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Maryland Votes To Ban Diebold Voting Machines

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the now-maybe-they'll-have-real-votes dept.

vandon writes "Computerworld.com reports: 'The state Maryland House of Delegates this week voted 137-0 to approve a bill prohibiting election officials from using AccuVote-TSx touch-screen systems in 2006 primary and general elections. The legislation calls for the state to lease paper-based optical-scan systems for this year's votes. State Delegate Anne Healey estimated the leasing cost at $12.5 million to $16 million for the two elections.'"

8 of 240 comments (clear)

  1. The old fashioned ways are still the best by InsaneProcessor · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I'm a technology snob and love the newest and greatest stuff but....
    There are places where technology does not belong and the old fashioned paper trail is still the best. I do not trust any voting system that the voter does not mark the paper. Anything else can be hacked or riged too easily.

    --

    Athiesm is a religion like not collecting stamps is a hobby.
  2. Re:Hope it doesn't rain.... by Daniel_Staal · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There is a bigger potential for covering up fraud with an electronic machine. If a paper ballot is tampered with (or gets rained on, or something else happens to it) it is noticable. The paper will show some sign. With an electronic ballot, you can tamper with the ballots and leave no sign.

    It's not that we need the ballots to be impossible to tamper with. It is that we need to know when they have been tampered with.

    --
    'Sensible' is a curse word.
  3. Taking it on the chin by Billosaur · · Score: 5, Insightful
    The state House of Delegates this week voted 137-0 to approve a bill prohibiting election officials from using AccuVote-TSx touch-screen systems in 2006 primary and general elections.

    137 to 0 -- ouch!!

    Diebold has gotten itself into a quagmire and they don't seem to be able to pull themselves out. How hard was it to add a paper trail to the machines to start with?

    And yes, there's plenty of fraud with paper ballots and mechanical voting machines. But the idea is that electronic voting machines are supposed to be superior to those systems, and without a paper trail to verify that votes have been recorded properly, they're reduced to being no better and actualy, given their hackability, worse.

    --
    GetOuttaMySpace - The Anti-Social Network
  4. Re:Thank God by JavaSavant · · Score: 5, Insightful
    I don't think that's the complaint. The complaint is that as a voter, if I don't have a piece of paper that I can look at and say "why yes, that's my vote" then as far as I know my vote is just lingering in the ether, vulnerable to hacking and misrepresentation. Auditability on the software side is good, and I think your idea is a good one to regulate what happens with all of the votes after I accept my choices - but people still want to be able to see that what they touched on the screen is what ends up ultimately as their vote.

    FURTHERMORE, I'm a strong believer that touch screen systems should only exist to produce a filled out, printed ballot that is then processed by conventional means. The goal here should be to increase the accuracy of the vote, not the speed. Government can wait - I'd rather have it done right than done fast.

  5. Re:Hope it doesn't rain.... by ShibaInu · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I think groupthink in this case is exactly the point - the voters don't want Diebold machines counting their votes. Diebold has taken virtually no action to reassure the public that everything is legit - they could release their source code, for example.

  6. It's a matter of the 'document of record' by TrogL · · Score: 5, Insightful

    With paper ballots (as in Canada's X on a slip), scannable hand-marked ballots, and paper receipts, the piece of paper is the legal document of record. With fully electronic voting, the electronic log is the document of record. Easily hacked.

  7. Re:Hope it doesn't rain.... by EvilEddie · · Score: 5, Insightful

    We are really advanced here in Canada....
    1. Paper
    2. Pencil

    Mark X on Paper.....

    No major screwups though......

  8. Re:Diebold is an enemy of the republic by Damvan · · Score: 5, Insightful

    And you missed the point 100%. A paper ballot does provide a mechanism to recount, and verify the votes. Sure, they couldn't verify that OldeTimeGeek voted one way or another, but they could count your vote again. With an entire electronic system, you get the results of the count by the electronic voting machines, and that is it. No recount, no way to verify that it counted the votes the way it should, nothing. This is the number (correct or not) end of story. At least with paper, there can be a checks and balances on the machines. Want to verify that a certain machine in a certain precinct was working correctly? Count the paper ballots. With all electronic, there is absolutely no way to verify that machine worked properly or not.