Maryland Scraps Diebold Voting System

beadfulthings writes "After eight years and some $65 million, the state of Maryland is taking its first steps to return to an accountable, paper-ballot based voting system. Governor Martin O'Malley has announced an initial outlay of $6.5 million towards the $20 million cost of an optical system which will scan and tally the votes while the paper ballots are retained as a backup. The new (or old) system is expected to be in place by 2010 — or four years before the state finishes paying off the bill for the touch-screen system."

Comments

But what I want to know -

[Recovering Hater]

-is where the "Suddenoutbreakofcommonsense" tag is?

Re:But what I want to know -

[jrothwell97]

Just 'cause I'm feeling nice, I have tagged it as 'suddenoutbreakofcommonsensejustforyourecoveringhater'. Happy now...?

Re:But what I want to know -

[Deag]

In a completely unrelated matter, how do I turn off those damn tags?

Re:But what I want to know -

[Anonymous Coward]

I realize that few /.ers have the relevant libraries for this, but it's called "ignoring".

Re:But what I want to know -

[jlarocco]

After digging around the page source, I've come up with the following solution.

If your browser allows user stylesheets (i.e. Opera, Konqueror), adding the following to your user CSS file should do it:

*.tags,
*.tagheader,
*.tagname
{
        display: none !important;
        width: 0pt !important;
        height: 0pt !important;
        background: white !important;
        margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0pt !important;
        padding: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0pt !important;
}

I've just now tried it, and it seems to work, but I take no responsibility if it breaks anything.

Re:But what I want to know -

[jlarocco]

Oh yeah, to block the link in the header you'd need to add the following to the selector list:

li > a[title="BETA! - Brief labels that you think best describe an article"]

Re:But what I want to know -

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it possible to mod up or down tag relevance, perhaps making the list of tags appear as a cloud in varying font scales?

Re:But what I want to know -

[Night Goat]

In your account preferences, choose Tags and set Show Tags to "off."

Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Jackie_Chan_Fan]

I'm sure many of us are aware... but let us not forget who Premier Election Solutions, really are. They are Diebold.

Changing the name was a sneaky move.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[davidsyes]

Too bad Diebold can't just "Die BOLD"... so the rest of us can die bowled (over)...

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[jrothwell97]

I'm sure many of us are aware... but let us not forget who Premier Election Solutions, really are. They are Diebold.

Changing the name was a sneaky move. Strange that while they offer flawed election 'solutions', they also make ATMs and cash deposit machines. HSBC banks here in the Free World use Diebold-badged machines, into which shopkeepers deposit their money every Friday. I dread to think what that may implicate if the ATMs are running similar software.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[gotzero]

At least this is going to result in a big audit and will hopefully shed some light into how this really works (or does not work). I will be excited to hear about the results, and even if they go back, I am glad it is being explored... I bet there will be some nasty digital skeletons in the closet.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[sconeu]

The difference is that both Diebold and their clients (the banks) have a vested interest in making sure ATMs *DO* record every transaction accurately.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[MobyDisk]

Their ATM's got a virus some years ago since they are running Windows Mobile.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Anonymous Coward]

In that case they should have changed the name to "Diehard" instead.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[PopeRatzo]

I bet there will be some nasty digital skeletons in the closet.

Absolutely.

The more I learn about this Diebold outfit, the more I think they should be kept far away from any part of our electoral system. Just yesterday, I read an interesting story about a county clerk in some rural Nevada county who looked the machines over carefully and, not being a techie, called in a few trusted computer people to check out one of the systems. Naturally, Diebold's machines are closed source, so they say this County Clerk violated their EULA. The worst part of this is that Diebold put pressure on the County Board until this clerk was forced to resign. They've got that much power.

Just the idea that our elections would run on a closed-source, impossible-to-audit system is unbelievable to me. Especially after the rate of undervoting (ballots that were completely filled out, except the Diebold machines say there was no vote cast for President that only seemed to occur in heavily Democratic precincts in Pennsylvania, New Mexico and Ohio. In some minority districts, the rate of undervoting was EIGHTY PERCENT in 2004. That means, in a heavily contest year, in an area that has a high turnout rate, voters went in and filled out their computer ballot for all the local races, all the judgeships, county board, etc., but for some reason did not cast a vote for President. It's absolutely ridiculous. Problem is, since there are no paper ballots, it's impossible to audit. Diebold sends in the count and that's it, jack. Four more years of a jug-eared dry drunk in the White House.

It's going to take a while, and maybe a few election cycles, but if we can't get honest paper ballots in every single precinct in the USA, there needs to be some serious shit a-flyin'.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[lazy_playboy]

"Just the idea that our elections would run on a closed-source,..."

You make good points and agree with all you say. But remember, even if the source was available that doesn't actually mean that the app running on the machine was compiled from precisely that code. Or even if it is, what about a boot sector type virus that subverts the software that subsequently runs?

In essence, there is no reason to use a machine to simply count. One corrupt person in a powerful place screws up the election. And corrupt people are as certain as the fact that my shit stinks. At least with hand counting the power that any one person has is lessened, especially if batches of votes are counted several times by random people (I assume this is what happens... surely this kind of redundancy is built in to the system?!)

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Anonymous Coward]

Windows XP Embedded != Windows Mobile

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Ucklak]

flawed election 'solutions' according to whom???
Apparently Diebold and the value in the register that represents something they want to have a higher percentage doesn't see it as flawed.
It's just following a routine.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[glitch23]

People who need govt to enforce their religion must not have much faith in the power of its message.

People who think the US gov't enforces a particular religion should move to a Middle Eastern country to be reminded of what a government religion really is. The key point is that in a country that has a real state-sponsored religion, you are punished for not obeying. The US, on the other hand, is an example of a country that has religious roots, a religious foundation, religion in government, religion (although dwindling) in public, but you are not punished if you do not conform to any of those. That is what freedom of (not 'from') religion means. Religion in government is not the same as government in religion. Go ask a member of your local al Qaeda users group what it feels like to be in a real state-sponsored religion country.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Tony Hoyle]

Make sure that the code is compiled by a trusted agency.. preferably several public agencies in parallel. The resultant binarys must all match otherwise they're scrapped. The verified binary is then signed using a key only available to a third trusted agency. All of this process must be in public, and every part has the right to send qualified observers to watch every step.

It goes without saying the original code must also be open to scrutiny.

Then I might trust it.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Anonymous Coward]

I just recently watched Hacking Democracy which covers the issues with the Diebold Optical Scan systems. Bev Harris found the source code and documentation for the system on an unsecured FTP server within Diebold. That same FTP server was listed just over a year ago in several "ATM default password" stories about people hacking ATMs and changing the value of the $20 bills to $5 or $1 and then withdrawing money. Out of curiosity I looked it up at the time of the story and the FTP was STILL NOT SECURE after several cases of the ATM problem.

Diebold tried to sue Bev Harris for using their code but lost due to their server being unsecure. Five years later they told the buyers of the ATMs "you should have changed the password" when the codes were found on the same unsecure FTP server.

So what is Diebold trying to tell us here? They don't care about their customers' security even though their customers are the national election process and financial institutions? Wow!

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[megaditto]

Four more years of a jug-eared dry drunk in the White House. Well, at least this "dry drunk" isn't starting another NAFTA, gutting our military, selling the nuke/laser/rocketry tech to China, or fingering interns like his predecessor.

Here's just a sample link of what you leebs seem to want: http://www.cnn.com/US/9903/10/nuclear.secrets.02/

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[mrchaotica]

Hey buddy, why don't you take your useless partisan bullshit rhetoric somewhere else? Here's a newsflash for you, asshole: pointing out that "the other guy" also sucks does not diminish the suckage of "this guy," regardless of what names you plug in to the variables. Really, all you ever manage to accomplish with your vapid, nonsensical drooling is to pollute the polite discourse the rest of us are trying to accomplish here!

In summary: you're not helping. In fact, you're harming America by trying to turn thinking people into raving partisan sheeple like yourself. So shut the fuck up, and get the fuck out!

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[onemorechip]

Maybe they do accurately record every transaction, but they are crappy machines. My bank's old ATMs were fast, dispensing cash and receipts swiftly. Now they've recently downgraded to Diebold machines, which:

* feature a comically gigantic keypad, making it harder to conceal your PIN as you enter it
* occasionally fail to debounce button pushes
* take ten to twenty seconds to count out and dispense a couple hundred dollars in twenties
* take five to ten seconds to print a receipt
* emit loud and annoying beeping sounds every few seconds while you wait (last time I was there, someone was two machines away from me, and their ATM was emitting the same sound but in a slightly different key, and about a half-second apart from mine -- making it really, really annoying).

OK, I'm done venting now.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[MagusSlurpy]

but if we can't get honest paper ballots in every single precinct in the USA, there needs to be some serious lead a-flyin'. Fixed that for you.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[PoopDaddy]

Just like AirTran is ValueJet.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Anonymous Coward]

pointing out that "the other guy" also sucks does not diminish the suckage of "this guy,"

Actually, the very cornerstone of the two-party system is that pointing out that "the other guy" sucks does reduce the suckage of "this guy."

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Dr_Barnowl]

I love computers, but I think they have no place in the electoral process.

Transparency should be the order of the day. Computers will always tend to obfuscate things for the common man, because as far as he is concerned, anything that happens inside a computer system may as well be a form of arcane magic. There are a far higher number of people who understand the principles of "counting", given you a far greater pool of competent election officials to draw from.

Understanding cryptographic signatures and ensuring that some part of the chain of trust, including the toolchain, isn't compromised, is far harder than understanding that "here is a locked box containing paper votes, anyone tampering with the contents is a BAD man".

The only reasons for using computers in elections are

  * Impatience
  * Pork
  * Making it easier to subvert the democratic process

A roomful of geezers inflated with civic pride is a counting device that is far harder to corrupt than a thumbnail of silicon which slavishly obeys every command it's given.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Anonymous Coward]

The more I hear about Diebold, the more I think the directors should be executed for treason.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[probablyandy]

The difference is that both Diebold and their clients (the banks) have a vested interest in making sure ATMs *DO* record every transaction accurately. ATMs do fail occasionally and there are cases of them being tampered with in various ways. The difference is that it's easy to quantify the risk of ATMs being tampered with as the expected loss of $$ vs the cost of making a better system. It's not clear how or if one can quantify voting machine security or reliability in a similar way.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[professionalfurryele]

"The US, on the other hand, is an example of a country that has religious roots, a religious foundation, religion in government, religion (although dwindling) in public, but you are not punished if you do not conform to any of those."

