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U.S. Bars Lab From Testing E-Voting Machines
Posted by
kdawson
on Thu Jan 04, 2007 10:14 AM
from the watching-the-watchers dept.
from the watching-the-watchers dept.
joshdick writes to point out a NYTimes story on the decertification of Ciber Inc. from testing electronic voting systems. It will come as a surprise to no-one here on Slashdot that experts say the deficiencies of the laboratory suggest that crucial features like the vote-counting software and security against hacking may not have been thoroughly tested on many machines now in use. From the article: "A laboratory that has tested most of the nation's electronic voting systems has been temporarily barred from approving new machines after federal officials found that it was not following its quality-control procedures and could not document that it was conducting all the required tests... The federal Election Assistance Commission made this decision last summer, but the problem was not disclosed then... Ciber... says it is fixing its problems and expects to gain certification soon."
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Hacking Democracy anyone? (Score:3, Funny)
But why? (Score:5, Insightful)
And not just replaced, but REPLACED RIGHT NOW with very little public input and negligible testing. Whenever I see such a huge rush to change something that's worked remarkably well for generations I get suspicious. When I see such a huge rush to change something that's worked for generations without any meaningful dialogue about whether it really should be done, I get even more suspicious.
When I see that same huge rush to change something upon which our Democracy depends, and that's been open to public scrutiny and has worked well for generations and replace it with some closed-source stuff that's not been sufficiently tested and the CEO of the company who provides said closed-source, easily hacked systems is also a major contributor to one of the political parties and who GUARANTEES DELIVERING A VICTORY TO THAT PARTY, I simply assume that the whole thing is pretty goddam crooked.
Parent
Re:But why? (Score:4, Insightful)
It's never been explained, to my satisfaction, why the use of paper ballots (or at least paper TRAILS), had to be replaced with the computer-voting machines.
It's really very simple. Paper records (such as ballots) are the evidence that can be used to verify the results of an election, or to prove when election rigging has occurred. If you want to rig elections without getting caught, it is essential that there be no evidence. Hence, the paper had to be eliminated from the process.
The only people who oppose paper ballots are the ones who want to rig elections.
Parent
Re:But why? (Score:4, Insightful)
I consider paper ballots as where the person actually makes a mark with ink on a piece of paper, not some weird misconceived contraption where you punch holes in the paper with a poker. By that way of thinking even if the computer makes the actual mark you would still be calling it a paper ballot. Pen and paper, is it that inefficient that we are scrambling to get away from it?
Is it so hard to conceive of an imperfect world where people don't want to play by the rules, that election fraud is relegated to just another unfounded conspiracy theory in you mind?
I do think the motivations of some are very suspicious, but I think the motivations are probably more based on the desire to make money on voting equipment. That voting machines make election fraud easier and nearly undetectable maybe just a side benefit.
Oh and were those hanging chads really worse than a virtual electronic ballot? At least the malfunction in the system was detectable. In a computer, errors in programming or hardware, either intentional or not, would be somewhat abstracted from the final result. Personally, I would prefer that both I and the elected person know that there is some doubt as to the intentions of the electorate versus allowing a elected official to hold office without knowing that his or her election was the result of some funny business.
But yes, some people would rather live in a society without integrity where the conflicts and corruption is ignored for as long as possible. Short term peace at the expense of longer term integrity.
Parent
Re:But why? (Score:4, Insightful)
Is it so hard to realize that the paper ballots/trails are just as susceptible to election fraud as electronic ballots such that electronic voting is just another unfounded conspiracy theory in your mind?
Yes, it is. Election fraud is much harder to pull off when it involves someone actually putting pen to paper. Logistics are important to election fraud because it has to involve as few people as possible and be very uncomplicated to assure success. Pressing a few buttons on a computer and having a voting history destroyed or writing a program that simulates vote casting is much easier and importantly could involve fewer people than physically creating individual frauds of paper ballots.
Oh well then, let me update my rant:
"This circle is half colored in. Obviously the voter intended to vote for my candidate."
"No, it's not completely filled in. Therefore this ballot is in error and doesn't count."
"This guy voted for Pat Buchanan, obviously his vote is incorrect."
Yes, the form of paper ballots matter. In my town we do well enough with having to connect an arrow with a magic marker. No it is not perfect and mistakes in "interpretation" could be made during a recount even asking people to make a clear mark. But the important thing is that there are clearly defined criteria for counting a vote that the average person can meet within a human margin of error.
My point to all this is that I voted in a county that had mechanical voting machines for nearly 50 years. They didn't have a paper trail. The only thing that was updated was a mechanical counter inside the machine that kept the tallies. These machines were opened during the day to check the counts (at which point they could also be tampered with) and at the end of the day these counts were read off and phoned to the central office then the counts were reset.
That would be just as bad as any other virtual ballot system, but I doubt you are describing the story in full. I too have voted on the machines with the little switches and the big lever, but I recall that there was also a roll of paper where a mark was made for each vote cast, which could be recounted if needed. I have nothing against this method, or for that matter computer ballots, as long as there is a physical record of the actual vote. What was lacking in the machine you describe, was a way for the voter to verify that the vote was recorded the way he or she voted.
