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California Sues E-Voting Vendor ES&S
Gustoman writes with news that the California Secretary of State has sued ES&S, a vendor of e-voting machines, for selling machines that were modifications of the model that has been certified. Apparently ES&S relocated two circuit boards, rerouted several internal cables, and changed some mounting bracket supports in their AutoMark A100 devices, named the modified version AutoMark A200, and sold 972 of them to five California counties. The changes sound somewhat trivial, but the certification contract specified that no "substitution or modification of the voting systems shall be made with respect to any component of the voting systems... until the secretary of state has been notified in writing and has determined that the proposed change or modification does not impair the accuracy and efficiency of the voting systems sufficient to require a reexamination and approval." The state is seeking a penalty of $10,000 per machine sold, plus the cost of the machines to the counties — almost $15 million in all.
If they are different enough for the company to give them a new model number, they are different enough to need recertification.
I was thinking the same thing. The problem is you can raise the bar high enough that corruption becomes viable for both sides. This case will hopefully make the chuckle-heads behind the voting machines realize that they need to be building bulletproof systems and not barely good-enough consumer goods. Think embedded system rather than an MS Access 'solution.'
SOME LINES FROM THE ARTICLE...
Does relocating two circuit boards, rerouting several internal cables and changing some mounting bracket supports mean an e-voting device must be recertified to meet state e-voting requirements?
The company also contended that the changes to the AutoMark A100 were so minor that ES&S was not required to submit them for review.
The only changes made to the devices were minor engineering modifications, according to ES&S.
Let me answer the question at the beginning of the article with a resounding YES!!!!!!!!!! YES YES YES! What if the software was written to act differently (cheat) if a bolt was in a certain place, if the color of some paint was different, or if something else was a cetain height? A company can just say "these are just minor changes that has nothing to do with the operation". You see, the contract was written to cover things like this. I am not saying the company had ill-intentions, but if they did violate the contract it's just stupid and - i guess if I can stretch it - a bit suspicious.
Really? Where shall we draw the line then?
There is surely enough electronics in these machines that it would be trivial to conceal a circuit that changes its behavior depending on how various circuit boards are physically mounted in a chassis, even when all the connections appear visually equivalent.
Without visibility of the source code, we have no idea what it's doing under normal circumstances, much less when bits inside of it as physically rearranged. Hell, even with full schematics and source code, things could be easily hidden in production units. No matter what we do, we're taking their word for it.
Get rid of the machines.
It is this simple.
The law REQUIRES Cerification of the Voting Machine to be used/sold. ESS had the A100 certified. They are allowed to sell the A100 in CA
ESS made a newer model the A200 and sold them uncertified to districts.
I don't care what the changes were, You put a sticker on it that wasn't there during certification its uncertified. PERIOD. Finish engineering the damn thing before submitting it for certification.
Let this be a lesson to the makers of these types of machines. ONLY CERTIFIED VOTING MACHINES are legal.
Frankly, I'm disappointed with you guys for your wishy washy interpretation just because we are a bunch of engineers doesn't mean we don't have to take their side when they violate the law. Especially wjen it comes to something so vitally important to our democracy.
I couldn't agree more with this comment from the Sec of State.
"ES&S ignored the law over and over and over again, and it got caught," Bowen said in a statement. "California law is very clear on this issue. I am not going to stand on the sidelines and watch a voting system vendor come into this state, ignore the laws and make millions of dollars from California's taxpayers in the process."
Thank You, that is all.
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I hate to tell you, but a change in the color of a key could be important. What if that change made the key unreadable to color-blind people? Or reduced the contrast so it was harder for a partially-blind person to read? These details can be important when you're dealing with something like a voting machine. Sure, maybe my scenarios don't seem likely, but they are possible, and thats why the government wants the chance to make the call, not the voting machine company. Notice that (at least the way I read this) the government of California isn't asking to re-certify trivial changes, they're merely asking to be notified of any change (no matter how minor) so that the government of California decides what is trivial, not the vendor.
The company obviously doesn't treat elections very seriously and should be smacked down.
An election doesn't just have to work right, it has to be SEEN to be working right - that is PART of the "deliverables". Otherwise people may rightfully get pissed off.
Say in an "old school voting system" you had a company in charge of transporting ballot boxes from the booths to the counting stations, and one of the trucks took a "minor detour" on the way, maybe for the convenience of the company or the employees (take a leak or buy a drink etc).
Sure, nobody might have tampered with the stuff, but the elections get "damaged".
How damaged who knows. The eventual losers could kick up a big fuss. You might piss off millions of voters.
The company obviously doesn't deserve to be in the election system business.
The USA spends so much money in Iraq on "regime change" AKA picking the leaders there, but when it comes to picking the leaders back home - "it's only a minor modification" or we'll let Diebold's rejects who wouldn't be able to make ATM machines build voting machines for us.
For me, it has always been surprising that you americans have all these problems with voting machines. Voting is a simple enough proccess, why would anybody need a machine to do it?
I think it's always better to do it the traditional way, you go there with your ballot and put it on a clear box, after somebody has checked that you are who you say you are, and that you are supposed to vote. Painfully simple, completely fool-proof. It takes a bit more people to do it, but it's just as being in a jury.
I see absolutely no downside about doing it the traditional way. Is there any reason to do it with machines in america, or you do it that way just because it's cooler?
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