Try getting elected as an atheist. You have about as much chance as a guy with a Hitler tash and torrets.

I much prefer the way things are treated in the UK. As a politician you don't talk about religion. You don't declare it a bunch of bull honky, you don't profess your faith. Instead you try to argue the facts (or some made up version thereof). If only we treated politicians sex lives the way we treat their religious affiliation things would be so much better.

Religion in US politics is a symptom of everything that is wrong with the Western democracies, Celebrity. If we elected politicians based on their competence rather than on their cosmetic facts like looks, religion, sexual orientation, relationship to the other candidates...

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[OSUBeav]

Gutting the military??? I was in the military and I got out when Bush I and Cheney and many others R and D were reaping the peace dividend prior to Gulf I. Base closures, major troop reductions, blah blah blah. The commies were gone and the economy was it. I can't say it was the wrong call either. Not sure what you are talking about pinning this on Clinton.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Anonymous Coward]

In other words, an ATM loss is an insured loss for the bank but an election loss is an assured loss for everyone.

I couldn't resist.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[megaditto]

Hey buddy, why don't you take your useless partisan bullshit rhetoric somewhere else? Yes, I am sorry to interrupt your Bush-bashing "discourse" with the facts.

In summary: you're not helping. In fact, you're harming America by trying to turn thinking people into raving partisan sheeple like yourself. So shut the fuck up, and get the fuck out! That's the problem with giving people like you a voice: they try to take it away from others.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[megaditto]

Are you sure you got your timeline right?

The Soviet Union fell apart in August 1991. Bill Clinton took office in Jan 1992, four months later.

Even a quick look at the numbers suggests that Clinton cut more: Bush (HW) cut 200,000 troops in four years. Clinton cut 500,000+ in eight.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[rilian4]

While you make a great point about how closed the software is on Diebold systems and therefore unreliable by definition..Of the 3 states you mention, 2 were won by the Democratic candidate in the 2004 presidential election. If so many democratic votes weren't being tallied, pray-tell how the democrats still managed to win those 2 states? By the way, You should know that not everyone who has a problem with Diebold votes Democrat. I am an independent conservative w/ Libertarian leanings, for example.

Also, for all your obvious issues with President Bush, there isn't much evidence that he is an alcoholic as you claim(Bush isn't perfect by a long shot, stick to real problems rather than name calling)...and I have it on the word of a 30+ year experienced medical doctor who has run 2 drug and alcohol rehab clinics that there is evidence that your favorite Democrat William Jefferson Clinton was an alcoholic, or was at least abusing alcohol for some time. This is from many observations of him in his many public appearances as a candidate and as President on television.

Just my $.02

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[mrchaotica]

Yes, I am sorry to interrupt your Bush-bashing "discourse" with the facts.

My "Bush-bashing discourse?" Check again, dipshit -- I'm not the same guy you were blabbering to. You're just making such an ass of yourself that even otherwise-disinterested third parties like myself feel the need to point out how much of a fuck-up you are!

That's the problem with giving people like you a voice...

"Like me?" You don't know anything about me, Mr. I'm-Too-Stupid-To-Check-The-Name-Of-The-Guy-I'm-Replying-To, except for the fact that I think you're a flaming douchebag!

Now, seriously. Are you even even aware that you completely ignored every piece of meaningful content of PopeRatzo's post, and instead flew off the handle over a random meaningless remark? You're acting like you're a spoiled four-year-old who was insulted personally, and that's just stupid. Grow a thicker skin, and stop deluding yourself that you're G. W. Bush! Unless you are Bush, in which case your whining represents whole new orders of magnitude of patheticness...

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[Anonymous Coward]

Also, for all your obvious issues with President Bush, there isn't much evidence that he is an alcoholic as you claim(Bush isn't perfect by a long shot, stick to real problems rather than name calling)...and I have it on the word of a 30+ year experienced medical doctor who has run 2 drug and alcohol rehab clinics that there is evidence that your favorite Democrat William Jefferson Clinton was an alcoholic, or was at least abusing alcohol for some time. This is from many observations of him in his many public appearances as a candidate and as President on television.

Yeah, but Willy can hang.. Bush strikes me as the kind of drunk would would lean real hard on a person's shoulder and say "just listen to me" over and over without saying anything deep or insightful. He would almost assuredly pee on or around a fake plant at some point.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[megaditto]

My "Bush-bashing discourse?" Check again, dipshit -- I'm not the same guy you were blabbering to. Here is the post where you claim it is your "discourse" and I am polluting it somehow.

So far, you have added nothing to the discussion save a bunch of random "dipshit," "fuck you," and "asshole" salutations. Nothing even remotely relevant to the topic at hand: voting procedures and the lack of meaningful alternatives.

You might try to actually reading a thread next time instead of hitting Reply just because I am on your Foes list. Have a nice day.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[OSUBeav]

Here's a little light reading for you. It takes more than a quick scan of the numbers - that is a shallow analysis. Unless you had your head in the sand you'd know that it was a bipartisan effort in cutting the military back. I know that doesn't make a good zinger, sorry.

http://www.csbaonline.org/4Publications/Archive/H.20000831.Post-Cold_War_Defe/H.20000831.Post-Cold_War_Defe.htm

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[PopeRatzo]

But remember, even if the source was available that doesn't actually mean that the app running on the machine was compiled from precisely that code.

What you say is true, of course. The machines themselves have proven to be just as vulnerable as the software. There are videos of people using generic mailbox keys to open Diebold machines.

Re:Diebold = Premier Election Solutions.

[PopeRatzo]

and I have it on the word of a 30+ year experienced medical doctor who has run 2 drug and alcohol rehab clinics that there is evidence that your favorite Democrat William Jefferson Clinton was an alcoholic, or was at least abusing alcohol for some time. This is from many observations of him in his many public appearances as a candidate and as President on television.

Another "experienced medical doctor" who diagnoses disease via Fox News.

Mr. Limbaugh, when this "experienced medical doctor" was telling you this, was your head bobbing up and down in his lap by any chance? It's a pity what you have to go through to get your oxycontin.

Where can Diebold hide now?

[jrothwell97]

Diebold are going to have real trouble building their reputation back up after this; even though other machines may be vulnerable, the fact that this case has been so well publicised is seriously going to damage Diebold's public image.

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[mOdQuArK!]

That's why they changed their name. Now that they have a new name, nobody is going to associate them with the "old" Diebold.

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[zappepcs]

Actually, they could have scored a huge boost in credibility *IF* they had said, wait! We'll pay for the NH recounts because we are certain our machines are good, and if anything is found to be wrong, we'll fix it before the next primary or caucus.

But that is not what they did... instead, there was a conversation in a darkened back room somewhere that went something like this:

Politician: I thought you said it would be undetectable?
Company Rep: I thought you said we'd not be prosecuted?
Politician: You didn't say you'd fsck it up this badly.
Company Rep: I did what you told me you wanted, give or take a couple of votes.

Politician: This is not going to be good, you had better hide the evidence now, bury it deeply.
Company Rep: No problem, we just paid Britney another $2 Million to pee on the courthouse steps.

profit!

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[NickCatal]

I read somewhere that Deibold wants out of the business because it is like 10% of their revenue and 90% of their PR headaches.

I love optical scanners. They are so easy to do, quick to report, and easy to check if there is a problem.

What a lot of people don't realize is that on election day those boxes are carted around escorted by agents from both parties. There is no funny business to be done because it is being watched the entire election with lawyers for both parties parked around the area ready to respond to a phone call and judges literally sitting at their desks all day waiting for phone calls. Even if the 'seal is broken' the box was watched from point a to point z by reps from all parties involved.

But it is more fun to claim rigged elections.

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[Mitreya]

Diebold are going to have real trouble building their reputation back up after this; even though other machines may be vulnerable, the fact that this case has been so well publicised is seriously going to damage Diebold's public image.

And pigs are certain to fly anytime now.
Some states appear to question their machines. Others don't. But I don't see anything about states demanding their money back for the scrapped equipment. And therefore I don't think Diebold is too concerned! They already sold the frigging machines. In fact, they probably prefer to have a chance of selling another round of machines in a few years once the legislative body is changed (or better-bought) rather than simply do maintenance support on the machines already sold.

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[DeadChobi]

What about the other 10 political parties in this country? Where are their representatives? It's not a two-party system despite what the media has led you to believe.

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[UbuntuDupe]

Is it a good or a bad sign that I got the same feeling from reading that exchange, that I do when I read the solution to a difficult puzzle?

Re: Where can Diebold hide now?

[Black Parrot]

Diebold are going to have real trouble building their reputation back up after this; even though other machines may be vulnerable, the fact that this case has been so well publicised is seriously going to damage Diebold's public image. How well is it actually known and understood outside geek circles?

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[plover]

What about the other 10 political parties in this country? Where are their representatives? It's not a two-party system despite what the media has led you to believe.

Because the other parties around here can't muster enough people to vote at every polling place, much less provide a volunteer to staff each one and assist in carrying the ballots around.

Neither the Republicrats nor the Demopublicans currently feels threatened enough by a third party to risk charges of rigging an election. Think about the risk required for both of them to agree to jointly commit a felony. If one asks the other, you know damn well the other would much rather see the first behind bars for election tampering, rather than fool around with half a dozen votes.

If the Greys, Libertines, or whoever ever reaches a threatening level of participation, (such as about 20%,) then it'll be different. It would also be different if we didn't have a winner-take-all voting system -- a proportional representation system would need to be much more careful. But until then, having two people who mistrust each other is a pretty good solution.

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[Jak Crow]

People need to be aware that the servers involved in the optical scan ballots can be hacked as well, and I do believe Diebold makes those voting systems too.

Re:Where can Diebold hide now?

[rewinn]

>What about the other 10 political parties in this country?

They have the right to have inspectors too (in my state at least ... don't know about the others). I think a couple years ago at the polling place where I was an inspector, we had a Green or maybe it was a Libertarian ... I didn't keep track really 'cuz everyone is welcome, so long as they don't touch anything.

I realize it's not quite proper to say "both parties" or "the other party" but that's just a figure of speech; the rules let any party to have watchers....which is as it should be.

Sudden outbreak of common sense indeed

[hekk]

Good riddance to bad rubbish. Whatever happened to "If it ain't broke don't fix it"?

Can this momentum spread to the federal level? Perhaps by having the money given to the states with the express implication that it be used for as secure and verifiable voting device as possible?

