Slashdot Mirror

Gottesser writes with this excerpt from Bev Harris's Black Box Voting: "I have found and posted the actual voter list software used widely throughout the USA (TN, WI, PA, CO, KS...) for Accenture voter registration and voter histories. I located the files on a magnetic backup tape of the hard drive of a county elections IT employee, part of a 120-gig set of discovery files. The Accenture voter registration / voter history software is highly problematic, and has been reported switching voter parties in Colorado, and losing voter histories in Tennessee. Although it is now widely known that Accenture voter list software gets it wrong, just WHY the program misreports voter information so often has never been explained. I am hoping that by releasing this software to the public, it may shed light on what's really going on with our voter registration systems. I also posted a Tennessee file with work orders and release notes which shows the Accenture software has a history of tripling votes in certain ('random') voter histories, going back to 2004. Except it is not random: Other files I discovered prove it is with primarily suburban Republican precincts that votes are somehow being recorded twice and sometimes three times for certain voters in the voter history report, and this didn't just happen in 2004; it also happened in the 2008 presidential primary and in May and August 2010, and according to election commission notes in Shelby County, also in the 2012 presidential primary. Computer buffs, have at it. Much source code exists within the structure because it is built on MS Access. I do not read source code, though I can see some structural problems with the software (for example, it allows political party ID to be set differently from one precinct to another)."

Westech writes "Multiple indications of vote fraud are beginning to pop up regarding the New Hampshire primary elections. Roughly 80% of New Hampshire precincts use Diebold machines, while the remaining 20% are hand counted. A Black Box Voting contributor has compiled a chart of results from hand counted precincts vs. results from machine counted precincts. In machine counted precincts, Clinton beat Obama by almost 5%. In hand counted precincts, Obama beat Clinton by over 4%, which closely matches the scientific polls that were conducted leading up to the election. Another issue is the Republican results from Sutton precinct. The final results showed Ron Paul with 0 votes in Sutton. The next day a Ron Paul supporter came forward claiming that both she and several of her family members had voted for Ron Paul in Sutton. Black Box Voting reports that after being asked about the discrepancy Sutton officials decided that Ron Paul actually received 31 votes in Sutton, but they were left off of the tally sheet due to 'human error.'"

Westech writes "Multiple indications of vote fraud are beginning to pop up regarding the New Hampshire primary elections. Roughly 80% of New Hampshire precincts use Diebold machines, while the remaining 20% are hand counted. A Black Box Voting contributor has compiled a chart of results from hand counted precincts vs. results from machine counted precincts. In machine counted precincts, Clinton beat Obama by almost 5%. In hand counted precincts, Obama beat Clinton by over 4%, which closely matches the scientific polls that were conducted leading up to the election. Another issue is the Republican results from Sutton precinct. The final results showed Ron Paul with 0 votes in Sutton. The next day a Ron Paul supporter came forward claiming that both she and several of her family members had voted for Ron Paul in Sutton. Black Box Voting reports that after being asked about the discrepancy Sutton officials decided that Ron Paul actually received 31 votes in Sutton, but they were left off of the tally sheet due to 'human error.'"

mcgrew writes "PC world is reporting that Diebold's super-popular voting machines are coming under even more scrutiny. A security review has revealed that they are simply 'not secure enough to guarantee a trustworthy election.' This is according to a report from the University of California Berkley, who did a two-month top-to-bottom review of all California e-voting systems. That's a subject we've discussed before, but Diebold's setup is truly unsettling. An attacker with access to a single machine could disrupt or change the outcome of an entire election using viruses. From the article: 'The report warned that a paper trail of votes cast is not sufficient to guarantee the integrity of an election using the machines. "Malicious code might be able to subtly influence close elections, and it could disrupt elections by causing widespread equipment failure on election day," it said. The source-code review went on to warn that commercial antivirus scanners do not offer adequate protection for the voting machines. "They are not designed to detect virally propagating malicious code that targets voting equipment and voting software," it said.' Oddly, my state of Illinois, long known for election fraud, has paper trails (at least in my county) and according to Black Box Voting doesn't use Diebold anywhere."

