How to Hack the Vote and Steal the Election

divisionbyzero writes "Many people have asked for it so that the government will have to deal with it. So here it is: a guide to stealing an election that uses electronic voting machines written by Jon Stokes over at Arstechnica. From the article: "In all this time, I've yet to find a good way to convey to the non-technical public how well and truly screwed up we presently are, six years after the Florida recount. So now it's time to hit the panic button: In this article, I'm going to show you how to steal an election.""

Comments

In two easy steps ...

[SpooForBrains]

1. Make sure head of company that supplies voting machines is a vociferous supporter of your party
2. There is no step two ...

Re:Lack of ethics

[chrismcdirty]

I'd go as far to say that it is more ethical to distribute it. The information becomes widely known. Maybe someone will hack an election to make it very obviously hacked, thus forcing a re-vote with an honest, verifiable way to count votes.

Re:Lack of ethics

[BoomerSooner]

I just hope someone does it. MY PARTY!!! lol... the system is screwed.

When people give a shit more about some gays marrying in NJ than they do about genocide in Darfur, military and civilian deaths in Iraq & Afghanistan, and people dying in this country due to being priced out of receiving their necessary meds, we have become a country that has lost focus on things that *actually matter*.

That being said, I'm not optimistic anyone that's in my camp has the guts to steal an election, we'd rather give it away. Liberal media my ass... I wish!

Here's hoping

[dlc3007]

The best thing that can possibly happen for this country and secure elections would be for Buggs Bunny to win 100% of the vote in at least one, preferably multiple districts. Until people see these results come in on election night, they'll never believe that it can really happen.

too complicated

[truesaer]

That article was way too complicated for the "non-technical public." It was great for tech savvy people, but if he wants to convince the average joe he needs to simplify. We don't need to see 10 different ways the machines can be hacked, just ONE way that is simple, understandable, and presented clearly to the user. Preferably on 1, maybe 2 pages max (before they lose interest).

Ideally, for the layperson you would simply explain that each pricinct's votes are stored in a small database, and that it can simply be edited with a piece of software commonly included in Microsoft's popular Office suite. Then, show a screenshot of access with the GEMS database opened, highlight the vote tally for some candidate, and explain that you simply click in the box and change the number. Then explain how it would be impossible to know what the vote count could be due to the lack of paper...relate it back to punched ballots (just save the ballots and recount em if necessary), optical scanners (again you have the ballots and usually there is a paper log that prints each vote as it is scanned), etc.

All of that is understandable to even the layperson. Most people understand what Microsoft Office is. Most people have heard of a database and understand thats how businesses store all their information. Most people have seen a spreadsheet and a screenshot of someone editing an access database looks almost the same.

Re:The presumption is that voting matters

[An Onerous Coward]

You know, cynicism is addictive, but it's not attractive. You can't think of a single thing that would be different about this country if Al Gore had won the 2000 election?

Would we be at war in Iraq? No.

Would we be running up record deficits? Probably not.

Would we have slashed public services to provide tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans? Hardly.

Would we be torturing people in secret prisons?

Would September 11th have been pumped up into justification for a global war against 'Islamofascism?'

Yes, both sides are pretty deep in the pockets of corporations. Both sides are often self-serving at the expense of both their stated ideals and the good of the country. Neither side is offering up solutions that really satisfy me. But to say there is "no difference" is just whiny, and promotes the sort of apathy that corrupt systems thrive on.