E-Voting FUBAR

[InfiniteNow]

If there really is nothing wrong with the current system, why is voter turnout so low? Can't only be a total non-interest in politics, it might have something to do with people not wanting to be inconvenienced.

Also, I know of several who are so frustrated by the lack of quality choices, so apathetic to choose since it's like picking the lesser of two evils, that the costs of time and energy required to vote seem to outweigh the potential benefits. There's a lot to it all, but certainly ease of the vote would increase the turnout.

 

How often do you write a full letter with pen and paper anymore since you can use email or call on your cellie?

 

I don't believe that there's "nothing wrong" with the current system.

Agreed. It's more than a belief though.

[TheFaithfulStone]

For the record, you can't vote using your social security number or anything like that, because voting the US is anonymous.

 

If e-voting machines were open source or government written (well, scratch that last one) I'd be much more trusting of them. As it is they are largely owned by Diebold, the president of which promised to deliver Ohio for Bush in 2004. And did.

 

Did he cheat at the computer? Probably not, but still - the fact that private companies own the method by which we vote and keep the "secrets" of how the voting e-machine works under lock and key is pretty disturbing. What happens if Diebold goes out of business? However many thousands of e-voting machines are now soon to be worthless hunks of plastic and metal.

 

The old mechanical voting machines were privately manufactured, sure, but if one broke down, it could be fixed by anybody with mechanical know how and a machine shop. If the Diebold machine breaks down, you've got to have the code.

 

And only one place has the code.

 

TFS

[Freddy]

For the record, you can't vote using your social security number or anything like that, because voting the US is anonymous.

 

If e-voting machines were open source or government written (well, scratch that last one) I'd be much more trusting of them. As it is they are largely owned by Diebold, the president of which promised to deliver Ohio for Bush in 2004. And did.

 

Did he cheat at the computer? Probably not, but still - the fact that private companies own the method by which we vote and keep the "secrets" of how the voting e-machine works under lock and key is pretty disturbing. What happens if Diebold goes out of business? However many thousands of e-voting machines are now soon to be worthless hunks of plastic and metal.

 

The old mechanical voting machines were privately manufactured, sure, but if one broke down, it could be fixed by anybody with mechanical know how and a machine shop. If the Diebold machine breaks down, you've got to have the code.

 

And only one place has the code.

 

TFS

 

That is the understatement of the millenium! At least with paper ballots there is a trail and voting fraud is limited. With software one can write a program which changes the votes throughout the system and with no ability to check the machines and their software we have to trust them. I do not think so!

[Turtle]

One SNAFU after another with the E-voting as the elections press near. I tried to Gargle up a link but the engine is clogged with adverts from the companies making and promoting the reliability of the accursed machines! ;)

[shouting]Stop the madness! Outlaw electronic voting now![/shouting];)

[C1ay]

Read 'em and weep:

 

Computer Voting Disks Likely Made For Testers

Former delegate gets purported Diebold code

Will The Next Election Be Hacked?

“Hotel Minibar” Keys Open Diebold Voting Machines

Hacking the Diebold AccuVote-TS Voting Machine

How to hardware hack a voting machine in 4 minutes.

Boot a Diebold from external flash memory.

Major Vulnerability Found in Diebold Election Machines

 

I could go on and on and on :evil: This is not the level of security I expect in the voting process.

[Cedars]

some snags today:

 

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15590530/

[Buffy]

And some people take direct action on the topic: Crazed Voter Murders Diebold Machine...

 

And some lovely action to try to obstruct complaints about it....

 

And Kos says they're dead...

 

Much action in Denver and other places to extend hours due to machine snafus...

 

More round up later...

 

Punditry in action,

Buffy

[Cedars]

A sheepish Gov. Mark Sanford was turned away from a South Carolina polling place

[Cedars]

Probably off topic but...

 

OK, assuming Friedman were to win, what would be his first act? "I'll probably light up a Cuban cigar with my traffic tickets,"

[Zythryn]

Have you really been to poor rural America? There are many people who live without access to a library, or to an internet cafe. And these are the people most likely to not have access to a computer.

 

Where do they go to vote? If they do go somewhere to vote, place 4 terminals (e.g. cheap computers) there with internet access.

 

I think that a physical paper ballot is less corruptable simply due to the numbers involved. It is nearly as easy to corrupt 1 million files as it is to corrupt 1, but to corrupt as many physical ballots is much more difficult.

 

Where I vote, the ballot is read by a machine. I am guessing here, but unless there is a recount, isn't that the numbers that are used? Can anyone clarify that?

If that is the case, it is as easy to electronically tamper with the vote now as it would be with e-voting.

 

Turtle, you mentioned something like "if it isn't broken, why fix it". I would argue it is, or at least it can be improved. If we can make it easier for people to vote, and more accurate, that is a win in my book.

 

Now, for my answer, the concept of e-voting is good (imo), but the execution of it this year is totally fubared.

 

The entire system needs to be reworked. The systems need to be under the direct control of no single company and there must be a paper trail. There should also be safegaurds that will not allow people access to the workings so swap chips or anything of that sort and an audit before and after the vote to insure no tampering.