Re:Sudden outbreak of common sense indeed

[MightyMartian]

Can this momentum spread to the federal level? Perhaps by having the money given to the states with the express implication that it be used for as secure and verifiable voting device as possible?

Whaddya wanna do here, give Ron Paul a coronary?

Re:Sudden outbreak of common sense indeed

[hekk]

Well, I meant the money already reaching states that is earmarked for new voting machines.

Re:Sudden outbreak of common sense indeed

[glitch23]

Good riddance to bad rubbish. Whatever happened to "If it ain't broke don't fix it"?

Don't forget that people have to be convinced that it ('it' can be anything in this case) isn't really broken for that motto to be useful.

Re:Sudden outbreak of common sense indeed

[Professor_UNIX]

Good riddance to bad rubbish. Whatever happened to "If it ain't broke don't fix it"?

Florida didn't use electronic voting in 2000 in the most disputed counties nor did Ohio in 2004 in its disputed counties. If anything, the electronic voting systems proved to be BETTER than paper ballots in both those situations and Bush was re-elected because of paper ballot problems. Need I remind you of the infamous pictures of the recount guys looking with a magnifying glass to try and determine whether a chad had any imprint on it or to try to determine, if in the case of two punched chads, which one was the accidental one and which wasn't? Paper ballots are for luddites and a complete sham.

Re:Sudden outbreak of common sense indeed

[Anonymous Coward]

You're statement concerning Ohio in 2004 is completely false. Many of the voting "irregularities" (read: hijacking) were from districts in the greater Cleveland area using Diebold voting machines. The urban area of Cleveland is also VERY heavily Democrat and typically has a semi-strong showing at the polls. In 2004, they magically turned to Red Town and had voter turnout far below the average for those districts.

If you actually spend some time looking into this stuff, it's pretty frightening what really happened in 2004. America's democracy was completely raped and hardly anyone knows or cares. Furthermore, those with the power to ask the questions absolutely refuse to do so.

In fact, to even bring this topic up anymore means you must be of terrorist descent, as no patriotic American would ever question the Almighty Bush and his mandate from God.

Re:Sudden outbreak of common sense indeed

[Firethorn]

Paper ballots are for luddites and a complete sham.

There's a huge difference though between punch-card ballots and optical scan(paper) ballets.

So far, every time somebody pops up talking about how bad paper ballets are they bring up hanging chads -

Pure Electronic voting isn't ready for real world use, in my and many other's opinions. Optical scanning is a mature technology though, and you can always go back and count by hand if necessary.

There, if the bubble or dash or whatever isn't completely filled in, I'd have to wonder how much the voter really cared about that vote.

One thing that got me was them talking about how the touch-screen voting allowed true anonymous voting by the blind. I'm curious as to how that works, given that a blind person won't be able to tell one 'button' from another on a touch screen. Maybe something along the line of a headset saying 'touch right side of screen for Bush, left side for Gore'? Then 'You have selected X, to confirm, press near bottom of screen'.

Verified Voting

[earlymon]

All this made me start to wonder about voting machine requirements and this turned up - http://www.verifiedvoting.org/

Thought others might find it interesting.

Re:Verified Voting

[hedwards]

Thanks for the info. Nice to see that my home state scores as highly as I would have thought, and that FL was apparently sufficiently embarassed by screwing up the 2000 election to get its act together.

I do have to say that I find it troubling that so many states don't require either a paper trail or proper auditing of elections. Seems to me that democracies work far better when there's somebody keeping an eye on things to make sure that partisans don't cheat the masses.

I have nothing to say, besides

[TheDarkener]

Thank you.

Stuck with the bill.

[Ethanol-fueled]

Perhaps the state could sell some of the Diebold devices to help pay the bill that they're stuck with. They may garner a cult following(like the iPhone) of hackers and tinkerers. The devices are worthless as voting machines but they may be coaxed into second lives as kiosk-style internet machines, etc.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[KiloByte]

Or, you see, return them as faulty and demand the (taxpayers') money back?

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[MightyMartian]

I'll wager that the contract would probably make that impossible, and if the governor and legislature tried it, it would end up in court, and the state would lose big money. It's probably easier and cheaper, though not very satisfying, to swallow the costs of paying for the machines, and hopefully the good people of Maryland have learned a valuable lesson.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[Greyfox]

At some point someone probably signed off that the deliverable had been met. Once you agree that the product meets your needs it's kind of hard to go back on it.

I like to say "It's OK! This is how we LEARN!" but unless the responsible parties are actually held accountable for their decisions they won't learn either. While in a perfect world this would lead to some people losing jobs or offices, I find that it's quite rare that people pay attention to huge wastes of taxpayer dollars. Putting it in terms they can understand ("They just threw away $25 of your tax bill last year!") might drive the point home a little better. Or maybe not...

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[Amorymeltzer]

This is just stupid. Wasting $65M to $90M is pointless, but they deserve it. Moving backwards isn't the answer, and neither is moving only slightly backwards. There's no way that for that kind of money, they couldn't have gotten a series of machines that actually works. I don't want to spit the same old Diebold sucks, yay linux/open source/etc. vitriol but there are a lot of options available to a small business, not to mention a bloody STATE. The instant these things weren't working properly eight years ago, they should've given Diebold an ultimatum and then gone elsewhere.

Maryland expects to be back on the paper trail, following states such as Florida and California, which have also decided that all-electronic systems make it too easy to compromise elections. Hmm... an all-electronic system doesn't work, and neither does all-paper. Gee, I wonder if there's someway to combine the two and maybe get some sort of hybrid, combining the best of both worlds...

Re: Stuck with the bill.

[Black Parrot]

Perhaps the state could sell some of the Diebold devices to help pay the bill that they're stuck with. They may garner a cult following(like the iPhone) of hackers and tinkerers. The devices are worthless as voting machines but they may be coaxed into second lives as kiosk-style internet machines, etc. Or sell them to a(nother) country where the ruling class considers it important *not* to get accurate vote counts.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[Anonymous Coward]

I think there is no way to be absolutely certain election votes are counted correctly.

-Machines are more reliable than people, so theoretically, if designed correctly, they should give an accurate (and fast, don't forget -fast- in this media-controlled world) result. However, no matter -how- well designed, someone wanting to mess with an election could probably still find a way. It just takes patience and skill. No system is flawless.

-A system where electronic voting leaves a paper trail makes me wonder what happens to the paper trail. Is it counted every time, just to be certain? In that case it could be reasonably reliable, but I'm sure even under the best of circumstances, people make mistakes. This could lead to potentially endless recounts, as it will take ages to come up with the same number twice. So if the discrepancies are not to big and it doesn't matter for the actual result (number of electoral votes), then it shouldn't matter much, case closed. - However, if the paper votes are NOT counted every time, then people could still easily mess with the electronic voting system. A paper trail would also only be good as long as the voter sees a slip of paper with his vote (suchandsuch for president in text, not just some barcode or whatever, even though that might potentially be more private) come out and then afterwards they read the ballot and count it manually. If scanned by a computer, it would -still- be possible to mess with the software, connection, database, or whatever.

-The problem with electronic voting is that whatever system you use, it's basically a black box. You can't watch the electrons move around and even if you know the system, it's probably possible to mess with it if you know what you're doing. No one would be the wiser just looking at the system. The problem with a paper-based system is that human counts are not 100 % reliable either, either by mistake or by malice discrepancies can occur. Multiplied by the numer of people involved, a very small margin of error could still have significant effects. Also, a paper system counted by machines is also open to subversion.

When so much is at stake, people will be willing to do almost anything to get their candidate to win. Personally I think electronic voting is much more vulnerable. In theory only one person could hack into the central database or hide something in the firmware and spread malignant code throughout the system. A paper-based system, checked by humans is flawed by definition, mistakes will be made with so many people involved, but for fraud on a large scale to work without anyone noticing, too many people would have to be involved in too many places. Someone would notice something. Of course, that's little protection either, there have been many reports of irregularities, but most people easily dismiss them.

Too bad something so important is also potentially so fragile.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[Darinbob]

Hmm... an all-electronic system doesn't work, and neither does all-paper. Gee, I wonder if there's someway to combine the two and maybe get some sort of hybrid, combining the best of both worlds...

Which is where governments should have been aiming. Generally governments in the past have tended towards being slow, lethargic, and resistant to change. That would have worked perfectly here. Governments shouldn't be "early adopters". Instead it appeared that many governments flipped into the "if it's new it must be good" mode.

Perhaps it was the panic from the Bush v. Gore election where none of the election boards wanted to look foolish. There's always been a tendency of the general public to trust technology much more than the engineer that creates the technology. So combine the sense of trying to look modern to the voters with a naive trust in technology, and you end up with e-voting machines being popular all of a sudden.

Then there's the slowly dawning realization that maybe they were too hasty; just like the guy who realizes that day-trading online may not have been a good idea. If governments had been slow and plodding, they'd have evaluated endlessly these voting machines before rolling them out, rather than use the voters as beta testers.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[dlanod]

Who's to say all-paper doesn't work? Many countries use all-paper and yet somehow democracy survives in such third world countries as Australia.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[mdsolar]

I worked on this issue pretty hard. One of the things that I think the legislature found persuasive, especially on the finance committee, was that the optical scan machines would be less expensive in the long run. The Diebold machines were showing signs of aging and needed much more repair than expected. The optical scan machines are known to last longer and work with fewer problems. This is pretty sad considering that voting machines are used quite infrequently. The other arguments were more important, but the financial issues were a consideration I think.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[jsiren]

I don't think the Diebold machines are secure enough for Internet terminals...

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[Firethorn]

Given that they were suffering crashes with the machines, they might be able to pursue it on a basis of the machines not meeting reliability standards, but that would indeed depend on the contract.

As much as I'd like to see the state return the machines and stop paying(or even demand a refund), it's likely not possible for the reason you state.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[drsquare]

Would you care to explain how all-paper doesn't work? It may not work in America with your hanging chads, mass disenfranchisement, electoral colleges and so on, but in the rest of the developed world many elections are run fairly and transparently using nothing but paper and pen.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[NixonTurf]

A great way to get free voting machines is to put a mouse into one and then claim you found it there.

Re:Stuck with the bill.

[Amorymeltzer]

Just because something works somewhere else doesn't mean it works everywhere. My computer works perfectly, but that doesn't mean yours won't crash tomorrow. Just because nations for thousands of years have thrown soldiers into a war didn't make Vietnam anymore "winnable" for the US.

