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Hardly Anyone Cares About Computer Voting Problems
Avidwriter writes "It's a sad thought that Roblimo explores in a NewsForge article about computer voting fraud and how you'd think all honest politicians would be working to make sure computerized voting systems are open source, and why open source wouldn't hurt well-run voting machine companies' profits. Not that most people care, since they don't even bother to vote, right?"
[In Australia there is compulsary voting,] even if you vote "abstain", or you get a small fine (unless you CAN'T be there, ie are hospitalized)
Yes, voting is compulsary, but thanks to protection of privacy there is no way for them to know whether you actually voted or no. You just have to turn up, and place a ballot paper - it can theoretically be blank, and for some people often is. But everyone turns out, and it is a much better system. We actually get a reasonable representation of the opinion of the people.
But with response to the article:
Yes! There is a need in the US for a better voter turnout, and if machines are in use it needs to be difficult to be forge or modify votes. Go me, master of the blindingly obvious!
"But everyone should know everything." -markab
Yes. That is true. You either
1. Go to jail for short stay
or
2. Pay a fine
Most people go for the fine. I don't think it matters, since like in the US, its two major parties, neither of which do anything new.
In my small district, its lifetime liberal voters, so if you vote anything but liberal your vote is wasted. So if i say i want to vote for the Democrats, they will recieve no benefit, due to the entire district only counting to one party.
There was an idea to become a republic, but the man in power gave us a non-direct election model, which would result in the same people being elected, and was thusly turned down in the referendum.
To be completely accurate, in Australia we have mandatory attendance at a place of voting. All that you have to do to avoid the fine is appear at the polling booth, get your name crossed off, and leave. There is nothing forcing you to cast a vote as such.
David Dill is rasing the alarm about voter verification. Granted he's not part of the gummint, but he's asking the right questions.
"iRights" - Voting Machine Analysed, Found Wanting.
From the linked site:
From the conclusion of the paper, Analysis of an Electronic Voting System, emphasis mine:
And finally, the text of the Voter-Verifiable newsletter I received regarding this issue, which should appear on this page sometime (July 24, 2003):
The Condorcet method of voting requires that each voter rank the candidates from best to worst. It's generally a good system, but has been criticised for being hard to understand (maybe not for those of us on /., but for the stupid voters). Another interesting voting method is range voting, which assigns a number value to each candidate based on that candidate's desirability.
Rated voting, which is a special case of range voting, was generally the best method (i.e., it maximised voter happiness) in a test of various voting systems. Also see ElectionMethods.org.
An improved voting system would certainly make lots of things better (though due to Arrow's paradox, a perfect system is impossible). I think we also need to improve the voters. The most heard criticism of Condorcet's method is that it's hard to understand, and it's really not all that complex at all.
The company I worked for did all of the original design assembly of the PCB boards.
Everything is done on paper (on those models, I hear they have other electronic only models). So it is completely auditable via a recount. The Federal Election Commision certifies the software and the hardware as fit for use. Once certified, no changes can take place without a re-certification, and justification for all changes made.
They use QNX as their base operating system, and use essentially fax based technology inside the system. They scan it using the fax scanner, using timing bars to tell where the bubbles are. They then read the black/white values using an A/D converter (at some point, they switched to infrared technology instead of fax technology). Each machine gets fed test sets of thousands of ballots ( I want to say over 100,000 ballots go thru the system during the final testing phase). Which the exception of a mis-feed, or jam (which has to be detected), there can't be any mistakes.
They are pretty serious about it. At one point I knew every guy who did the day to day coding on the systems. They are plenty trustworthy. Maybe not coding gods, but naferious evil plots just won't happen. Sorry, take your conspiracy theories and go home.
Oh, and no one in their right mind would want to read the code. For a variety of reasons. First it's boring as hell. Second, the rules make it nearly impossible to write interesting code. All function can have on and only one return. No function can be over 200 lines long. No matter how clear the function is, it can't be longer then 200 lines. Why 200, got me, but it's the rule. There are rules against using macros, and rules about function pointers, and rules about recursion, rules about how data structures have to be stored. Rules about lots of different things. Rules about election layouts. Rules about ballot layouts. All kinds of mind numbing rules.
Open sourcing them, or making them available under NDA for a third party audit, sure seems like a good idea. However, there are plenty of safety measures in place to assure that the right things go on.
Christ the machines run while being hit by a giant as static electricity gun. (Vandigraph generator, I believe it was called).
Kirby
I strongly reccommend that you read The Case of the Quake Cheats. It's a very good read :)
Uh...ballot papers already have serial numbers.
> you'd -still- have to be sure
that -all- the executables
were made from the final source,
using a compiler that's known not to contain any code that can generate unexpected code from the supplied input... okay, so we need an open source compiler...
but how do we know that the compiler was compiled using a compiler that doesn't inject malicious code that would mean that the compiler compromised the ballot software?
You might want to check out this classic ACM paper
So you look at the disassembled binary code, and verify that it does what the sourcecode says, right? But then you have to trust that the chips do what the manufacturer tells you they do. Maybe you should dismantle the chips and get them under an electron microscope, verify that the gates and pathways all work according to spec... but what if the electron microscope is rigged to misrepresent certain images?
The thing is, you can't be certain that the intentions of sourcecode will be executed faithfully, without returning to first principles (basically the laws of physics), unless you start trusting some of the layers. And once you start trusting layers - say, the hardware layer, the compiler - why not extend that trust further up the stack? So, why is sourcecode access so crucial to trust?
What's important is that there be some external, verifiable proof that the machine results reflect the intentions of the voters. That means a system where the machine prints off a physical ballot paper, the voter checks it accurately reflects their vote, and deposits it in a secure ballot box. That way an audit trail exists that means that you can physically count the votes and ensure that the results are what the computer said they were. Source access isn't necessary to ensure this, just as access to electron microscopy of the chip surface isn't required.
Throw in the fact that you can be a conscientious citizen, get yourself well informed on all the candidates and issues, and have your vote negated by some ninety-five year old lady who is voting for Al Gore because he wore the best tie... can you blame us for getting cynical?
so you voted bush then....
I honestly voted for Gore because I knew that bush would be nothing but daddy's puppet in the white house. Yes Clinton was an embarrasment to the country, but his not doing anything but chasing skirts at least delayed the snowballing of america by the damn ventyure capitolists and other scumbags we called "visionaries" back in the 90's.
but, bush is not doing anything good for this country. in fact he is hell bent to finish daddy's job while driving our rights and the people into the ground.
Jesus, that's not funny at all, what was the moderator smoking!
The post above this is exactly right, and I'll explain, using the US as an example. In the US there are 3 "branches of government" as set down in the constitution. There's the Executive Branch (President), the Legislative Branch (Congress) and the Judicial Branch. They each have duties, and the existance of the three brings balance (none of them can go overboard, because it's almost impossible to control all 3).
Now, the US constitution implies a fourth branch - the people. As a citizen of the US, you have a responsibility to ensure that the system is working, that the balance is preserved. The simplest method of discharging that responsibility is voting. If the citizen doesn't vote, then they are not discharging their responsibility, and thus the system starts to get unbalanced, and that is exactly what is happening at the moment.
This idea is at the root of the idea of "Democracy"
Incidentally, IANACOTUS (I Am Not A Citizen Of The US)
Rational thought is the only true freedom
No, before Iraq was liberated, Hussein held an "election", where turnout was supposedly 100%, and of course, he "won".
That was my point, high or low turnout by itself doesn't mean bad or good.