 

I prefer internet voting for convenience and it removes the possibility of tampering at the polling site (the servers can be placed under tight security which is not possible in transit to,from and while at polling places).

[Zythryn]

The government should expedite any measure to increase voter participation. In fact, the people should insist on it.

 

I don't believe that there's "nothing wrong" with the current system.

 

Whole heartedly agree on both points.

I heard Arizona was either offering a 1 Million dollar 'lottery' prize to one lucky voter, or that the idea was on the ballot for the next election. Now that is a way to increase voter turnout:hyper:

[Turtle]

Where I vote, the ballot is read by a machine. I am guessing here, but unless there is a recount, isn't that the numbers that are used? Can anyone clarify that?

Yes, I can clarify. The paper ballots used by the voters which were originally run, have been saved, and they are run again through the machines. This is the case whether it's punch cards and a punch reading machine or a make-a-pen-mark ballot in optical reader machines.

If that is the case, it is as easy to electronically tamper with the vote now as it would be with e-voting.

The case is different with the afforementioned machines, at least for the quote "outdated" machines, because they are analog. More or less like your odometer.

 

Turtle, you mentioned something like "if it isn't broken, why fix it". I would argue it is, or at least it can be improved. If we can make it easier for people to vote, and more accurate, that is a win in my book.

In this regard I think the famous "hanging chads" episode in Florida will suffice as an example. Rather than say fix it with e-voting, the fix may be as simple as redesigning the puncher stylus and matrix overlay so no chads hang.

 

Now, for my answer, the concept of e-voting is good (imo), but the execution of it this year is totally fubared.

 

The entire system needs to be reworked. The systems need to be under the direct control of no single company and there must be a paper trail. There should also be safegaurds that will not allow people access to the workings so swap chips or anything of that sort and an audit before and after the vote to insure no tampering.

 

I prefer internet voting for convenience and it removes the possibility of tampering at the polling site (the servers can be placed under tight security which is not possible in transit to,from and while at polling places).

I don't deny the idealistic appeal of the scheme you outlay, however I would still contend there is a lot more security in the analog methods over the digitial and the expense of digital is unjustifiable on the 'not-broke-don't-fix' argument and :hihi: principle. (KISS: Keep It Simple Stupid)

[Cedars]

For the MN ballot we had a Senator, Govenor, and Attorney General (and others) to vote for in the election and we also had a state wide vote on how our gas tax is spent. The gas tax was a simple yes/no. A blank box on the ballot was supposed to count as a No vote for the gas tax ammendment. This is done by electonic scan of the paper ballot that is a circle filled in by the voter next to the candidate/yes/no spot. The ballots were easy to read in that it would have been difficult to fill in the circle for the wrong candidate.

 

Thursday evening the local paper published the results by voting site, for portions of three differenet counties so I tallied up some numbers. What I found was the race for the Senator position received the highest total votes in each of the three counties, whos portions were displayed in this paper.

 

In county #1 there were 20 less votes cast in the govenors race than in the senator race ( Sen. total 11,815 Gov. total 11,795)

In county #2 there were 159 less votes cast in the govenors race than in the senator race ( Sen. total 103, 771 Gov. total 103,612)

In county #3 there were 269 less votes cast in the govenors race than in the senator race (Sen. total 132,432 Gov. total 132,163)

 

Now I can accept these numbers as accurate, in that I know people in the past who have only voted for a pres and left the rest of the ballot uncompleted. And while I cannot see how someone could have goofed up this particular ballot, that doesnt mean it was impossible for someone to screw up and negate a particular vote. I also assume by the numbers and my interpretation of them, if a voter goofed up on one vote in the previous portion of the ballot, this would not negate the rest of the ballot, but I do not know this as an absolute.

 

Here is where the FUBAR aspect comes into play as I am interpreting the numbers. The FUBAR seems to come in with the yes/no portion of the ballot and I am going to assume for this post that it is when a box is left blank that there is issues (and they said on TV there have been some issues on blanks not being counted). In the newspaper, county #1 did not list each polling place vote on this one issue, only the total for yes or no, and I do not know why.

 

In county #1 there was the total of 11,815 votes cast in the senate race and for the gas tax, the total was 11,428

a difference of 387 votes on a question that technically was supposed to register as no if left blank.

 

In county #2 there was the total of 103, 771 votes cast in the senate race and for the gas tax, the total was 100,052

a difference of 3,719 votes on this question.

 

In county # 3 there was the total of 132,432 votes cast in the senate race and for the gas tax, the total was 127,629

a difference of 4,803.

 

One of the things I do not know, for example, if someone didnt know how to vote and didnt want to have their gas tax vote automatically assigned a no vote, they might have marked yes and no in an attempt to void this on their ballot, in an attempt to state that they do not want their vote counted either way. Another thing I saw was in county #1 less persons voted for Att. Gen than the gas tax vote, so it doesnt appear an earlier mistake negated the whole ballot, however, as I said, the numbers printed for county #1 on the gas tax did not list individual polling places numbers.

 

So I guess one lesson may be, with automatic scanners, a blank may not be counted as a No vote regardless of what you are being told by whatever voting authority is an absolute.