Diebold's Election Data Off-limits 497
tommcb writes "The State of Alaska Division of Elections has denied a request by the Alaska Democratic Party for the raw file format used to tabulate voting results by citing that the data is in a proprietary format that is owned by Diebold. The ADP says 'The official vote results from the last general election are riddled with discrepancies and impossible for the public to make sense of'. The article contains some good quotes from Jim March of Black Box Voting: 'Copies of these kinds of files have been sitting on the Internet for over two years, with Diebold's knowledge.'"
Re:Cananda (Score:2, Informative)
Why is that? In 2003 Diebold bought a Canadian company called Global Election Systems, the #1 supplier in Canada of electronic voting machines.
-Charles
Re:STOP TAKING BLACK BOX VOTING STORIES (Score:3, Informative)
Sorry, but the information in this case comes from the Alaska Daily News, not from Black Box Voting or Bev Harris.
Re:Cananda (Score:3, Informative)
Voting machines are not used in Canadian elections. If a Canadian company makes voting machines, it is benefitting from the foolishness of people elsewhere.
Re:Jim March and Gun Owners (Score:4, Informative)
MS-Access table layout (Score:4, Informative)
Diebold systems use Microsoft Access as the underlying file format for everything, including the audit logs. So it's not even that they're claiming the file format is theirs -- it obviously "belongs" to Microsoft -- they're claiming that the table layout they came up with for Access is theirs. Which could be interesting, given that if the state programmed the ballot layout themselves, it's possible that some of that table layout was generated by the Diebold program. So you've got one Diebold program generating a table layout for the MS-Access file format, and Diebold is claiming that generated table layout is theirs.
Brilliant!
-jdm
Re:Cananda (Score:3, Informative)
Well, not really. To begin with, the Conservatives only got a little over a third of the seats in Parliament, meaning that they will form a minority government. Furthermore, the Senate (which is not elected) is dominated by Liberals. So, yes, the Conservatives will form the government, but they will not be able to do whatever they like.
Moreover, the issues in the election were largely not aligned with left-right divisions. In fact, there wasn't an awful lot of disagreement on policy at all. What this election was really about was disenchantment with the Liberals, partly because they have been in power for a long time and partly because of a number of scandals. The election was anti-Liberal, not pro-Conservative. Indeed, although the Conservatives gained seats, there was also a dramatic increase in the number of seats held by the New Democratic Party, which is socialist, roughly the equivalent of the Labour Party in some other countries.
There are also major differences between the Conservatives and the US Republican party. For example, they have explicitly stated that they have no interest whatever in banning abortion. On same-sex marriage they have not taken a stance on the issue itself but merely say that they will allow a free vote (meaning that MPs are not obligated to vote with their party). Their platform included reducing the sales tax, which is arguably a progressive move since the sales tax is regressive. So, yes, they are to the right of the other major parties, but they aren't the Republicans, thank goodness.
Re:STOP TAKING BLACK BOX VOTING STORIES (Score:3, Informative)
Re:STOP TAKING BLACK BOX VOTING STORIES (Score:2, Informative)
The source of the information is irrelevant. Why don't you discuss it on its' own merits, instead of resorting to demonizing the messenger. This is a tactic taught in debate class -- something practiced by those that are more concerned with "winning" an argument than getting to the truth of a matter. Discounting some information out of hand because it came from someone or something that doesn't fall 100% in-line with your personal idealogy is both foolish and dangerous.
BTW, the source of the article was the Anchorage Daily News, not your beloved BBV. Get a grip.
Re:Computerized voting is a great idea (Score:3, Informative)
What exactly is the point of computerizing any step in the process, if you end up counting physical ballots?
Here [elections.ca] is a link to what a Canadian ballot looks like. You mark an X in the circle. We used these yesterday. They work.
You have ten times our population in the US, so that's a lot more ballots, but that means you also have ten times the willing volunteers to tabulate these things, no?
Re:Diebold nonsense (Score:4, Informative)
Diebold CEO swears Bush will win Election 2004 (Score:2, Informative)
And let's not forget that infamous quote from Walden O'Dell, chief executive of Diebold Inc., who swore that he was "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year." (http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0828-08.h tm [commondreams.org])
And just for the record-- you might wanna think about the election bru-ha-ha that happened in 2000 in California... a state conveniently governed by Bush's brother... coincidence??? Yeah, sure. Oh, and the margins were extremely slim there too.