But it's more than that, it's preventative. Just because your paper ballots have worked flawlessly (you assume) doesn't mean they will continue to do so. Our elections worked nicely until the hanging chads. We don't want another debacle, so we're turning to more methods. Hopefully, these methods will be more secure, as well as more convenient and easier - after all, counting tens of millions of ballots by hand sucks.

Besides, the article was speaking to American concerns. Over two million of us can't figure out how to punch holes in paper ballots, and clearly need a different system.

Good

[Anonymous Coward]

After the news of two AI researchers committing 'suicide,' we know that they have drawn first blood, and I want machines as far away from politics as possible.

What about the old machines?

[jo7hs2]

Here is question... Before touchscreen voting, our area in Maryland had an optical paper system, which resembled some sort of Star Wars fan video version of R2D2. Why didn't they hold onto these machines, just in case the touchscreen voting devices didn't work out?

Re:What about the old machines?

[nomadic]

Before touchscreen voting, our area in Maryland had an optical paper system, which resembled some sort of Star Wars fan video version of R2D2. Why didn't they hold onto these machines, just in case the touchscreen voting devices didn't work out?

I think they tried, but the Jawas stole them.

Re:What about the old machines?

[greed]

'Cause if you don't trade in your old voting system, they charge you full sticker price, dealer prep, and delivery?

Re:What about the old machines?

[SeaFox]

Hahahaha! Thanks. I appreciated that.

Why on Earth are they still paying?

[RodgerDodger]

I'd claim "unsuitable for purpose" and not pay. Except (and I'm sure this is the case...): Maryland probably borrowed money to pay for the system, Diebold has already been given their money and won't give it back, and the creditors don't care how the money was spent.

Re:Why on Earth are they still paying?

[symbolic]

Maryland could still take Diebold to court and get a ruling in its favor. Then the fun can really start.

Or better yet...

[Anonymous Coward]

...make the state officials who went out and bought those machines in the first place, pay the bill out of their own pockets. Doesn't matter if they can't afford that much money, slap a lien on all their homes and property and garnish their bank accounts to recover as much of it as possible.

Election fraud

[Capt'n Hector]

I don't know if this is common knowledge to informed Americans (I only know of it because it is part of my family lore), but in the 1970s there was another voting machine company, named after its founder, Shoup. They made the voting booths with the pulldown lever, and though I doubt they're still around today, some of you older /.ers may remember them. Anyhow, this company was plagued by scandal. One of the Shoup family, Ransom Shoup was actually convicted of conspiracy to throw an election. The company was also involved in bribing florida politicians. And this was in the era of paper ballots, too. Fast-forward to today: nobody knows if Diebold is up to no good, but that's kind of the point. Without a paper trail, it will be hard to convict anyone of anything, and I think Diebold knows this.

Re:Election fraud

[ThinkingInBinary]

They made the voting booths with the pulldown lever, and though I doubt they're still around today, some of you older /.ers may remember them.

Heck, I only missed by a president or two. My parents used to vote on those machines, but by the time I got around to voting (in 2006) we were using Diebold optical scanners. Frankly they're comforting, because there's a sheet of paper they can read if it gets fucked up.

AMANDA?

[whiskey6]

Perhaps Maryland has come to the sad, sad realization that The Advanced Maryland 'Automated' Network Disk Archiver is the biggest POS ever to come out of that state? And that calling Pavel at Zmanda http://www.zmanda.com/contact.html for help is a doomed task? Just sayin', that's all...

Re:AMANDA?

[strredwolf]

No, AMANDA's done by the Univ of MD College Park. The voting stuff is by Diebold, but I believe Governor Glendenning helped bring it in.

" ... impossible to imagine ..."

[Bearpaw]

FTA:

"Indeed, it is impossible to imagine a voting system that could be impervious to attack," the report concluded.

That's true, as far as it goes.

But voting systems can -- and have been -- imagined that make it much more difficult to get away with such an attack.

Re:" ... impossible to imagine ..."

[Bombula]

Impervious, no, but any number of simple solutions would be - pardon the expression - nearly foolproof.

The Greeks and Romans voted with black and white stones. It wouldn't be that hard to implement something similar. Picture vending machines that recognize different coins - they are pretty close to foolproof in as far as not mistaking a quarter for a dime goes. Get to the polling station, get a 'coin' (or stone or ball or disc or bill or whatever). From there, how hard is it to only allow one vote per person? Easy - with a time limit (no more than one vote per 60 seconds) and two (or more) synced counters (think of turnstyles synced with the coinslots). So no cheating by dumping more 'quarters' in the machine.

With a simple system like this you can not only count the votes electronically, but you can count the 'coins' too. And just as with real money, you can screen for and discard counterfeit coins.

Of course the real way to have accurate elections is to throw out the secret ballot, but that's another argument entirely.

Re:" ... impossible to imagine ..."

[MightyMartian]

Of course the real way to have accurate elections is to throw out the secret ballot, but that's another argument entirely.

Oh good, so now my neighbor can know who I voted for. So can my boss and my wife.

Nothing like good ol' fashioned voter intimidation.

Re:" ... impossible to imagine ..."

[roguetrick]

But then I can finally start getting paid to go vote.

they should not pay Diebold

[Dan667]

On a system that is clearly flawed and does not do what it is intended. I would advocate for a full refund to the state of Maryland for breach of contract.

Paper ballots are pretty horrible, too

[harlows_monkeys]

What they should do is use this. It seems to address all of the problems with machine votes, AND all of the problems of the traditional system.

Re:Paper ballots are pretty horrible, too

[fangorious]

Separating the human readable and machine readable ballot, and then shredding the human readable one, keeps the door open for tampering with the counting software (you might have marked choice A for your candidate on the human readable ballot but what if the counting software counts choice A as a different candidate). How do you then prove how it was supposed to be counted? If you're going to in some way securely preserve the human readable portion, why bother separating them in the first place? Also if you keep a copy of your cast ballot then a voters can be intimidated by threat of retaliation, and bribed with certainty of the result. What is so freaking bad about a ballot which is simultaneously human and machine readable which is turned in via secret ballot? It seems to work ok for the many other countries with international oversight.

Re:Paper ballots are pretty horrible, too

[Anonymous Coward]

It seems to address all of the problems with machine votes

From the web page:

.

The EAC provides a list of registered equipment manufacturers. It includes the more well known vendors such as Premier Election Solutions, Inc. (formerly Diebold), a name according to them "synonymous with security."

.

Strike four, dude.

Re:Paper ballots are pretty horrible, too

[DMUTPeregrine]

Separating the human readable and machine readable ballot, and then shredding the human readable one, keeps the door open for tampering with the counting software (you might have marked choice A for your candidate on the human readable ballot but what if the counting software counts choice A as a different candidate).
True, though both ballots are machine readable and human readable. Either sheet, chosen by the voter, can be shredded. Software can be tampered with, but the people hand-counting votes can also be tampered with. Also, since punchscan is open-source (BSD licensed) it's easier to verify that the software is working as it should be.
How do you then prove how it was supposed to be counted?
You prove it was recorded correctly by having the results of the marking viewable by any voter online. This image shows the process, you want part 3, post election audit.
If you're going to in some way securely preserve the human readable portion, why bother separating them in the first place?
Separation prevents vote buying while allowing the voters to keep and verify their own paper trail. You can verify that your votes were counted as you marked them (a, b, or left hole, right hole,) but you can't associate the marks with who you voted for. So you know your votes were counted as marked, and you know you marked them for the candidates you want, but no one else can reliably determine the correlation without having access to ALL the encryption keys.
Also if you keep a copy of your cast ballot then a voters can be intimidated by threat of retaliation, and bribed with certainty of the result.
From the FAQ: If a vote-buyer or coercer tells the voter where to mark before the voter enters the polling place, then those marks will correspond to random votes. This is because only in the booth can the voter see what vote corresponds to what mark on the receipt (as mentioned in question 2). So paying for such marks is actually paying for random votes, which is substantially the same as paying someone not to vote at all. But paying people not to vote can be achieved more directly (and even online), since who votes in US elections is generally visible and in practice a matter of public record. Influencing voters not to vote on certain contests, while allowing them to vote their choice on others, is essentially a waste of the influencer's efforts, which would be more effective if the voter were kept from voting altogether. Observing how long people spend in booths has been used in improper influence schemes, and lever machines even make a distinctive sound for each contest voted. Nevertheless, an "overvote" position (inherent in many other paper-based voting systems) combined with a mark per contest requirement, lets a punchscan receipt hide even which contests were voted.
What is so freaking bad about a ballot which is simultaneously human and machine readable which is turned in via secret ballot?
The individual voters must trust both the vote counters and the vote auditors, with punchscan the voters ARE the primary auditors. Since any voter can audit their own votes any voter can expose election fraud. This makes fraud much harder. It's similar to the "many eyes" principle used by open-source software. Also from the FAQ:
21. Wouldn't good old-fashioned paper ballots counted by hand in each polling place provide a higher level of integrity for election outcomes?
The reasons for automating in the US actually included improving integrity as well as the difficulty of counting the many contests. It might be possible to get enough people to observe and count in the US today in order to achieve a high-level of integrity for basic voting. But such an approach cannot secure absentee ballots traveling through the mails, a significant and growing fraction of voting, that has different demographics/statistics and thus cannot be ignored as far as integrity. Also, polling-place counting cannot pro

Re:Paper ballots are pretty horrible, too

[DMUTPeregrine]

Yes, punchscan keeps track of bad things the EAC does. Punchscan has nothing to do with Diebold, the EAC is the US Election Assistance Commission. They like diebold, which is clearly bad. Punchscan is telling you about that. They do need to make that clearer in that blog entry, but oh well.

Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference is that both Diebold and their clients (the banks) have a vested interest in making sure ATMs *DO* record every transaction accurately.

Unlike state government agencies, the banks, especially many of the ones in Chicago, NYC and up and down the east coast of the US, are run by the kind of folks who might be inclined to provide a set of concrete sneakers to anyone who sells them untrustworthy ATM machines. And the ATM makers know this.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[Trogre]

And why oh why is your country not populated by people who might be inclined to provide a set of concrete sneakers to anyone who sells them untrustworthy elections?

