Ohio Opts to Put Touch Screen Voting on Hold

Dachannien writes "The AP reports that Ohio's Secretary of State Kenneth Blackwell is asking the Feds for an extension of the deadline for installing touch-screen voting machines at polling places for the 2004 election, citing numerous security concerns. The problems discovered in a review of 57 areas of concern include such gems as "software that permits votes to be counted more than once" and "unauthorized poll workers or others could gain access to hardware that could allow them to perform supervisory tasks, such as closing the polls.""

Comments

Re:Go Ohio!

[llefler]

There have been issues with paper votes too. Mis-counts, "lost" ballots, and a growing demand to have election tallies faster.

There is also no reason why such an important part of our political system can't move forward to newer technologies. When appropriate.

One thing I question is why use touch screen voting? What is wrong with this solution? Votes are cast on a piece of paper, just take a marker and fill in the appropriate bubble. Only one machine is required per location. So you have a fast count, and can always verify the acuracy by counting the paper ballots. And it's cost efficient too.

Now if only my state would clue in

[R2.0]

I live in the People's Republic of Maryland, and they are bulling ahead despite the fact that THEIR OWN STUDY said it was insecure.

Basic response: "We're confident that the problems will be fixed in time."

Keep in mind this is one of the only 2 states that have implemented UCITA. Why? "Virginia has implemented it, so we need to implement it to stay competitive."

The

[goombah99]

The score so far is:
california SOS requires verifiable voting
Louisiana SOS wants to replace all their ES&S machines, not sure with what yet.
Nevada SOS has called for a public forum to determine if the public wants verifiable voting, he doesn't think its essential for security but recognizes it may have value for public confidence.
New York Assembly passes bill requiring verified voting. Companion bill is awaiting a vote in the NY senate

Russ Holts bill is now up to 84 sponsors some republican. But it's stuck in a committee chaired by Rep Nye (Ohio--- AKA Diebold) so its unlikely to pass in advance of strong public support. On the bright side, the NY times is now covering this not as a technical issue but as a political issue: Krugman has two columns dedicated to it, and the candidate Kucinich put it on his congressional web site. So its moving into the mainstream at least. Hopefully it can not become tainted as partisan.

Also relevant:
NY City's Council (? not sure what they call it) passed a resolution calling for the senate to pass the bill and the Elections's manager supports it too. I should note that the population of NY City comparable in size to many small states so this is no small endorsement.

So the tide is slowly turning.

The GAO, and the Library of congress have both said the problems are formidable and FEC regulations are not yet up to date.

Marylands SIAC report is an interesting case. The govenor redacted about 80% of it so we dont know exactly what was said. We do know that the Elections officials said the problems are all fixed now, thank you. To which the response from Rubin, the John hopkins researcher that anaylsed the diebold code said: "If they are all fixed then you should release the report", and the Election official had to respond: "oh that would be giving a roadmap to how to break in". What the fuck is going on! are these people blind zealots or retards?