might not.
Lucky for us they did! (Score:3, Interesting)
company image? (Score:3, Funny)
they should take a vote on the matter (Score:3, Funny)
They did what they needed to do (Score:4, Interesting)
Diebold should have been able to make an e-voting system. NO bank would accept the "really, really, it works" hand waving from Diebold with regards to the e-voting. All ATM machines, teller machines, and machines that handle monetary transactions somewhere along the line, produce at least one verifiable paper record of credit and debit for each party in the transaction and agents involved. To do less with voting seems completely absurd. For Diebold to even suggest a system without proper accountability makes absolutely no sense what so ever. They really do understand security and record keeping, what the hell happened with e-voting? As a corporation, e-voting should have been a slam dunk for them.
Ineptitude at such a large corporation is not unheard of, but surely someone would have said something, right? When the president of Diebold said he would do what ever he could to make sure G.W. Bush gets re-elected, it was an event that colored my "benefit of the doubt" stance on Diebold.
I honestly believe that G.W. Bush and company helped fix the election and Diebold was just one of the methods. It only takes slight tampering to sway a consensus or another. When the polling authority in ohio opened ballot boxes to "pre-screen" the supposedly "random" selection in order to avoid a full recount, one has to wonder. In 2000 it was Florida, in 2004 it was Ohio, regardless the outcome is the same.
I think in the U.S.A. we have to ensure our own democracy before we try to bring democracy elsewhere by force.
Just my $0.02
P.S. This is not a flame post, just the words of a sad and disillusioned patriotic American.
Don't Party Yet... (Score:5, Interesting)
OT: Secure Tallying (Score:3, Interesting)
Any proposed method of verifying your electronic vote, whether it's a paper receipt, a bar code, or a website that you can check later on, is susceptible to being left out of the tally. So what if the website reports that it has correctly recorded your vote? You have no way of knowing whether your verified vote is counted in the official tally. Even if you see a vote exactly like yours in the official tally, it may or may not belong to you. With anonymous voting, several people might be looking at a single ballot, all thinking it was the one that they cast.
I'm trying to imagine a system where we can all have verified votes and make sure that they are affecting the official tally, but still maintain anonymity in the vote. Voting is basically a system where each voter can affect the outcome of the election by exactly one vote, for each office and issue. Perhaps a system where each voter adds encrypted strings of their vote to the official tally. Each voter can decrypt the official tally string and see that their vote has affect the tally. At the end of the election the last voter turns their decryption string to the officials, and the tallies are decrypted.
As you can tell, I'm not a mathematician nor a computer scientist. Please feel free to chime in and criticize or offer new ideas.
Rats Leaving the Sinking Ship (Score:5, Interesting)
Now, that it appears very likely that in 2008, Democrats will control both houses of congress and the presidency,I can understand why the folks at Diebold are worried about things like future investigations of their business. I really can believe it might make business sense for the Diebold management to dump their voting machines business at a loss-and let somebody else hold that hot potatoe. I would also expect some substantial managerial turnover is in order too.
Now, the problem is that Diebold is just the most visible of several corrupt companies here. I wouldn't forget about ES&S--which is another major player in the market-and which has similar problems.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally, I see no other purpose in the design of Diebold voting systems other than to facilitate fraud. Seriously, there just aren't any really good protections built into the whole device.
I have to say that quotes about attribution, malice, and incompetence come to mind. It is certainly true that the Diebold system is horribly insecure. On the other hand, it also bears a lot of the hallmarks of something thrown together by a few incompetent engineers in a couple of weeks. I mean really, the central tabulator running on a half assed little Access database? The insecurity of that is simply down to Access and how painfully cobbled together the system is - the sort of thing a VB programmer woul
They could sell the division back to crooks (Score:4, Informative)
The criminal records of these people would make them ineligible to carry bedpans in Maryland nursing homes, but of course there are no criminal record checks for people who design and maintain voting machines.
The criminal backgrounds of Global's original founders gives reason to suspect that the widespread security vulnerabilities of the machines were not due to mere incompetence but might have been connected to some kind of nefarious scheme concocted by their criminal minds.
Accordingly, let me suggest that a proper purchaser for Diebold Election Systems might be some international criminal syndicate, for example the Russian Mafia, the drug cartels, or perhaps some criminal group fronting for terrorists. That would, in a sense, return the machines to people with the backgrounds of the founders of the original developer.
The Russian Mafia could make voting systems a subsidiary of their organization that reportedly is responsible for all the recent spam related to pump-and-dump penny stock schemes. They certainly have sophisticated computer capability behind those schemes. They could auction election victories just like they now reportedly auction cybercrime facilities and exploits.
Just some thoughts.
