Diebold to Withdraw from E-Voting?

ICA writes "It appears after years of criticism, Diebold may be ready to withdraw from electronic voting entirely. The company is concerned that this relatively small and marginally profitable unit is hurting the company's overall image."

Comments

Latin

[Stanistani]

de mortuis nil nisi bonum dicendum est

Of the dead, speak no evil.

[roscivs]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/De_mortuis_nil_nisi_b onum

Ignorant Diebold managers destroyed the company.

[Futurepower(R)]

"The company is concerned that this relatively small and marginally profitable unit is hurting the company's overall image."

That's absurd. Diebold's voting machines have destroyed the company's image completely, in my opinion. Seriously, if you know something about the history and you have a little technical knowledge, would you ever buy anything from Diebold?

DEADbold.

--
My summary of U.S. gov corruption. Where's your's?

Re:I hope they do..

[rlp]

> I doubt the ATM division would be much different.

Very different problem. There are fewer ATM's and banks pay a lot more for them. The are put in place once and generally not moved. They are serviced by trained technicians rather than volunteers. The technology is much more mature. And banks are more concerned with security than the average politician / bureaucrat who's simply looking for the lowest bidder.

Then What?

[necro81]

If it is true that Diebold is looking to dump this business unit (which hasn't been confirmed or denied - Diebold has only said that an announcement would come sometime), what then happens to all the machines (100,000+, i think)? Surely they, or whoever purchases the business unit, is still on the hook for support, updates, and whatever flak comes when the things don't work right. Those machines aren't going to simply vanish or instantly become secure and reliable. Some improvements can be made by completely changing the firmware, but a great deal of the criticism behind the voting machines was their lack of physical security and lack of a physical paper trail. Those are problems that can't be fixed without drastically altering the hardware itself. What company out there would want to buy this business unit and take that challenge on?

Article summary

[Dekortage]

According to quoted experts, Diebold might dump its poorly-rated electronic voting division. Or it might not.

Re:thats interesting

[GodfatherofSoul]

Us "losers" are complaining because Diebold ISN'T 100% fraud-free, isn't verifiably so, and in fact deliberately designed not to be. blackboxvoting.com

Get the facts straight

[blueforce]

[Disclaimer, I live and work down the road from the Diebold corp offices and have family that work there.]

I know it's asking a lot from the /. crowd, but try getting the facts straight before throttling the company and writing it off as a total incompetent.

Diebold didn't make the voting machines, it purchased the company that did: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diebold_Election_Syst ems

For those too lazy to click the link:

"Diebold Election Systems is currently run by Bob Urosevich [1] who has worked in the election systems industry since 1976. In 1979, Mr. Urosevich founded American Information Systems. He served as the President of AIS now known as Election Systems & Software, Inc. (ES&S) from 1979 through 1992. Bob's brother, Todd Urosevich, is Vice President, Aftermarket Sales with ES&S, DES's chief competitor. In 1995, Bob Urosevich started I-Mark Systems, whose product was a touch screen voting system utilizing a smart card and biometric encryption authorization technology. Global Election Systems, Inc. (GES) acquired I-Mark in 1997, and on July 31, 2000 Mr. Urosevich was promoted from Vice President of Sales and Marketing and New Business Development to President and Chief Operating Officer. On January 22, 2002, Diebold announced the acquisition of GES, then a manufacturer and supplier of electronic voting terminals and solutions. The total purchase price, in stock and cash, was $24.7 million. Global Election Systems subsequently changed its name to Diebold Election Systems, Inc."

Diebold is actually well-respected and admired in this area. Diebold election systems are based in Texas whereas the financial systems are here in NE Ohio. I interviewed there for an SE position a couple of years ago, toured their ATM lab, and spent some quality time with some of their software engineers. They seemed to have a very competent operation and I enjoyed the interview. (I ended up taking a different job with another large international corp for other $elfi$h reason$ (I have a family to feed)) I heard the same moaning from the employees I met that I hear from family members who work there - something similar to "those stupid voting machines make us look bad." I have yet to meet an employee, management or otherwise, who has anything good to say about the elections systems division.

Wally O'Dell is largely (if not solely) responsible for the elections systems debacle. It's no secret that he lead the company right into this political mess at the expense of the company's and his own reputations.

Don't torpedo the whole company just because the former CEO bungled a bad deal with a flawed political agenda. It'll eventually work out in the wash, then you can cast aspersions on a new company TBA.

Re:When I called for support

[RxScram]

Personally, I like the quote that is attributed to Joseph Stalin...

"Those who cast the votes decide nothing.
Those who count the votes decide everything."

Err... correction: I don't like the quote, I just think that it is sadly true.