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[aztektum]

Ignorance is bliss.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[Gyga]

Not as much money involved. In society it seems money trumps rights.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[g-san]

Well, I assume by your tone you are talking about the US. Here is my anecdote for the day:

On a recent gameshow (1 vs. 100), first question was who was so and so's step son. Some actress got married and by the marriage the stepson is like 5 yeas younger than the dad. Whatever, I can't remember the question or answer, that is completely useless knowledge (unless you are an agent or something). Out of 100, only 3 people got it wrong. Not bad. 97% of the people in that set knew the answer.

Next Question: What is the third highest rank in the Senate called?
Out of 97 people, a third got it wrong.

Now these are people who were screened for a TV gameshow. They should be smarter than the average bear. A third got it wrong.

These and people less intelligent (than gameshow contestants) are the voters. What do you think they care about more? What do you think they spend more time exposing themselves to, politics or OJ and Britney? That is the true hopelessness of our situation. If you know of a way to get 200 million people to stop paying attention to a drug-addicted talentless dead-beat mom or other Hollywood scuttlebutt, I would love to hear it. You want us to run a marathon to stop election fraud when most of the public barely knows how to crawl. Nevermind the 100 yard dash to comprehend why our economy and world reputation are crumbling to dust. IMHO, that is the answer to your question.

Other answers may vary. This answer does not constitute the opinion of my employer or my land lord or my cat. This answer may become invalid in the future and no guarantees are made, either thusly, thisly, or implied. This answer may be copied if it contains this disclaimer. Due to quantum fluctuations, this answer may cease to exit at any time. This answer may cease to have been written in the first place if an unforseen time warp should occur. Do not submerge this answer in water.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[rjstanford]

Now these are people who were screened for a TV gameshow. They should be smarter than the average bear. A third got it wrong.

What -- exactly -- do you think that they were screening for? I'd be willing to bet it wasn't intelligence. People who make for a fun[ny] game show audience, now, that'd be a pretty good guess.

What do you think they care about more? What do you think they spend more time exposing themselves to, politics or OJ and Britney?

While I appreciate the sentiment, you should be a little fair here as well. I mean, how many slashdot readers know (sans google) what the third-highest ranked Senate official is... compared to the number who would happily go on for hours about the differences between GPLv2 and GPLv3?

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[Grandiloquence]

Because the concrete sneaker people are also in the election selling business.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[mrchaotica]

Now these are people who were screened for a TV gameshow. They should be smarter than the average bear. A third got it wrong.

No, they should be better at memorization than the average bear. Not smarter; there's a difference. Intelligence, in the traditional sense, is a measure of the ability to synthesize new ideas, not regurgitate the original ones.

The fact that proportionally so many of the people were unable to answer the question has more to do with the lack of decent civics classes (and lack of giving a damn about government) than lack of intelligence.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[elrous0]

Next Question: What is the third highest rank in the Senate called? Out of 97 people, a third got it wrong.

Christ, only a third? I am abd on a Ph.D. in history and even I don't know that off the top of my head (minority whip maybe?).

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, a few decades ago, we elected people who started hunting down all the concrete cobblers. Our supply of concrete shoes have been surprisingly small since then. Maybe Jimmy Hoffa has them all.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[sconeu]

It's got to be either Minority Leader or Majority Whip, with 1 and 2 being President Pro-Tem and Majority Leader, respectively.

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[workindev]

This isn't an obvious question, so I too am surprised that that many people got it right. From This Chart, it would appear that the 3rd ranking member is the Majority Leader, behind the Vice President (1st), and the President Pro Tempore (2nd).

Re:Especially in Chicago, NYC and the East Coast.

[Elrond, Duke of URL]

While not an obvious question, the grandparent neglected to mention that on this particular show the questions are multiple choice and four possible answers are given. And since this was the second question given to the contestant, at least one of the answers was a clear throw away.

So now you're asked who Number 3 is: a) Speaker of the House, b) President Pro Tempore, c) Minority Whip, d) Licorice Whip

As a prime time game show this is, perhaps, more difficult than many questions that might be asked. Still, with a tiny bit of logic you can narrow it down to A or B.

Optical scan ballots

[rtechie]

Optical scan ballots really aren't a dramatic improvement in reliability. In fact, the touchscreen systems replaced optical scan ballots in many locations.

Designing a reliable balloting system is really quite easy. The UN nailed it down decades ago:

1. Printed paper ballots wherein each ballot is marked by grease pencil or felt marker.

2. Ballots are folded and placed into a slot on top of a locked clear plastic box.

3. The boxes are guarded, transported to a central location, and then opened and the ballots are all hand-counted by volunteers in front of observers from all parties.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[MobyDisk]

What is wrong with using an optical scanning device to assist the hand-count? So long as a statistically relevant percentage of random ballots are hand-counted to confirm it, I have no problem with those optical systems. Heck -- I don't think most Slashdotters would mind a computerized system so long as it was done properly. The real issue is that none of the closed-source systems proposed today are even close.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[Anonymous Coward]

...and the people who want to throw these elections? They pull out another grease pencil or felt marker and add a few more selections to the ballot, thereby making it invalid.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[karmatic]

Optical scan ballots really aren't a dramatic improvement in reliability.

They can be. Have the touchscreen device print the vote onto the paper ballot, and a barcode with a checksum. Scan it optically and verify it against the checksum.

Anyone can verify their ballot - they simply look at what is marked. Misreads simply don't happen - if the two don't match, there is a problem. Give they guy a new ballot (replacing the old one), and have him do it again.

If the hand recount doesn't _exactly_ match the automated totals, it can be scanned in batches (any size). Count X ballots, scan X ballots. If they don't match, there is a problem.

As a nice side effect, machines don't have to be trusted, and don't have to have a network connection either. The machine can't screw up your vote without marking the wrong thing (or the CRC would be wrong), and you can check that yourself before it's counted. Recounts can be done by hand, and in the event of total system failure, you can still mark the silly thing by hand.

As a nice bonus to this, you get the benefits of touchscreen voting - secret ballots for the blind (audio), multiple language support, pictures, the ability to offer more in-depth descriptions of line items, etc.

It's not exactly rocket science.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[Jeff DeMaagd]

The point behind optical scan is that it is quick, low cost and still auditable. Hand counting is not quick, and human error can enter into that. Hand counting with lots of observers can be pretty time consuming in terms of man-hours.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[rhizome]

Hand counting is not quick, and human error can enter into that. Hand counting with lots of observers can be pretty time consuming in terms of man-hours.

This brings up one of the consistently-unasked questions in debates over electronic balloting: what's the hurry? I don't mean "It would be nice if we knew sooner," but what is it about an election requires that this stuff be done quickly?

A second unasked-question would be, "what makes hand-counting errors less desirable than electronic-counting errors?"

Re:Optical scan ballots

[Kingrames]

"It's not exactly rocket science."

No, but if you could do it with rockets, that would be awesome.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[rsborg]

What is wrong with using an optical scanning device to assist the hand-count? So long as a statistically relevant percentage of random ballots are hand-counted to confirm it

That's the problem. Almost no voting processes in ANY STATE implement random hand-counted audits. I think many people would be happier if your "so long as" was actually the way it worked.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[AeroIllini]

One step better:

Have the company that designs and manufactures the machine to print the ballot be a different company from the one that designs and manufactures the counting and checksum machine. (This would require an open checksum algorithm-- another plus.)

In fact, get two companies to build the counting and checksum machines, and verify them against each other.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[rtechie]

The point behind optical scan is that it is quick, low cost and still auditable. It's quick, but the system I propose is considerably cheaper. I disagree with the third point. Optical scan ballots, in practice, are only "audited" by the same scanning equipment used to count them initially. This does not really translate to "auditable" in my mind since equipment tampering is undetectable. The likelihood of observers being able to certify the reliability of the scanning equipment "on the spot" is very low. Voter suppression is the most serious issue in the USA, and as my system is extremely cheap and easy to use it will better serve poor, rural, and elderly areas that are underserved.

Hand counting is not quick, and human error can enter into that. Absolutely. But the errors are well understood and relatively easy to correct. Also, lots of eyes from observers (as you pointed out), makes errors less likely. And some percentage of errors is inevitable. Tampering is considered a more important problem than an honest miscount anyway.

Hand counting with lots of observers can be pretty time consuming in terms of man-hours. Yup. Counting ballots is labor intensive. It's going to take a lot of people and it's going to take time. Once that idea is firmly fixed in the mind it's possible to create tamper resistant balloting systems. It is the foolish attempt to make counting ballots EASIER that leads to corruption in the process. Counting ballots doesn't have to be easy, auditing and reliability are FAR more important.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[falconwolf]

Optical scan ballots, in practice, are only "audited" by the same scanning equipment used to count them initially.

Humans are capable of reading those ballots. So if there's questions as to the accurracy of the count the ballots can be hand counted.

Falcon

Re:Optical scan ballots

[Anonymous Coward]

I love all the scandel from "lost" ballots. Is it really that hard to keep track of a bunch of locked boxes?

A couple years ago there was a big scandel for the governorship in washington state. I dont remember names, but the republicans won the fist count by a few hundred. Then they "find" some lost boxes and he wins the recount again by a few less. then another recount with more lost ballots. Finally after like 3 recounts the democrats won by under 200 and it was decared final. Then some people came and found death certificates for about 200 people that "voted" democrat. The courts still decided that the last recount was the most accurate.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[RodgerDodger]

Both the UK and Australia do hand-counting. All votes are piled up in stacks of 100, verified by other people, and then the stacks of 100 are counted. In Australia, we even pull this off with our preferential voting system.

We know who the winning political party (and thus the Prime Minister) on the night. Sure, some seats take a while, as postal votes have to come in, and the last 1/6th of the Senate takes a while to become known, but the raw figures are known on the night, and the delay for the final numbers is purely to allow for postal votes.

The UK, with 3 times our population, gets it done in one night as well. The nice thing about having more people is you can bring more people in to count. Mind you, their "first-past-the-post" system is easier to count.

The US could easily do hand-counted votes. You will still know the main numbers (President, Congress, Senate) on the night, before the Hawaiians have finished voting. You may have to wait a day or two to find out who was elected dog-catcher, but I think you can live with that.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[CoolVC]

How did you learn they voted democrat? Did somebody give out a list of all the voters, as well as who they voted for?

Re:Optical scan ballots

[aussie_a]

You do realize most other civilized democracies manage to somehow not have their elections ridiculously rigged using simple pencil and paper don't you?

Re:Optical scan ballots

[TempeTerra]

Also, if you look at countries that actually use hand counting, 'time consuming' usually means the results aren't final until about midnight on polling day. That's long enough for a drinking game, but not long enough for the game to land you in hospital.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[dloseke]

I bet that voter turnout would be a lot better with rockets as well...