H.R.811 sounds great: It's stated purpose is "to require a voter-verified permanent paper ballot." Unfortunately, it sounds like the details have some devils, as usual. From the Bev Harris article Is a flawed bill better than no bill?: "[T]he Holt Bill provides for a paper trail (toilet paper roll-style records affixed to DRE voting machines) in 2008, requires more durable ballots in 2010, and requires a complex set of audits. It also cements and further empowers a concentration of power over elections under the White House, gives explicit federal sanction to trade secrets in vote counting, mandates an expensive 'text conversion' device that does not yet exist which is not fully funded, and removes 'safe harbor' for states in a way that opens them up to unlimited, expensive, and destabilizing litigation." Update: 07/11 16:23 GMT by KD : Derek Slater writes "EFF's e-voting expert Matt Zimmerman recently published this article separating the myths about HR 811 from the facts, and countering many of the misleading and outright false claims being made about it."

Gottesser writes, "Bev Harris of Black Box Voting has asked for the help of the Slashdot community. She would like people to take a look at ES&S's central tabulator software and start reporting on their impressions of it. This is a past release of the software but it is similar to the applications in production. Sorry, no source code." Read on for Bev's request and pointers to the code repositories. Update 23:38 GMT by SM Bev has confirmed that blackbox1.org is indeed owned by BlackBoxVoting making both a comment in the discussion and a post on the front page of blackboxvoting.org to help assuage reader fear/doubt.

From Bev:

"ES&S 'Unity' central tabulator software.

Software stash: three zip files --
http://www.blackbox1.org/ems.zip
http://www.blackbox1.org/un5.zip
http://www.blackbox1.org/Unity.zip

User Manuals for ES&S software can be found here:
http://www.bbvforum s.org/forums/messages/2197/2864.html

This is the ES&S central tabulator software, the ES&S counterpart to the Diebold GEMS central tabulator software. No source code, sorry, and no software for the precinct machines. This is reportedly one generation back, but from what I'm told has significant similarities to the new stuff. I would appreciate it if you can provide me with feedback on your impressions after looking at it. You may want to Slashdot it or whatever.

Best,

Bev Harris
Founder
Black Box Voting

Gottesser writes, "Bev Harris of Black Box Voting has asked for the help of the Slashdot community. She would like people to take a look at ES&S's central tabulator software and start reporting on their impressions of it. This is a past release of the software but it is similar to the applications in production. Sorry, no source code." Read on for Bev's request and pointers to the code repositories. Update 23:38 GMT by SM Bev has confirmed that blackbox1.org is indeed owned by BlackBoxVoting making both a comment in the discussion and a post on the front page of blackboxvoting.org to help assuage reader fear/doubt.

From Bev:

"ES&S 'Unity' central tabulator software.

Software stash: three zip files --
http://www.blackbox1.org/ems.zip
http://www.blackbox1.org/un5.zip
http://www.blackbox1.org/Unity.zip

User Manuals for ES&S software can be found here:
http://www.bbvforum s.org/forums/messages/2197/2864.html

This is the ES&S central tabulator software, the ES&S counterpart to the Diebold GEMS central tabulator software. No source code, sorry, and no software for the precinct machines. This is reportedly one generation back, but from what I'm told has significant similarities to the new stuff. I would appreciate it if you can provide me with feedback on your impressions after looking at it. You may want to Slashdot it or whatever.

Best,

Bev Harris
Founder
Black Box Voting

boot1780 writes "Having 'successfully sued former Palm Beach County (FL) Supervisor of Elections Theresa LePore to get the audit records for the 2004 presidential election,' Black Box Voting reports that the 'internal logs of at least 40 Sequoia touch-screen voting machines reveal that votes were time and date-stamped as cast two weeks before the election, sometimes in the middle of the night.' Besides the date discrepancies, they claim to have discovered countless other errors and anomalies, including a case of one voting machine being 'powered down 128 times during the election'." Given the findings here, can we have a do-over?

Slashback tonight brings some corrections, clarifications, and updates to previous Slashdot stories, including Brin's defense of Google's recent actions in China, DoJ criticizes Microsoft's delay meeting antitrust regulations, Bush allies defend NSA domestic surveillance, Wisconsin rolls back open-source voting, a look back at Pixar, and Stardust samples exceed expectations -- Read on for details.