Get the facts straight (Score:5, Informative)
I know it's asking a lot from the
Diebold didn't make the voting machines, it purchased the company that did: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diebold_Election_Sys
For those too lazy to click the link:
"Diebold Election Systems is currently run by Bob Urosevich [1] who has worked in the election systems industry since 1976. In 1979, Mr. Urosevich founded American Information Systems. He served as the President of AIS now known as Election Systems & Software, Inc. (ES&S) from 1979 through 1992. Bob's brother, Todd Urosevich, is Vice President, Aftermarket Sales with ES&S, DES's chief competitor. In 1995, Bob Urosevich started I-Mark Systems, whose product was a touch screen voting system utilizing a smart card and biometric encryption authorization technology. Global Election Systems, Inc. (GES) acquired I-Mark in 1997, and on July 31, 2000 Mr. Urosevich was promoted from Vice President of Sales and Marketing and New Business Development to President and Chief Operating Officer. On January 22, 2002, Diebold announced the acquisition of GES, then a manufacturer and supplier of electronic voting terminals and solutions. The total purchase price, in stock and cash, was $24.7 million. Global Election Systems subsequently changed its name to Diebold Election Systems, Inc."
Diebold is actually well-respected and admired in this area. Diebold election systems are based in Texas whereas the financial systems are here in NE Ohio. I interviewed there for an SE position a couple of years ago, toured their ATM lab, and spent some quality time with some of their software engineers. They seemed to have a very competent operation and I enjoyed the interview. (I ended up taking a different job with another large international corp for other $elfi$h reason$ (I have a family to feed)) I heard the same moaning from the employees I met that I hear from family members who work there - something similar to "those stupid voting machines make us look bad." I have yet to meet an employee, management or otherwise, who has anything good to say about the elections systems division.
Wally O'Dell is largely (if not solely) responsible for the elections systems debacle. It's no secret that he lead the company right into this political mess at the expense of the company's and his own reputations.
Don't torpedo the whole company just because the former CEO bungled a bad deal with a flawed political agenda. It'll eventually work out in the wash, then you can cast aspersions on a new company TBA.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Uh, if they're purchasing a company, they then take on that company's responsibilities until they divest themselves of it - which is what they're attempting to do now.
Diebold themselves sell (I believe) more ATMs than any othe
Does this mean e-voting goes away in general? (Score:3, Interesting)
I say we should wait until computer security really is nailed down. Not just because Symantec or other vendors say we're secure, but because it's actually so. Listening to security vendors do presentations at work to the executives is a painful exercise. The common theme is "buy this box, and you're 100% secure from these threats." I think it's going to take a lot of convincing (and a few examples) to change people's thoughts on this.
Brazil elections... (Score:5, Interesting)
Of course there are some issues to be sorted, but overall it was a huge improvement over the old paper-based system.
So, why did Brazil succeed where the USA failed?
Re:In other news.... (Score:4, Interesting)
As my dad said, don't stake your reputation on something if you can't seem to get the hang of it; he was talking about sports, but it applies here as well. Diebold can't do this well; they should stop doing it and concentrate on their core business.
That, and Diebold has already accomplished what it's CEO promised to do - deliver the Presidency to the Republicans.
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Re:In other news.... (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:In other news.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's the thing that bothers me about this, though: EVERYONE should be upset when someone says something like that. His statement should be read as, "I will use the Republican party to tear down democracy." Republicans should take that as a slap in the face, and should be MORE outraged than Democrats! This isn't an us-vs-them issue. If ANY party gains control over voting, EVERYONE loses. Don't imagine for a second that such a change would benefit the core values of the Republicans. As soon as entrenched politicians have no one to answer to, and no means of removal, they will serve their own needs (desires) alone. This has been demonstrated by members of every political organization (regardless of their views) that has ever been given the opportunity to go bad.
This is not a partisan issue. This is one man making statements that are darned close to treasonous and certainly a smear on the reputation of any party that accepts his support thereafter.
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Re:In other news.... (Score:5, Interesting)
Here's the thing that bothers me about this, though: EVERYONE should be upset when someone says something like that. His statement should be read as, "I will use the Republican party to tear down democracy." Republicans should take that as a slap in the face, and should be MORE outraged than Democrats!
Pot/Kettle
As an ofttimes Republican voter I was:
* Upset when a thorough study of the 2000 Florida results (by mostly liberal mainstream media) concluded that Bush had indeed won the state, but long after that history has been re-written to only focus on headlines from 24 hours after the election.
* Upset that a paper ballot system, with known, but fixable flaws, was thrown out not only in Florida but in other voting districts all over the country, even in cases (such as my last two voting districts) where the paper based systems did not share the "hanging chads" issue and had never had any known problems concerning fraud or miscounts.
* Upset that perfectly valid systems all over the country were scrapped in favor of retrofitted WINDOWS laptops and Windows touchscreen devices with only marginally tested software.
* Upset that in the 2004 election cycle, Democrats AGAIN cried foul in districts where lazy, incompetent election officials spent taxpayers money hand over fist too buy this junky hardware and software rather than do realistic requirements analysis, and particularly upset that while these changes took place (pre 2004) these same left wing complainers said NOTHING, waiting instead for the results that they didn't like.
or but that wasn't enough,
* Post 2004 I engaged in numerous debates with individuals who swore they were not complaining about the 2004 results, but were indeed interested in the issue. Again, these people grew silent as distance from the 2004 election increased. As I would bring up newly discovered issues with this Windoze based software (and hardware) they would thank me politely for reminding them and then go right back to Bush bashing, continuing to ignore the very REAL bipartisan problems that were being ignored by the mainstream media.