Re:Optical scan ballots

[SuiteSisterMary]

Ok. By definition, there's question. So why bother to scan?

Re:Optical scan ballots

[drsquare]

The point behind optical scan is that it is quick, low cost and still auditable. Hand counting is not quick, and human error can enter into that. Hand counting with lots of observers can be pretty time consuming in terms of man-hours.

Rubbish. In British general elections, we have paper ballots, counted by hand, and the results are usually all known by the following morning. Human error? Every party has observers watching every single vote being counted, the system is impeccable.

And cost? A few boxes, locks, and a school hall for the volunteers to count the votes in, versus computers, optical scanners, technicians etc.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[Arbitor Elegantorum]

i am an election judge in Chicago, where we use mostly optical-scan paper ballots, with a scanner in each polling place. They are vastly more reliable than hand count paper ballots. Why? Because voters make dumb mistakes. An example. In the last election a lady in my preicinct filled in the mark for the wrong candidate. She then filled in the correct one, circled one of the two, and put an X next to it and proceeded to slide it into the scanner. The scanner is set to eject any ballots with ink outside the specified areas, or with marks for more than one candidate for one office. If she had just put it in a ballot box it would have been up to me and the other judges hours later to devine which person she was actually voting for. It would be an ink version of the hanging chad. Instead I gave her a new ballot which she filled in correctly, and her votes were unambiguously counted. Two judges (one for each party)defaced her first ballot, signed it, and placed it in the spoiled ballot envelope so we could account for it when we closed the poll. I wish some of the people who criticize polling procedures would work one year as a judge and see how elections really work, instead of coming up with pipe dreams like the punch ballot up above,a system only a sysop could love. I had two 100 year old voters last election who could never could have figured that one out.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[rtechie]

In the last election a lady in my preicinct filled in the mark for the wrong candidate. She then filled in the correct one, circled one of the two, and put an X next to it and proceeded to slide it into the scanner. ... I had two 100 year old voters last election who could never could have figured that one out. I've worked at polling places too. You're defending stupidity. I don't care if the ballots of stupid people aren't counted. Elections are too heavily skewed towards old and stupid people anyway.

However, it's difficult for me to see how the optical ballots are better for stupid voters. In a hand-count system it would be MUCH more obvious to the voter where they had to put their mark, and if they put their mark in the wrong place they could easily tell they made an error and request a new ballot THEMSELVES. If despite the simplicity of the hand-counted ballots, they submit ambiguous ballots anyway, those ballots would be rejected.

Again, legitimate ERRORS are NOT the problem we're trying to solve because legitimate errors are NOT considered a serious problem in any of the balloting systems we're discussing. The much more serious problem we're attempting to address is vote tampering. If a measure to decrease vote tampering increases the likelihood of legitimate errors (I am not conceding the point that hand counting is truly less accurate) that's okay.

So why not support ID requirements for voting? Because these requirements have been proven NOT to reduce vote fraud or tampering, but they DO prevent a significant number of legitimate voters from voting because they lack the appropriate ID (they forgot to bring it to the polling place, etc.) The idea is usually put forward by Republicans who think illegal immigrants somehow make up a significant voting block.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[Arbitor Elegantorum]

So, the old and "stupid should not be allowed to vote? What's your position on Jews and Catholics being allowed to vote?

I am not defending stupidity, but rather the fact that all humans make mistakes. Including you. You seem to think that our Chicago ballots are like those #2 pencil answer sheets we used in school. If you look at http://chicagoelections.com/docs/ballots/387d.pdf you will see that our ballot has the names already on it. The voter completes the arrow pointing to their choice. This paper is then pushed into the scanner, and drops into a sealed box. The paper ballots and the scanner memory chip are returned to the collection station in sealed packages after the polls close. We get the convenience of rapid results from a perfectly hand-verifiable paper record.

You might ask why we need the scanner. Some of our elections have 96 different names on the ballot, when you add in judicial elections and other races. Hand counting would take all night, and far more liable to fakery.

Actually I'm a bit surprised you oppose strong ID laws. How will you know if a voter is too old to meet your standards without a date of birth?

As to the mistake vs. tampering issue, there is still no evidence that any electronic votes have been tampered with. Most of the evidence is that maybe it could be done, and that exit polls conducted by college students hanging out all election day in Starbuck's didn't match expectations. Now contrast with the notorius 2000 Florida vote, which was amazingly close, so much so that the hanging chad case became critical. Your breezy dismissal of the mistake issue sets us up for another debacle. Disenfanchising those who don't meet your standards seems like a poor way to promote democracy.

Re:Optical scan ballots

[rtechie]

So, the old and "stupid should not be allowed to vote? What's your position on Jews and Catholics being allowed to vote? No, PEOPLE (old, stupid, or otherwise) shouldn't prevent OTHER PEOPLE from voting. It's better to disenfranchise a small number of people rather than risk the integrity of the entire vote. You're arguing for a solution that makes the system integrity lower and less reliable in general to accommodate a handful of stupid people.

You seem to think that our Chicago ballots are like those #2 pencil answer sheets we used in school. If you look at http://chicagoelections.com/docs/ballots/387d.pdf you will see that our ballot has the names already on it. The voter completes the arrow pointing to their choice. This paper is then pushed into the scanner, and drops into a sealed box. I have used similar equipment extensively. This is EXACTLY this type of equipment I was talking about.

The paper ballots and the scanner memory chip are returned to the collection station in sealed packages after the polls close. The memory chip is a "black box". There is no way to know what it's actually recording without using elaborate test equipment that won't be available 99.9% of the time.

We get the convenience of rapid results from a perfectly hand-verifiable paper record. Except this never happens. In practice, recounts amount to "rescans" wherein the same ballots are scanned again. IN PRACTICE, they are never hand read. Removing the OPTION of machine counting is the only way to insure hand counting actually takes place.

You might ask why we need the scanner. Some of our elections have 96 different names on the ballot, when you add in judicial elections and other races. Hand counting would take all night, So what? People don't take office the next day. As numerous other posters have pointed out, most other industrialized countries use handcounted ballots and the delay doesn't seem to cause any significant problems.

and far more liable to fakery. All evidence seems to support the idea that hand counts in front of multiparty observers is the method LEAST susceptible to undetectable tampering.

there is still no evidence that any electronic votes have been tampered with. Bullshit. Pretty much without exception handcounts of receipts generated by touchscreen machines have revealed massive discrepancies. This is why state after state is tossing out touchscreen machines. There is strong evidence that some of this was deliberate tampering. Nobody has gone to jail yet, but that doesn't mean it hasn't happened.

There are a number of cases of optical scan systems being tampered with. People HAVE gone to jail for this.

Of course, there are a lot more cases of people tampering with hand marked ballots (both domestically and internationally).

If you're smart, this should tell you something about how easy it is to detect tampering in different systems.

Lawsuit time?

[Iphtashu Fitz]

I wonder if we'll be seeing a slew of lawsuits against Diebold coming in the next few months/years as the states try to recoup the cost of their investments in the Diebold voting machines. I'd bet that they'd have contracts with Diebold that would hold them responsible for failures in the equipment. Given the reports from NH that seem to indicate discrepancies between what Diebold equipment reported and hand recounts I'd think that's a pretty good indicator that the Diebold equipment is faulty.

Re:Lawsuit time?

[Anonymous Coward]

I doubt it. After all, in NH we either use hand-counted paper ballots, or optically-scanned paper ballots. By law the paper ballots have to be filled in by hand. Second, the discrepancies popping up are transcription errors, IE, a volunteer writing down the count from the machine incorrectly, not the machine giving the wrong count. In fact, there are more hand-counted miscounts than scanned miscounts so far in the recount. So now we're looking at modifying the proposed random audit of machine-counted votes to include hand-counted votes as well...

Who wrote these contracts?

[devjj]

If the state buys a touch-screen voting system that is later proven (without a doubt) to be flawed in any of a number of ways, all of which contribute directly to an incorrect tally of the vote (the very reason the machines were procured), why does said state still have to pay for that contract? Are states not naturally covered by the same laws we are? Did they not get a warranty? Did no one even stop to fucking ask?

Just in time

[MrCopilot]

2010? Just in time for the all important Senate and House races.

I'm sure there will be no problems in the next presidential election.

Why not skip the electronics step then alltogether

[KZigurs]

With the farce that any elections are now in USA why not skip the touch screens, OCRs or whatevers in first place? Anyway there is a 100% chance that recount will be requested by ether side.
Going with paper only in first place will save quite a few million dollars and will be set up in what - 6 months including training?

voting

[falconwolf]

Hmm... an all-electronic system doesn't work, and neither does all-paper. Gee, I wonder if there's someway to combine the two and maybe get some sort of hybrid, combining the best of both worlds...

TFA does describe a method of combining electronic and paper, the optical scanners. A person votes on a paper ballot which is then fed into a scanner. The scanner allows for quick tabulation of votes but if there's any questions about the votes the paper ballots are still available. And there's no reason touch screens or other electronic voting machines can't have a paper record either. Diebold, one of the companies making these machines, makes ATMs as well and ATMs print out receipts. Just require the machines to print out a record of the vote on a roll of paper, the voter can check to make sure the name of the person he or she voted for is on the paper. Then the paper is stored in case there are questions on the results.

Falcon

Re:voting

[Weedlekin]

"And there's no reason touch screens or other electronic voting machines can't have a paper record either. Diebold, one of the companies making these machines, makes ATMs as well and ATMs print out receipts. Just require the machines to print out a record of the vote on a roll of paper, the voter can check to make sure the name of the person he or she voted for is on the paper."

How will an after-the-fact printed audit trail help if the system "accidentally" either ignores votes for the "wrong candidates" when they're input, or "mistakenly" credits them to the "right candidates"?

Re:voting

[falconwolf]

How will an after-the-fact printed audit trail help if the system "accidentally" either ignores votes for the "wrong candidates" when they're input, or "mistakenly" credits them to the "right candidates"?

How will not having an audit trail help? At least with paper ballots someone can call for a hand count of the ballots.

Falcon

Re:voting

[Weedlekin]

"How will not having an audit trail help?"

It will save time and paper by not bothering to print out something that contains exactly the same "errors" that the machine has already incorporated in its data.

"At least with paper ballots someone can call for a hand count of the ballots."

I fail to see where anything in my reply mentioned, or was in any way applicable to paper ballots.

