Wisconsin Requires Open Source, Verifiable Voting

AdamBLang writes "Previously covered on Slashdot, Wisconsin Governor Jim Doyle today signed legislation that "will require the software of touch-screen voting machines used in elections to be open-source. Municipalities that use electronic voting machines are responsible for providing to the public, on request, the code used." Madison's Capital Times reports "the bill requires that if a municipality uses an electronic voting system that consists of a voting machine, the machine must generate a complete paper ballot showing all votes cast by each elector that is visually verifiable by the elector before he or she leaves the machine.""

Comments

KISS

[grub]

[T]he machine must generate a complete paper ballot showing all votes cast by each elector that is visually verifiable by the elector before he or she leaves the machine.

And how do we know that the prinout matches whatever counter is incremented within the computer? Being open source makes it tamper-resistent, not tamper-proof. Would it not be easier to just use a paper ballot in the first place? Then any recount could be performed against the actual ballots cast, not as a spot check against computer (glitches|fraud).

Re:KISS

[Dutchmaan]

We can only move in the right direction.. This is a positive step to be sure, and as flaws in this system reveal themselves we will take further steps toward refining the process of preserving intergrity in the voting system.

The perfect democracy is a goal and can never really be perfectly attained... but it serves as a compass to keep us going in the right direction.

Re:KISS

[kfg]

. . .put your thumbprint in the corner . . .

No.

KFG

Re:KISS

[Rude Turnip]

To elaborate on kfg's comment..."No. I'd rather not give my employer or corrupt union leader a way of tracing my ballot back to me. I appreciate my status of being employed and only wish to have my bones broken due to a skiing accident."

Re:KISS

[HUADPE]

Agreed. One of the major tenets of democratic voting is the secret ballot. This is in and of itself a problem with electronic voting because the order of votes can be counted as well as the votes themselves. A determined individual can then match the order and time of votes to individuals as they signed in to the polling place. Non-secret ballots can allow for voter intimidation (will the new mayor fire people who voted against him?)

Re:KISS

[mooneyd]

That's exactly how it should be done. Use a touch screen to make your choices, it prints out a op-scannable ballot you can hold in your hand and verify. You then stick it in one of two slots: the scanner slot or the shredder slot. That action will either confirm or reject your vote inherantly. If you reject the ballot, you can go through it again on the touchscreen, otherwise you are done.

And the machines should be developed by national research labratory in a completely open and transparent way. The source code, design plans and manufacturing process would be completely auditable by the public. No corporate control of voting machines. No security through obscurity.

Re:KISS

[hazem]

The problem with a receipt is that it can then be used to make sure you voted a certain way.

corrupt boss: Joe, have fun voting, and be sure to bring back your receipt so I can know how you voted and decide if I'm going to fire you. Oh yeah, and if you don't have a receipt, I'll fire you.

Re:KISS

[sam1am]

As has been mentioned elsewhere; this is a bad idea, because you could be "persuaded" to share your receipt number with someone else, who could use it to verify you voted a certain way.

Guy sets up booth taking receipts that prove a vote for candidate A, you get $10.

Or more insidious, your boss tells you you need to vote for candidate A. In order to obtain your next paycheck, you must show your receipt that you voted for candidate A.

Once you leave the polling place, you should not be able to verify your vote to yourself or anyone else.

(Now, if you took that receipt and dropped it in the ballot box on the way out of the polling place, that's another story)

Re:KISS

[kernelpanicked]

------ Begin PHP Signed Text -----
ReceiptID 243524534523423454345234234
Voted For: Kodos
------ Begin PHP Signatre Block -----
(signature here)
------ End PHP Signatre Block -----
------ End PHP Signed Text -----

I think what you're looking for is 'PGP" signed, but hen again some folks will use php for damn near anything.

Re:KISS

[j. andrew rogers]

Something similar is done in Nevada, which is generally regarded as being clueful about preventing fraud in electronic machines thanks to many years of dealing with elaborate attempts at electronic gambling machine fraud. Much of the value of electronic voting machines are that they are inexpensive, fast, and theoretically less error-prone to manage compared to pre-printed paper ballots and other older methods.

While no voting system is fool-proof, the Nevada method is something like this: Electronic voting with a voter-verified paper receipt to ensure that what is on the paper is what was selected electronically by voter. The paper receipts are collected and a few percent of the total paper records are randomly and independently audited to verify the electronic records. The important thing that happens here is that the verification and authentication of the vote is distributed among multiple authorities, providing strong statistical evidence that an election was indeed counted as it was voted while providing no single point of failure or manipulation that is likely to go unnoticed. It also does not have the overhead of manually counting every single paper ballot.

This is actually a more robust voting protocol in many ways than the paper ballots it replaces. I do not know if Wisconsin is doing things precisely this way, but I imagine that they would use some variation of the Nevada protocol.

Re:KISS

[hackstraw]

I wish I was on a website with computer geeks.

"hanging chads"

Bullshit. Punchcards were first made in the early 1800's and then used more commonly by big computer companies like IBM in the late 1800's. They were not used after the late 70's because they sucked. I work with people that used punch cards to program computers. They never talk about "chads" they talk about things like getting cards out of order, dropping them on the ground and not being able to edit them once made. They don't talk about "chads", those are invented words for the 2000 election well after nobody used punchcards for over 20 years.

