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U.S. Bars Lab From Testing E-Voting Machines

Posted by kdawson on from the watching-the-watchers dept.

joshdick writes to point out a NYTimes story on the decertification of Ciber Inc. from testing electronic voting systems. It will come as a surprise to no-one here on Slashdot that experts say the deficiencies of the laboratory suggest that crucial features like the vote-counting software and security against hacking may not have been thoroughly tested on many machines now in use. From the article: "A laboratory that has tested most of the nation's electronic voting systems has been temporarily barred from approving new machines after federal officials found that it was not following its quality-control procedures and could not document that it was conducting all the required tests... The federal Election Assistance Commission made this decision last summer, but the problem was not disclosed then... Ciber... says it is fixing its problems and expects to gain certification soon."

7 of 123 comments (clear)

  1. Hacking Democracy anyone? by spammeister · · Score: 3, Funny

    Never in a million years did I expect this to happen.

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    I tried to think of a good sig, and this wasn't it.
  2. WTF? by s31523 · · Score: 2, Funny

    All the news about voting machines being buggy, insecure, etc. is just ridiculous! Am I missing something terribly complicated in the requirements for how these machines should function? For shits sake they are glorified vending machines! Push A1 and you get a Hershey chocolate bar and H5 gets you a bag of BBQ chips. Now just replace Hershey chocolate bar with candidate A and BBQ chips with candidate B. Seriously, WTF is going on with these things!

    1. Re:WTF? by techpawn · · Score: 3, Funny

      B7... DAMNIT! I wanted Skittles not the Republican...

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      Ask not what you can do for your country. Ask what your country did to you
    2. Re:WTF? by mpathetiq · · Score: 3, Funny

      I wanted a candy bar which was "HH" so I hit H twice, and fuckin' potato chips came out! They had an "HH" button! Christ - you gotta let me know! I didn't learn my AA BB CC's god god dammit dammit.

      --
      Post-rock/Ambient/Drone and other noise.
    3. Re:WTF? by Thansal · · Score: 2, Funny

      Down the hall from my office is a vending machine. The screen is fubar, and it is mostly empty. However every so often it gets restocked. The fun part is that if you start punching in random numbers it will start running the coils. The only reason there is anytihng left in it is that you can't get some of the coild to run at all. Yet they keep on restocking it!

      Now, in this case all that happens is the idiot who ones the machine is out a nice chunk of cash (especialy as he keeps on restocking it). If this was to heppen with a voting machine it might be a bit of a bigger problem.
      "Yes, I hit E7 tryign to vote for the Mr. X for the state legislature, however the screen flashed a bunsh of thigns then thanked me for voting and to let the next person use the machine."
      Instead of:
      "Yah, I hit E7 and then ever 2nd screw on the E line went off in order"

      Things mess up, things can be broken into (Vending Machine Hacks).

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      Do Or Do Not, There Is No Spoon, There Is Only Zuul. Everything in the above post is probably opinion.
    4. Re:WTF? by Viper+Daimao · · Score: 2, Funny

      I like when you reach into the vending machine to grab your candy bar, that flap goes up to block you from reaching up. That's a good invention. Before that, it was hard times for the vending machine owners. "What candy bar are you getting?" "That one, and every one on the bottom row!"

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      "In the game of life, someone always has to lose. To me, if life were fair, that someone would always be Oklahoma." -DKR
    5. Re:WTF? by mpathetiq · · Score: 2, Funny

      I wanna make a vending machine that sells vending machines... it'd have to be real fuckin' big!

      --
      Post-rock/Ambient/Drone and other noise.