Re:voting

[falconwolf]

It will save time and paper by not bothering to print out something that contains exactly the same "errors" that the machine has already incorporated in its data.

If the paper has the same err as the machine then the voter didn't check to make sure it recorded the right vote.

I fail to see where anything in my reply mentioned, or was in any way applicable to paper ballots.

Here it is: "printed audit trail". If it's not printed on paper then what is it printed on?

Falcon

Re:voting

[Weedlekin]

""I fail to see where anything in my reply mentioned, or was in any way applicable to paper ballots.""

"Here it is: "printed audit trail". If it's not printed on paper then what is it printed on?"

You are either a troll, or simply too dense to realise the difference between a paper ballot (unprocessed input) and an audit trail (processed output). Neither possibility is worth wasting any more time on.

Re:voting

[falconwolf]

You are either a troll, or simply too dense to realise the difference between a paper ballot (unprocessed input) and an audit trail (processed output). Neither possibility is worth wasting any more time on.

I think you're the troll.

I'm done.

Falcon

Get some balls and sue Diebold

[kcornia]

Unless this thing was negotiated on handshakes and golf games, there should be a good amount of evidence for the state to press for elimination of that debt due to breach.

Let's start holding them accountable for their shenanigans instead of just taking our ball and going home.

NY Might Keep Physical (Paper) Ballot Records

[Doc Ruby]

According to NY Verified Voting, partisan deadlock and a lack of product alternatives might just combine to ensure that NY state requires that every voting machine that replaces our time-honored "Iron Maidens" (metal mechanical lever-pull boards) voting booths be a paper ballot. Marked with a standard marking machine, and counted electronically - but available for recounts as physical evidence.

Maybe after a few hundred more years running this huge "democracy experiment" we'll finally get right the basics, like counting the votes.

Re: NY Might Keep Physical (Paper) Ballot Records

[Black Parrot]

Maybe after a few hundred more years running this huge "democracy experiment" we'll finally get right the basics, like counting the votes. That will only happen if democracy survives the experiment. Otherwise the politicians in power will ensure that it is *not* fixed.

Heck, Shoup is still in the game today!

[Fantastic Lad]

Except Shoup is now calling itself, "Advanced Voting Solutions" (AVS). You've probably heard of them. --The most astonishing part is that Diebold's, Howard Van Pelt and Larry Ensminger left Diebold and were hired by AVS in late 2004. --And not just a small hire either. Van Pelt and Ensminger are now AVS's President and Vice President!

Here's a little of Shoup's history.

It's a big, hairball of a mess and none of the right people are in jail.

-FL

Re:Heck, Shoup is still in the game today!

[Anonymous Coward]

It's a big, hairball of a mess and none of the right people are in jail. This should be on a T-shirt :)

Re:Heck, Shoup is still in the game today!

[Thing 1]

It's a big, hairball of a mess and none of the right people are in jail.

JUST HOW THE FUCK IS THIS POSSIBLE???

I called it!

[ILuvRamen]

an optical system which will scan and tally the votes while the paper ballots are retained as a backup.

Wooo! I called it! I said in a post 4 weeks ago they should just have a scantron-like technology and there we go, someone pulled their head out of their ass and discovered that's the best idea too. Although I must add here the same tweak in that they should have a glorified printer with no long term memory or counting ability print a scannable ballot after you press some BUTTONS (not the screen). That way you wouldn't error out on people that can't fill out a ballot well enough for the machine to scan it in. As long as the printer doesn't run out of ink, all the ballots would look the same and scan perfectly. Fast voting, fast counting, and a paper trail. Hurray!

Re:I called it!

[Anonymous Coward]

Wooo! I called it! I said in a post 4 weeks ago they should just have a scantron-like technology and there we go, someone pulled their head out of their ass and discovered that's the best idea too.

Hate to burst your bubble, but four years ago (predating your 4-week-old post) this is precisely the system that MD was using...

(CAPTCHA: "crotch". A comment on our political system, perhaps?)

Re:I called it!

[tux_attack]

Agreed, MD did use optical a while back. Also, though I'm not sure I believe that the makers of the optical machines may have been Diebold. Personally I would like to see the system from http://openvotingconsortium.org/ implemented widely since it is open source and uses a optical & paper system.

Because we know what's actually important?

[Chmcginn]

Duh.

Re:Because we know what's actually important?

[Anonymous Coward]

Severely offtopic and a reply to a .sig at that, so posting as AC

Homosexuality: not even mentioned in the New Testament, and the old testament has more to say about the evil of pork.

Say what?

My previous county's voting system

[oahazmatt]

I always enjoyed my previous county's voting system.

Here's your paper, here's your marker. Fill in the dot next to who you're voting for. If you make a mistake, please see one of the attendants for a new ballot and we will destroy the old one, and record the action and confirm it with your signature. If you would like to vote and are unable to properly use the marker, please see one of our attendants for assistance. Once you are done, please slip your ballot into the secured box at either end of the room. The "I voted" sticker is optional and will not be forced on you.

I voted in that county for 7 years, and not once did anyone ever question the authenticity of the outcomes, even when outcomes were close.

Re:My previous county's voting system

[IHC Navistar]

That is exactly the way we've been voting in my city for years.

Here is our process:

1: Show up to the polling place (Some people find this pretty hard to do).
2: Give them your name and DL, Military ID, State ID card, or Passport.
3: They look up your name, address, and Party and give you the appropriate ballot in a hard, opaque plastic sleeve with a black marker pen.
4: You go into a little stall and take as much time as you want figuring out which corrupt blowhard you want to "give" your vote to.
5: You then bring your ballot and pen back to them, in the sleeve, and they tear off the end stub and give it to you as your reciept, and ask you if you want an "I Voted" sticker (which I always get).
6: They then take your ballot out of the sleeve and place it into a scanner that automatically scans the ballot and then drops it into huge, secure safe the size of a washing machine.
7: You then go home, crack open a few beers and wait to see which idiot got elected.

If you are disabled, they always have numerous volunteers from each party specifically designated to aid those with disabilities.

After an election, the paper ballots are tallied and matched against the electronic tally.

How could people find this so goddamn difficult to understand?!

Re:My previous county's voting system

[eaman]

Same here, except for the sticker. And we have something like 80% of the people voting :)

And most importat: it's Italy... Enought said.

Re:My previous county's voting system

[zippthorne]

How could people find this so goddamn difficult to understand?!

No one finds it difficult to understand. They just want to create conditions whereby they can manipulate the vote count or create the impression that the other party is manipulating the vote count. Or both.

Re:My previous county's voting system

[argStyopa]

Simply marking down a space next to the name is elitist discriminatory to the handi-capable!

Blind people can't vote.
People with no arms or legs can't vote.
The comatose and brain-dead can't vote.
People from Florida couldn't understand it.

Are you willing to nearly disenfranchise these voters (or force them to ask for/have assistance) just for your silly, reliable, simple, and trustworthy system?

You're PRACTICALLY Hitler!

Re:My previous county's voting system

[oahazmatt]

Blind people can't vote.
People with no arms or legs can't vote.
The comatose and brain-dead can't vote.
People from Florida couldn't understand it.
They can, they just ask for assistance.
Again, they can, just ask for assistance.
No, but the Governor passes legislation in their name, so it evens out.
We never had a problem with this system. (Guess where Citrus County is.) ;)

Re:My previous county's voting system

[argStyopa]

Notice I said "...or force them to ask for assistance..."

I meant to post sarcastically; obviously the blind and seriously disabled are going to HAVE to ask for assistance no matter what system is used, the brain dead/comatose shouldn't be voting (unless you're a Democrat, in which case you're in favor of ID-free voting, felons voting, so I expect you're in favor of voting for the dead or nearly-so, since it worked so well for Kennedy), and ultimately this whole ISSUE was touched off by a few urban Florida counties where the people were too stupid to figure out a frikkin' PUNCHCARD, so I'm not sure how they safely cross the STREET much less it being a critical issue that these informed, responsible individuals need to cast their ballot. :)

Re:My previous county's voting system

[oahazmatt]

The fact is, my sister lived in the county where a lot of the recount hooplah (that's right, I said hooplah) happened. She was able to decipher the ballot. My friends and I who saw copies of it were able to figure it out. My friend's eleven year old son was able to figure it out when asked how to use it.

The situation may have happened in Florida, but it would have happened in any area where the masses were more embarassed to ask for help than to be sure they voted for whom they wanted.

And I did note the sarcasm in your original post, I was just trying to convey the point that the voting fiasco in Florida was not something that was the result of the entire state. It was just a very vocal, and very stupid group.

Result!

[PipingSnail]

Result!

Oblig. Upton Sinclair's The Jungle

[Wilson_6500]

And shortly afterward one of these [government inspectors], a physician, made the discovery that the carcasses of steers which had been condemned as tubercular by the government inspectors, and which therefore contained ptomaines, which are deadly poisons, were left upon an open platform and carted away to be sold in the city; and so he insisted that these carcasses be treated with an injection of kerosene--and was ordered to resign the same week! So indignant were the packers that they went farther, and compelled the mayor to abolish the whole bureau of inspection; so that since then there has not been even a pretense of any interference with the graft.

Diebold is already rigging this election.

[Anonymous Coward]

Vote rigging, yet another infringement on our rights by the gov't. Add it to the ever-growing list of violations:
They violate the 1st Amendment by opening mail, caging demonstrators and banning books like America Deceived (book) from Amazon.
They violate the 2nd Amendment by confiscating guns during Katrina.
They violate the 4th Amendment by conducting warrant-less wiretaps.
They violate the 5th and 6th Amendment by suspending habeas corpus.
They violate the 8th Amendment by torturing.
They violate the entire Constitution by starting 2 illegal wars based on lies and on behalf of a foriegn gov't.
Support Dr. Ron Paul and save us all.

Re:Diebold is already rigging this election.

[Anonymous Coward]

They violate the 1st Amendment by [...] banning books like America Deceived (book) from Amazon.

Please provide evidence that the government is banning a book from trade on Amazon.com.

Support Dr. Ron Paul and save us all.

How about voting for someone that doesn't caucus with the party responsible for everything on your list, and who isn't determined to outright dismantle every public safety, public welfare, and corporate oversight institution that the current government has already done its best to sabotage.

The man's a crazy, minarchist conservative, not the second coming of Christ.

Its about time

[Anonymous Coward]

I can't understand why Diebold keeps pushing these things. They don't work, can't be audited, are a nightmare waiting to happen. Any state using them is asking for trouble.
Can I Get a Word in

Anything can be manipulated

[Nikker]

FTA:
"In every other part of life, we're going the other way," he said. "I think it's a giant step backward. I can predict our elections will be no more secure and they will be less accurate - that's what the evidence shows."