What's the difference between the mechanical and the evoting ones? Ultimately nothing. Ultimately you have to trust the people running the system because otherwise Democracy means nothing because you don't trust your fellow man to properly vote or check your vote. I realize that's difficult when Bush is trying to orchestrate a coup to overthrow Democracy, especially after all those Diebold machines gave the vote to Republicans in this last mid-term election. But hey, that's how it goes.
The point is that you have to trust most people in a Democracy to do the right thing, but you can't trust everyone. The system must be designed so that individual corruption does not so easily corrupt the whole system. Computer balloting, especially without a voter verified paper trail, threatens this principal. In the past sure you could have a vast conspiracy involving hundreds of people strategically positioned at polling places to gum up the works in your opponents territory... so that what it took was a fairly elaborate dirty tricks outfit to steal an election. Now you have 5 or 10 people that know a thing or two about computers and find some vulnerability in the system and hack the election in a wholesale way.
Oh and it also becomes much more believable when the election machines stop working in a particularly busy district and the long lines reduce turnout and votes never even get cast. Much harder to justify those long turnout reducing lines when all someone needs is a pen and a surface to write on.
Though e
Parent
Re:But why? (Score:5, Insightful)
Any voting system requires Universal Comprehensibility in order to be trustworthy. After all, how can you trust something that you cannot even understand? The use of Open Source Software is not enough: it restricts the set of people who can understand the system to competent programmers.
Elections should not depend upon any technology that is beyond the understanding of a school leaver with passing grades. Pencil, paper, slotted boxes, wire seals and hand-counting have been used successfully since democracy was first invented. Everybody can understand how they work -- and, just as crucially, all the potential failure modes.
What's more, using complex machinery doesn't change the failure modes, nor the need for vigilance. If the voting machines use a paper journal roll, someone still has to inspect each and every machine to make sure that the take-up spool is empty at the beginning of the election, and certify same by fitting a tamper-evident seal which prevents the machine from accepting votes. How is that any better than someone checking that each and every ballot box is empty, and sealing the slot with a tamper-evident seal?
Parent
Personal experience with Ciber (Score:5, Interesting)
The real question (Score:5, Insightful)
so its a problem of documentation (Score:5, Insightful)
WTF? (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:WTF? (Score:5, Interesting)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Now, in this case all that happens is the idiot who ones the machine is out a nice chunk of cash (especialy as he keeps on restocking it). If t
Title misleading (Score:4, Informative)
And the net real-world effect will be...? (Score:4, Insightful)
After all, we would not want to use untested electronic equipment in other crucial areas of life, like medical equipment. Why allow them to run/determine elections?
Bigger problem -- waterfall process (Score:3, Insightful)
Outsourcing certification makes no sense. (Score:5, Insightful)
But why outsource the certification of equipment? This is precisely the kind of task that a government bureaucracy is best suited for: you have a routine task that is done by established rules and procedures. It's hard to see how a private company could outperform a government agency at apply a set of standards with unforgiving rigidity. The problem with government processes is that even good people working in them (of which there are many) are hampered by the bureaucracy's rules and culture, which limit the scope of individual initiative and judgment. In this case it would be a good thing.
The hard thing in the whole process is creating the certification standards. Here there is considerable use for consultants from academia and business.
What this suggests to me is that there aren't really standards. It looks like they just took the whole mess and swept it under the rug, letting the vendors select a sham certification organization.
This is an abdication of an important responsibility the government has. Not just to ensure free and fair elections, but to make sure it spends our money responsibly.
even if they did test, it would be of minimal use (Score:3, Informative)
Misleading headline (Score:5, Informative)
Sheesh. Come on
Re:Misleading headline (Score:4, Insightful)
Parent
Smash them (Score:5, Insightful)
If the government and it's anointed tools aren't up to the job then it's the duty of the citizens to take care of the problem. It's why we have the right to bear arms. It's why Thomas Jefferson's memorial has such pithy inscriptions. We sadly, currently, live in exactly the situation the founding fathers foresaw.
If the only effective protest is the destruction of the tools of misrepresentation, and if people are willing to die for their freedom and to protect their country and their constitution there shouldn't be any problem. We should fight the threats at home before exporting our expertise to damage others abroad at the behest of corrupt industries. Our politicians have been funded/emplaced by the very companies who seek to profit the most from a muddled vote. If voting is our one sure way of getting a message across then it needs the same kind of protection that the Constitution requires. It requires and demands the right of the citizenry to implement deadly force to secure it's own voice.
With the long lines and the availability of floors and blunt objects in polling places it shouldn't take more than an hour after polling facilities open to accomplish the task nation-wide.
And to all those citizens who think this isn't the solution, please reply with one that's rooted in reality, and not some "hugs and tea" fascimilie of reality.
Cheers.