Brin defends Google's recent actions in China. An anonymous reader writes "Fortune Magazine recently had a chance to talk to Google co-founder Sergi Brin and asked him about the company's decision to accept censorship in China. As you might guess, Brin defended the move. From the article: 'The end result was that we weren't available to about 50 percent of the users. [...] We ultimately made a difficult decision, but we felt that by participating there, and making our services more available, even if not to the 100 percent that we ideally would like, that it will be better for Chinese Web users, because ultimately they would get more information, though not quite all of it.' Human Rights Watch boss Ken Roth, though, wasn't impressed and had a few scathing remarks about the decision."

DoJ criticizes Microsoft's delay in meeting antitrust regulations. Rob writes to tell us that the US Department of Justice is complaining that Microsoft is dragging their feet on certain antitrust technical documentation submission guidelines. From the article: "Microsoft acknowledged the current problems and the steps it is taking to correct them in a recent status report but "has not detailed the seriousness of the current situation," according to the DoJ."

Bush allies defend NSA domestic surveillance. Jason Jardine writes to tell us News.com is reporting that Bush's allies are coming out of the woodwork to support the recently criticized NSA domestic surveillance program. From the article: "In a continuation of a full-court press that began a day earlier, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales on Tuesday told students at Georgetown University that a wartime president has the lawful authority to eavesdrop on Americans' telephone calls and e-mail messages without court approval." Forgive me if I don't agree.

Wisconsin rolls back open-source voting. Irvu writes "One day after the good news that Wisconsin was requiring open-source electronic-voting software was reported on Slashdot, it was gutted. According to BloackboxVoting.org the open-source public review provisions of the bill were removed and replaced with a version requiring the state to escrow the code and, unless a recount occurs, provide only internal examination. The final form of the bill reads: 'Sec 5.905 "...Unless authorized under this section, the board shall withhold access to those software components from any person who requests access under s.19.35...' Meaning that public review is not required and should be, by default, refused. The Legislation History [PDF]reflects the change and points to the final crippled bill. [PDF]"

A look back at Pixar history. An anonymous reader writes "With all of the recent press coverage of Pixar getting bought out by Disney it seems only fitting to take a look back at Pixar history. LowEndMac.com has an interested retrospective writeup exploring the beginnings of Pixar back in the 1970's by Dick Shoup through to the current day."

Stardust samples exceed expectations. carpdeus writes "MSNBC is reporting that the recent opening of the Stardust sample in a clean room appears to be a great success. From the article: 'It exceeds all expectations,' said Donald Brownlee, Stardust's lead scientist from the University of Washington. 'It's a huge success,' he said in a university statement released Wednesday. 'We can see lots of impacts. There are big ones, there are small ones. The big ones you can see from 10 feet away,' Brownlee observed."

Philip K Dickhead writes "After numerous ethical lapses and much controversy, Diebold CEO, Wally O'Dell resigned to the applause of the markets. Diebold's price improved more than 5% today, as the story broke. Business Week is reporting that O'Dell is leaving for "personal reasons", although the news blog Raw Story cites board action on imminent securities fraud litigation, and legal challenges by states claiming fraudulent certification of Diebold voting machines. Latest vulnerability tests show an impossibly negligent attention to vote security and privacy." Not overly surprising, considering their recent childish antics in NC.

Doc Ruby writes "The California Secretary of State has invited Black Box Voting to hack away at some Diebold voting systems. The testing is set for Nov. 30, 2005. Evaluations conducted by Black Box Voting in San Joaquin, Marin, and Alameda counties (Calif.) reveal that a critical paper audit component is missing for all absentee and mail-in ballots, and also for recounts. (Black Box personnel were hired by the Libertarian Party to conduct inspections.)"

Doc Ruby writes "The California Secretary of State has invited Black Box Voting to hack away at some Diebold voting systems. The testing is set for Nov. 30, 2005. Evaluations conducted by Black Box Voting in San Joaquin, Marin, and Alameda counties (Calif.) reveal that a critical paper audit component is missing for all absentee and mail-in ballots, and also for recounts. (Black Box personnel were hired by the Libertarian Party to conduct inspections.)"