* While you say the results of 2006 were "overwhelming", in fact in many local elections the margin of victory, particularly for newly elected democrats were a dozen votes, and for state level offices a few hundred. Almost NONE of these votes were contested, even in cases where the Republican candidate had only to request a recount.
Did these Republican candidates even get a "good sportsmanship" pat on the back from the press? Saving the taxpayers millions of dollars in recount costs, in fact got them nothing except continued insults from people like you.
Your right, we should all be outraged (and I am) by slipshod voting practices, whether the cause is corruption or incompetence (and very little is being done at the election-official level about incompetence), how many of them can you name who have been "fired"?
We should also stop accepting the fact that other types of voting corruption has gone on for years in largely Democratic districts. It seems to be widely accepted, even among Democrats that this corruption goes on, but where is the outcry? As your post indicates (not intentionally I'm sure) many Democrats are of the "ends justifies the means" school of thinking and simply don't consider an election invalid if their candidate wins. Of course there are Republicans who fall into this category too, but silence from the left is deafening.
The results of this, which will serve us (you) lazy citizens right, will be another ma
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Re:I hope they do.. (Score:5, Interesting)
Very different problem. There are fewer ATM's and banks pay a lot more for them. The are put in place once and generally not moved. They are serviced by trained technicians rather than volunteers. The technology is much more mature. And banks are more concerned with security than the average politician / bureaucrat who's simply looking for the lowest bidder.
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Re:I hope they do.. (Score:5, Insightful)
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To add to that (Score:3, Insightful)
Voting Machine: End user is not to receive a paper receipt, mainly on the basis that doing so could further vote-buying/pressuring/forcing/etc (i.e. a given group threatening dire consequences if voted Y doesn't come out with a slip saying he/she voted for "X")
Re:I hope they do.. (Score:4, Informative)
1. The secure transaction networks NOT created by Diebold;
2. The visual and electronic security monitoring every ATM is subject to;
3. Receipts;
4. Government-mandated standards and auditing.
Any other questions?
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Re:I hope they do.. (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:thats interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
I think they're taking the Democratic lead and will just appeal to the dead vote. You know, an FDR-esque "brains in every pot!"
On topic, they're probably right to do this. In my home state of Pennsylvania it is literally illegal for the touch-screen machine to produce a paper receipt so a black-box solution like what Diebold provides will always be open to criticism and question. They could provide a 100% fraud-free election and the loser will still complain. In my humble opinion the best solution is a touch-screen front end with a paper ballot printout that is then available for vote count verification. Run the count electronically, sure, but randomly verify counts of a few precincts and if anything is off you know you have to audit the whole thing. If somebody challenges the results you have a paper trail that was REVIEWED by the voter themselves before being placed in the ballot box.
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Re:thats interesting (Score:5, Informative)
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Re:thats interesting (Score:5, Insightful)
And for good reason: the only thing worse than not having a receipt is having one you can take with you. The machine needs to be
I prefer the optech systems where you just mark up a very unambiguous physical ballot and place it in a reader. Like anything else, those can be gamed too, but at least the ballots are there as a final authority.
My guess is that Diebold's exit will simply hand the company off to a buyer who will continue to run it in the same unaccountable way, but during the interim uncertainty, Sequoia, ES&S, and Optech will make sales. Also, keep in mind that ES&S has had more than its fair share of scandals as well.
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Re: (Score:3, Funny)
"Bingo!"
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
After all, what's more important, voting or money?
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
But, but, but, I though money = votes.
Was that a trick question?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That fear is justified, I won't use my bank's ATMs because they're made by Diebold. Given all the horrendous security gaffs Diebold has made over their voting machines (like having a picture of the key that opens them up on their website) I'm not comfortable using my debit card in anything
...probably not (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously, you can't make money on something which is (a) an expense which cannot garner any revenue and (b) which is used extremely infrequently.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
There will never be truly "secure" electronic voting without a complete rework of every aspect of the process and even then it probably would never be truly secure.
Someone's been abusing mod priveledge (Score:3, Insightful)
Even worse, many electronic machines don't produce a paper record that can be recounted when equipment malfunctions - an omission that practically invites malicious tampering. "Every board of election has staff members with the technological ability to fix an election," Ion Sancho, an election supervisor in Leon County, Florida, told me. "Even one corrupt staffer can throw an election. Without paper records, it could happen under my nose and there is no way I'd ever find out about it. With a few key people in the right places, it would be possible to throw a presidential election."
Just because it's a conspiracy theory, dosen't mean it's flamebait.
-GiH
Re:Good. (Score:5, Funny)
Tell me more about failed a Turing test?
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