I've taken a number of standardized tests for over 20 years that have never, ever used punchcards or had hanging chads. They were all done with standard #2 pencils and a piece of paper that could scan them at remarkable speeds and accuracy. I'm sure somebody could counter with a time that one kid had his SAT score off by a point or two out of 1600 or the 2400 or whatever it is now, but AFAK they are beyond human accuracy, and never, ever have "chad" issues.

So, why all the talk and fuss about this stuff? Are elections routinely rigged? Is this the new terrorist plot? Are the scantron type ballots that I have used rigged or wrong? Are the mechanical vote counters rigged or wrong? Was the President of the United States chosen by popular ballot in 2000? Does it even matter?

The more this disinformation keeps us busy, it makes those who really matter in these matters more free to have more room to do whatever they want to do.

I don't believe its any more difficult to count nominal data accurately than it ever was. Its the people that do the counting that are always variable, and will always be.

Re:KISS

[mrhartwig]

From what I understand, the hanging chads were most likely the result of voter fraud by the election officials in charge.

Bullshit. While I happen to suspect that there was some fraud in the 2000 election (in Florida along with a bunch of other places) this sounds like nothing more than a Conspiracy Theory, knee-jerk, reaction.

We use the same ballot system here in my little corner of Missouri, and I assure you that it's very possible to leave a chad hanging, even with the "approved" punch device that's part of the voting station. No icepick required.

If you did use an icepick in the manner described in the parent, you couldn't do very many cards at once; there would be quite obvious damage around the hole, as the icepick would be significantly bigger than the chad hole. And the wrong shape (round vs. rectangular).

I don't remember if I'm making this up, but I believe our instructions include a step having you check to make sure all the chads have been totally punched out. If we do have such an instruction, I don't know if it was there before 2000. But I've always checked, instruction or not; it's not that complicated. :-)

Also to add an on-topic comment; Wisconsin's law is a great step, but I agree with other posters that a much better system would be to make the vote generation device separately from the vote counting device.

That's great, but

[LodCrappo]

unfortunately you will still have to vote for either a republican, a democrat, or someone who will lose.

Unfortunately,

[Sheetrock]

There's also a provision that the voting machines be made out of cheddar.

Uh oh! I see the next calamity approaching!

[mister_llah]

So instead of people who can't figure out how to punch the proper hole, now we'll have people pushing the wrong button, accidentely pushing the "Are you sure?" prompt's "OK" ....

Oh wait, whew, Wisconsin, not Florida...

This is amazing

[TubeSteak]

Municipalities that use electronic voting machines are responsible for providing to the public, on request, the code used.

This isn't like North Carolina requiring that the source be placed in escrow, they're actually requiring it be available to the public.

I can't wait to see what http://www.blackboxvoting.org/ has to say about this one.

It means they won't have to jump through fucking hoops just to test the machine (like in California)

Nonsense

[bheading]

It hardly matters if it is open source. Who will compile it before it is uploaded to the machine ? Who will check that the correct software is loaded ? Who will check the guy doing the checking ?

Automated vote counting of any kind - electronic or mechanical - makes fraud considerably easier, puts a mystery shroud around the counting process and as such is incompatible with democracy. In the UK we count all the votes in our elections within 12 hours including the odd recount. Why are Americans obsessed with diluting their democracy by using machines to do it ?

Re:Nonsense

[killmenow]

Why are Americans obsessed with diluting their democracy by using machines to do it ?

Shhh! It's easier to control the populace this way. Now shut up!

buried in the legalese

[revery]

the bill requires that if a municipality uses an electronic voting system that consists of a voting machine, the machine must generate a complete paper ballot showing all votes cast by each elector that is visually verifiable by the elector before he or she leaves the machine.

Of course buried in the legalese was the rest of the bill:

The vote-tallying software shall be closed source and shall be owned in whole by Diebold. As such, the printed ballot shown to elector may have no bearing on actual vote recorded. Names may be substituted based on (1) party of candidate (2) intelligence of choice (3) corruption in district (4) time of day (5) OR if you live in Palm Beach or Broward County, pure whimsy. Additionally, elector may be fined or audited based on vote case, or in extreme cases, placed on the National Do-Not-Fly list and scheduled for investigation by the Department of Homeland Security.

Federal Mandate Time

[Kefaa]

Can someone explain why we can standardize street signs and the amount of sugar allowed in school lunches but we cannot get a standardized election system?

After the 2000 election debacle, we had money thrown at the states to "fix the problem." So we ended up with 35 different solutions.

A simple federal mandate - the voter must be verifiable, their vote must be able to be able to be authenticated after they leave the booth, in the event of a recount and the system can be fully audited. Instead, we have systems with no paper trails, questionable vendor operations, and seemingly contradictory election results.

We can make millions of secure stock sales, bank transfers and on-line purchases daily, and we cannot get a vote counted and auditable? The people who produced these machines should be fired for stupidity and forced to return our money.