HBO's Hacking Democracy Available Online

prostoalex writes "HBO's controversial special 'Hacking Democracy' on issues with Diebold voting machines is now available in full on Google Video." Covered earlier on Slashdot, the documentary seems to have gathered quite a bit of heat from Diebold in addition to the one that didn't air.

Comments

Checks and Balances

[M0b1u5]

Great documentary.

Despite the fact that I have very little faith in the electoral process in the USA, and no confidence at all in the election results - what I still retain faith in is the way that US citizens will not stand idly by, while democracy is stolen from them, whether it be by design, or by mistake (it's immaterial really, either way).

The important thing is that the US system of checks and balances permits citizens to kick up an almighty stick about the systems which count (or fail to count, or alter, even worse!) their votes.

The only question in my mind is this: can the citizens of the USA kick up a big enough stink, and fast enough, to produce a fair election in 2008. Somehow, I doubt it, sadly.

Re:Is that legal?

[Lost Found]

> the sights and sounds of a bunch of geeks getting all morally outraged over the thought of someone stealing an election after watching a stolen
> video is buttery thick with irony

That's because you're an idiot. Influencing an election is a fraud on our entire system of government. Making an unauthorized copy of a video that exposes it is not stealing, no matter how much the content industry wants you to think so.

Re:The weird thing about electronic voting

[doom]

Anonymous Coward wrote:

The weird thing about electronic voting is that after 2000, the Democrats were decrying paper ballots and were all about "modernizing" the system and adopting electronic voting.

This year, they're decrying electronic voting and all for paper voting because it "leaves a trail."

Yeah, those silly Democrats. They're not happy if Republicans steal an election with paper ballots, they're not happy if Republicans steal them with electronic ballots. How do they want you to steal them, eh?

Why the sudden 180? Is it just to cover their backs if they fail to gain a majority in the mid-term elections ("We would've won if it wasn't for those darn electronic voting machines") or is it just a pattern of blaming the system whenever they lose an election ("We would've won if it wasn't for those darn paper ballots")? What's the deal?

Well, if you ask me, the deal is that the Bush machine is getting ready to pull some fast ones tomorrow, and they expect they're going to have some peculiar "upsets" that need to be explained away, so they're sending folks like yourself around to soften up the crowd in advance. But hey, some people think I'm paranoid.

Posted anonymously because raising questions about Democrats can be risky business on Slashdot.

Aw, poor baby. You might lose some karma.

Re:Negative votes?

[Technician]

So the demonstration at the end showed how this could work - they voted in a fake election. They had six votes for "Yes" and two votes for "No". They put in the hacked memory card and it produces the initial printout which shows zero votes for no and zero votes for yes. After entering in the votes through the machine it comes out as seven for "Yes" and one for "No" (so I guess they had -5 "No" and +5 for "Yes" on the hacked card).

Just to set the record straight;

The vote was can the machine be hacked?

6 no votes were cast and 2 yes votes were cast.

The pre count showed no votes cast for either option and no votes cast.

After the count (optical scan) the official verified result was 7 yes and one no.

My question is - why did the initial printout show zero votes?

The initial votes on the card were zero..

The important question is.. How did the final count get altered?

Answer.. The card that does not contain a program actualy does contain a program. That program altered the result. Re-watch the film. The card contains much more than just the poll totals which is denied by the manufacture.

I would hope the machines would format any card at the start of an election and then write the encrypted count totals to the card and nothing else except a checksum and the machine ID number.

Re:The weird thing about electronic voting

[doom]

Anonymous Coward wrote:

Yeah, those silly Democrats. They're not happy if Republicans steal an election with paper ballots, they're not happy if Republicans steal them with electronic ballots. How do they want you to steal them, eh?

This is exactly the point the parent was making! It's turning into 'If we Dems don't win, then the election must have been a fraud! It's the only explanation!". It doesn't matter how people vote or how many safeguards are put in place,

1. The "safeguards" in place border on the non-existant at this point. No one who understands those DRE machines thought they were a good idea.
2. I would not believe the 2004 election was stolen were it not for
   1. the patterns in the exit-poll data discrepancies
   2. the huge number of conventional election corruption techniques deployed in Ohio.

In other words, you can spin, spin, spin all you want, but there's a reality-based world out there, and some day the truth (if you will excuse the expression) will out.

Re:The weird thing about electronic voting

[doom]

Lord Kano wrote:

Yeah, those silly Democrats. They're not happy if Republicans steal an election with paper ballots, they're not happy if Republicans steal them with electronic ballots. How do they want you to steal them, eh?

In 2000, the Democrats said that the Republicans stole the election because of the confusing butterfly ballots and that we needed a new and modern way of voting. Now that we have it,

Now think very carefully here. Is it possible that both ways of doing an election could be fucked? That the Republicans looked at the demand for a "new and modern" way of voting and did an excellent job of subverting that demand, replacing the old somewhat corrupt techniques with a new, more massively corrupt technique?

The thing is you can't possibly deny that, say, Diebold Accuvote machines aren't pieces of swiss-cheese as far as vote security is concerned, and you can't possibly deny that the management of the big electronic voting companies (Diebold and ES&S) have a known Republican bias -- both of those points are tremendously well documented. The one and only thing you can possibly deny is that maybe those two points weren't put together to steal the 2004 election -- except that there is that nasty little problem of explaining away the peculiarly large exit-poll discrepancies that correlated with the use of those voting machines.

Hence, I vehemently deny your accusation that this is all Democratic spin, and I reiterate that this is just an attempt at Republican counter-spin.

It smacks of arrogance. These people honestly believe that they only way that they can possibly lose is if the opposition cheats.

El wrongo... if you really believe that (and I find it unlikely that you really do) you're not paying attention.

Is it really that unbelievable that there are actually people out here who don't vote the same way that you do? Is it really that unbelievable to you that roughly 50% of the American electorate feels differently about the issues than you do?

Well, at the moment it's a little hard to believe that, because all polls seem to agree that most people are sick of the Iraq war, and annoyed at the Bush regime's handling of it. The American people can be a little slow on occasion, but they do catch on eventually (you know, "some of the people some of the time" and so on, as was once said by a man who doesn't deserve to be associated with the current crop of people calling themselves Republicans).

There is no need for paid operatives to infiltrate Slashdot, K5 and where ever else geeks like us congregate online.

What is so hard to believe about Karl Rove engaging in an internet astro-turf campaign? Wouldn't it seem weird if he didn't try something like that?

In any case, I'm not suggesting that every conservative voice on slashdot is necessarily a hired Republican-sock puppet. What I am saying is that there's a surprising number of folks doing mindless reiteration of the same pretty lame talking points, like "Oh the democrats do it too!", or "oh polls are so inaccurate", or "oh you're just a tinfoil hat conspiracy nut like those 9/11 truthies!" Those folks, I find, shall we say, suspicious.

And you're a real paragon of bravery for posting material that defames Republicans in a forum where there is a clear pro-Democrat bias.

It must be biased. We just don't realize that The Democrats Do It Too (so it must be okay).

In any case: if anyone is so whacked as to still be reading this: don't get so wrapped up in the "the elections are rigged!" business that you don't bother voting. Yeah, they're rigged, but none of us know how badly they're rigged, and if it's just a finger on the scale (and not a two-ton weight) we need all the legit voters out there we can get.