So where's the evidence? Where's the smoking gun? Why aren't people crying out and taking to the streets? Well, it turns out THEY ARE! A quick google search for for "US Election Fraud" comes back with 17.9 Million entries. Another search for "us stole election 2004" turns up 9.2 Million entries. Yet another for "bush election fraud" turns up 11.9 Million entries. Admittedly these results are unscientific, and there is perhaps some overlap in the numbers, but every search with combinations of words like "Bush", "Stole", "Election", "US", and "2004" or "2000", and various permutations of these terms, comes up with literally millions and millions of results-- meaning a significant percentage of people in the US (and of course around the world) believe the US Elections were not fair and accurate. A similar check for with Clinton comes back with only a comparative handful of results. And very few people seem concerned with Nixon, Carter, or Reagan's election results-- only around a million or so have anything to say on that subject. And just for illustration purposes and to give us some counterpoint results, a google search for the word "vagina" turns up about 23 Million entries, so while it is clear that people are obviously more interested in vaginas than Bush, still they are ruminating about the liklihood of a fraudulant US election at least half as often. I'd say these are some startling results!
So, while this is definitely a somewhat tongue-in-cheek commentary about the subject of Diebold and election fraud, not to mention a clever way to work in the word "vagina" multiple times during my post... the subject of hijacking the US election is a very serious one and people need to demand that their elected officials do what's right (as if that ever happens) and get down to the truth of the elections. People are worried what the revelation of such a high, treasonous crime would do to the national outlook, economy, and to the rest of the world. However, I say that NOT looking into it, NOT telling the public the TRUTH, and NOT hanging everyone involved by the balls until blue would be an even GREATER INJUSTICE foisted upon the American people!
Yes its bad if the election's been compromised. Its worse if people know and nothing happens.
Here are a lot of links to get you on your way... there are a lot of people concerned about Diebold, the elections, and whether or not George W Bush is the rightful president-- and they are concerned about it not ONCE, but TWICE!!!
The Wikipedia Entry on the STOLEN US Election:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2004_U.S._Election_co ntroversies_and_irregularities [wikipedia.org]
A goog search on the subject: http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=2004+election +voting+machine&btnG=Google+Search [google.com]
Some selected sites (I have no affiliation):
Hearings on Ohio Voting P
Re:Computerized voting is a great idea (Score:3, Informative)
Simple. You let the computers count the ballots as well. You spot-count a small percentage of them, and if there's a discrepency you hand-count them all. You can also hand count them if there's a contested vote somewhere, or just for grins.
Here is a link to what a Canadian ballot looks like. You mark an X in the circle. We used these yesterday. They work.
Most large USA elections have many, many issues on the ballot. That makes the ballot itself much more complicated.
You have ten times our population in the US, so that's a lot more ballots, but that means you also have ten times the willing volunteers to tabulate these things, no?
Sadly not, but that's unfortunately beside the point here.
Re:Cananda (Score:3, Informative)
Wikipedia - Electronic voting in Canada [wikipedia.org]
I have a blog with more info at blog.papervotecanada.ca [papervotecanada.ca]
Re:What is so proprietary (Score:1, Informative)
Website: blackboxvoting.org (Score:1, Informative)
Canadian elections (Score:5, Informative)
Well, because Canada is smart enough to not actually use Diebold's crappy Windows-based technology. We just completed a federal election yesterday that went pretty much without a hitch. All federal electoral districts in Canada use one, identical system: A paper ballot. The format of all ballots across the nation is identical--the only difference being the names. The names are always in alphabetical order of the candidate's last name, with the full party name printed underneath, in slightly smaller print. Beside each name is a large circle, clearly associated with one of the candidates.
The process of voting in Canada is simple, and identical across the country for federal elections, and pretty much the same for provincial elections as well. You receive a voter registration card in the mail telling you where to vote, and if you are not registered you phone a well advertised 1-800 number to find the location of your poll (you can register any time up to and including voting day). You go to your poliing station and a scrutineer finds and crosses off your name on the official printed copy of the registration (or collects and signs your registration form if you just registered). You are then handed a folded ballot (all ballots in the entire country are even folded the same) and are directed to the voting booth. You then select the candidate by drawing an X in the correct circle using an HB pencil, fold your ballot back up and return it to the scrutineer. The scrutineer removes the perforated section, hands it back and you put it in the ballot box.
It's been like that for decades, and it has always worked perfectly fine. There are no "pregnant chads", no confusing ballot formats, no clunky Windows-PCs-as-voting-machines and no political controversy around the process. We have to improve maintenance of our permanent electors registry, but that is already nearly up to snuff by now, and has never been as bad as the US.
As for electronic voting machines, the company you mentioned only supplies those to MUNICIPAL elections. Furthermore, they are specialised elctronic tabulators, not glorified PCs. You still record your vote on a paper ballot--it is just machine readable now (you connect the broken line next to a candidate). The tabulators count up the official results, however if a judicial recount is ordered in a very close race, it is conducted manually.
If I encounter a Diebold PC in a municipal election I'll be quite disappointed. Since what most cities do ain't broken, I doubt they'll "fix" things in future elections with Diebold's flashy goods.
Re:big numbers? (Score:3, Informative)
The flight surface control system on a 767 isn't the same one which runs the in-flight entertainment. It is a specifically designed mathematical logic system which does what it's told, when it's told, and nothing more. Should part of it fail, a seperate system detects that part of it failed and routes the control through another system. If all else fails, there's another system which basically exists to hard-wire the controls into their respective control surfaces regardless of any other computer saying that the plane should be climbing/descending/turning/bursting into flames.
Diebold uses Microsoft Access, which despite being a reasonably powerful database also happens to implement a general purpose execution system into it and run on general purpose hardware.
The two are simply not the same.
Re:Which is why (Score:1, Informative)
Someone should mod you up.
Re:I used a pencil (Score:2, Informative)
The Scrutineers are permitted to oversee everything except the actual marking of the ballots (except in one exceptional case). Scrutineers are not permitted to physically touch ballots. If one falls on the floor during counting (which did happen with me), the Scrutineer alerts the Deputy Returning Officer of the fact, points out the ballot but does not touch it.
The one exceptional case where a Scrutineer may witness a ballot being marked is when a voter requests assistance from a poll worker. At that point the poll worker assists the voter and the Scrutineers witness to ensure that the poll worker is not coaching or influencing the voter.
Poll workers and Scrutineers are sworn in at each polling station, swearing to follow the rules and to not ever divulge any information about how a particular voter voted. The penalties are pretty hefty as I recall.
Cheers,
DrLlama.
I am so disappointed with this country... (Score:5, Informative)
Thirty years ago I would have assumed that if there was the slightest hint of election fixing that ALL election officials would tear into it with abandon, and that the people would similarly tear into any official that even suggestion that it was a bad idea to look into election results.
These days I have the same confidence in our system that I have in any south-American, African or Russian system, essentially none. That said, all you ever hear from the populous is the occasional reference to "wingnuts" and liberal media trying to jack the existing government.
Perhaps I'm mostly disturbed with my own inaction. Anyone have suggestions on things I can do that really work? Voting does NOT (No matter what you have been trained to believe), talking to representatives does NOT (unless you can outbid the lobbyists whispering in their other ear--I can't). I've just given up...
Any suggestions at all?
(PS. How did Diabold get away having a name that spell-checks to Diabolism? It's like they are throwing it in our faces!!!)
Re:big numbers? (Score:3, Informative)
Could be. But what's your point? That the Diebold electronic voting system in particular is crappy software and should not trusted? Or that electronic voting itself is a disaster waiting to happen, something we are just not smart enough as a species to implement securely?
I could have missed something, but I don't think anyone is claiming that it can't be implemented. And it's not just Diebold, Sequoia Systems has had some major problems as well. When a voting machine turns in negative numbers, that's a problem.
The voting machine manufacturers have their own little consortium and hired that ITAA mouthpiece Harris Miller to spread confusion to the news media (his great talent). The companies have fought as hard as they can to eliminate any paper trail that could be used to check the numbers reported by their systems. And no, I don't think they are trying to rig an election, they just don't want anyone to be able to prove their machines can return faulty numbers (which they have been shown to do). Links to all this stuff should be available from blackboxvoting.org (or google on "volusia county voting"). I've provided links many times in the past, and it doesn't seem to help - we just get the same discussion over and over. Electronic voting without a verifiable recount (not requerry) capability is a disaster waiting to happen.
Diebold (Score:2, Informative)
Re:What is so proprietary (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Diebold nonsense (Score:2, Informative)
Finally, note that despite all the spin on both sides, most of our Conservative party resembles your Democratic Party far, far more than your Republican Party. (They have the odd nut, but so do the Democrats
But I think that all Canadians can agree that our voting process is far superior to yours
I live in Alaska (Score:4, Informative)
While I agree our state Division of Elections (and their vendor) needs to do a better job of breaking down individual district results, there is not a problem of "no paper trail" here in Alaska. The Diebold machines used for many years here (including 2004) are not the touch screen "pure electronic" machines, but rather fill-in-the-blank bubble cards that are then scanned into an optical reader. The paper cards are then randomly spot-checked to the results the optical scanners provide. I have complete faith in the machines and I've voted on them since ~2000.
If the format is proprietary (Score:2, Informative)
Hell, I'd be happy if we got a tab delimited text file.
All we care about is the information. I don't give a damn what form it's in. Diebold's proprietary format can go screw itself, I'm not interested. This is just an untenable excuse, and it screams coverup on every band.