John Willis, Maryland's former secretary of state and a government professor at the University of Baltimore

Mr. Willis seems to buy today's system. I do think this can be an asset but buying something like this and they tell you not to look under the hood, thats a problem. Even with a "perfect system" there should always be at least 30-40% that are done randomly by paper ballots. This could be done surprisingly simple by designating 3 or 4 out of 10 booths per location a simple paper ballot counted by hand. This way there are too many people involved to take advantage of them all as well with paper only one sheet can be forged at a time ;) You would have an immediate idea of how poler's are deciding and have a balance and check with the paper.

To improve the system even better in terms of security, the electronic component of the system should be open, standardized and engineered to be assembled by parts that even small towns can obtain and assemble. For example old computer parts that can be tested and benchmarked, much of it will be safe as they can provide their functions reliably as long as it is structurally sound.

Re:"guarded, transported to a central location"

[Keith McClary]

guarded, transported to a central location

Better to count them at the local polling station, observed by local reps of parties.

Once you have them in a central location, who is guarding them? The incumbent regime, of course.

Proud to be a Marylander

[tie_guy_matt]

Today I am proud to be a Marylander! I would break out singing a round of "Maryland My Maryland" (still Maryland's official song) if it weren't a song written at about the time of the civil war about what a jerk Lincoln is and how we should join the Confederacy.

Funny in 140 years or so Maryland has gone from that to being one of the more progressive states in the union. Seriously, don't let our past fool you Maryland is a great place to live -- and for the record we never did leave the union. Now let's not get into what the states official motto translates to.

Re:Proud to be a Marylander

[mdsolar]

Thank Linda Schade of the Maryland Green Party. http://truevotemd.org/ was all over this. But, defeat could still be snatched from the jaws of victory. Keep calling your legislators.

Re:Proud to be a Marylander

[GottMitUns]

more progressive states in the union Yeah, by "progressive" you mean the TAX, right. Maryland is the crappiest tax fscking hell. BTW Lincoln was a tyrant. "Sic semper tyrannis!" - John Wilkes Booth

Re:Proud to be a Marylander

[Anonymous Coward]

Funny in 140 years or so Maryland has gone from that to being one of the more progressive states in the union. Seriously, don't let our past fool you Maryland is a great place to live -- and for the record we never did leave the union.

Because Lincoln suspended habious corpus and had our legislature thrown in jail before they could vote on it.

Now let's not get into what the states official motto translates to.

  The complete translation is "Soft words, strong Deeds" Unfortunatly too many people stop with the literal translation.

Re:Proud to be a Marylander

[tie_guy_matt]

And yet Maryland is THE wealthiest state in the union in terms of median household income and 4th richest in terms of personal per capita income (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maryland_locations_by_per_capita_income#_note-0 if it is on wikipedia then you know it is true.) I might have to pay more taxes to live here but when I look at my total paycheck then I literally laugh all the way to the bank. You can keep you lower taxes that go along with you much lower income!

Windows CE insanity

[olman]

While I don't give a hoot about how americans do the physical act of voting, as an electrical engineer I'm appalled about using something like Windows CE to implement a god-darn voting system!

If the voting system is more complicated than a basic 4-function calculator, you're doing something waaaaaaay wrong. Maybe you should just licence the system Brazil uses? Or India? That's where your hi-tech comes from theses days anyhow.

Re:Windows CE insanity

[Shotgun]

If the voting system is more complicated than a basic 4-function calculator, you're doing something waaaaaaay wrong.

If it is more complicated than a ONE function calculator, something is waaaaaaay wrong.

Re:Windows CE insanity

[olman]

Oh, I just assumed you want to have some kind of display where you can see your options. Not strictly necessary of course. But apparently some of those elections have bazillion items in popular vote, so you might have to allow for going forward/backward in a list of selections.

Of course, when you decide to go down with an ATM style display you're already 2/3rd of the way to crazy overcomplicated machine.

Still, if you drive a LCD display that accepts text input the program doesn't have to be complicated at all. Something that can be, ahem, audited.

optical scanners

[nguy]

Anybody who thinks that using paper ballots with optical scanners is secure should have a look at "Hacking Democracy":

http://video.google.de/videoplay?docid=4463776866669054201

Basically, optical scanners can be hacked just as easily as touch screen voting machines, and election officials can easily prevent effective manual recounts.

The only reasonable voting system is one in which all counts are conducted by hand, in public view.

There are some things that don't need to be automated: sex, cooking, hair cutting, and, yes, vote counting.

Are you not armed?

[Anonymous Coward]

Tell your boss to fuck off. Record him/her telling you to vote a certain way and don't. When they find out tell them to fuck off. Record that too.

If your wife won't let you fuck her because you've voted wrong, have a wank. visit a prozzie. Do without sex. She'll crack first. Women are just as sex mad as men.

If your neighbour gives you grief about it, ask them why the fuck they're looking. Ask to look through his garbage and see his till receipts. Tell HIM to fuck off.

Intimidation only works if you're scared of them.

Don't be.

Re:Are you not armed?

[BalanceOfJudgement]

Intimidation only works if you're scared of them.

It also works if the person doing the intimidating has a .45 caliber revolver pointed at your head. Or your child's or spouse's head. Or has already beaten the lower part of your legs to dust and is threatening to do the same thing to someone you care about.

Why do you think the ballot is secret in the first place?!

2010?!

[amigabill]

Isn't that a year late? I was excited to see this subject title, but a little disappointed that it won't be here before we choose our president. :(

Re:2010?!

[pease1]

Isn't that a year late?

Ha ha! Of course Martin needs to cheat to win MD for Hillary next month in order to have a crack at being a running mate. As for the general election, you don't need to worry; the Dem's have already gerrymandered the process to ever prevent a Rep majority in that state; no cracked machines needed.

MoCo represent

[Pojut]

Glad they are doing this...I personally didn't have any problems during the last election insofar as the voting machines themselves go, but givin Diebold's security track record I am very glad this is happening.

electric voting could be great.

[fringd]

cryptographic voting protocols have gotten much better. All that's left to do is write a nice specification, and implement it. this is hard, but my guess is that it'll be easier than the crypography was.

it's sad, but i i think that diebold (and all other current electronic voting machines) may have soured the public opinion of electronic voting so badly that it will be impossible to convince people that cryptographic voting is any good, and cryptovoting was already hard to sell because it's tough to explain how it works.

we need to get the word out on cryptovoting though. it could raise the level of control people have over elections to an unprecedented height. let your less geeky friends know that you think it's good.

that is, if you DO think it's good. may i offer this pdf as a good place to start. also this video is very nice, and seemingly a little more up to date.

So Maryland is goign back to...

[hittman007]

So Maryland is going back to the old system... A system that is easy enough for fourth graders, yet to difficult for many Democrats in Florida...

Hittman

Where's the lawsuit?

[gryf]

How long before the ACLU sues to prevent the state from dumping the electronic balloting system? They fought CA tooth and nail in order to stop an election until electronic balloting was imposed statewide.

They are very adamant about using current electronic balloting systems with no regard for their flaws.

Now I wonder, if they did, would that make the ACLU a card-carrying member of the bushitler conspiracy, or just a shill?

Probably not...

[alispguru]

... because then someone in the states in question would have to admit that They Made A Mistake in approving the machines in the first place, despite the loud public warnings of every computer scientist not employed by an e-voting machine company.

And that would mean that Someone Should Be Fired for negligence and general stupidity. Given that the people most likely to be fired got their jobs via political patronage, that would reflect badly on their patrons.

Therefore, nobody will be punished - except the taxpayers, as always.

Feh.

Re:"guarded, transported to a central location"

[SuiteSisterMary]

This is when you bring in the neutral, 3rd party observers; UN reps, random citizens, and so on.

But yes, I do prefer the 'count them right then and there' method, myself.

why bother to scan?

[falconwolf]

Scanning increases the speed. However I think I prefer India's system. Indian voting machines make it hard to cook an election. Slate has an article on what the US can learn from India.

Falcon

Re:why bother to scan?

[SuiteSisterMary]

Who needs speed? Up here in Canada, where each and every ballot is hand counted, sometimes twice, we still often need to withold east coast results until the west coast's polls have closed.

Hell, far as I'm concerned, it should be flat-out illegal for any sort of 'results' to be advertised before the final, approved counts are in. "We here at Fox news are calling Florida for Bush." Who the FUCK are you, Fox News, to be 'calling' the election? I could have sworn that, oh, you know, THE PEOPLE call the election? You know, by VOTING?

Who needs speed?

[falconwolf]

Up here in Canada, where each and every ballot is hand counted, sometimes twice, we still often need to withold east coast results until the west coast's polls have closed.

According to wiki Canada's population is just over 33 million. The USA's population is 10 tymes that. If it were possible to have all votes counted by hand like that town in New Hampshire, which had less than 100 voters, that would be okay. However look at the hand counts in Palm Beach County. Republicans took it all the way to the US Supreme Court to stop the hand counting.

as I'm concerned, it should be flat-out illegal for any sort of 'results' to be advertised before the final, approved counts are in.

While I believe the official tallies should be held until all polling stations are closed, to bar the press from reporting exit poll results would be an abridgment of free speech.

Falcon

Re:Who needs speed?

[SuiteSisterMary]

According to wiki Canada's population is just over 33 million. The USA's population is 10 tymes that. If it were possible to have all votes counted by hand like that town in New Hampshire, which had less than 100 voters, that would be okay. However look at the hand counts in Palm Beach County. Republicans took it all the way to the US Supreme Court to stop the hand counting.

Oh gods, I was waiting for somebody to trot out this argument.

Look, America has ten times the votes to count, maybe it should just employ ten times the vote counters?

Republicans took it all the way to the US Supreme Court to stop the hand counting.

Well, we can branch this off into another discussion if you'd like, but mayhaps part of the problem here is that the judical branch just asserted more power over the voting system than the electorate?

While I believe the official tallies should be held until all polling stations are closed, to bar the press from reporting exit poll results would be an abridgment of free speech.

Arguable; there are tons of examples I can trot out of this very thing. Can't report the name of a young offender, for example.

Reporting exit poll results are one thing, however; deriving future winners from those polls are something else, and 'calling' the election is a third thing. I seem to recall, for example, Gore giving his initial concession speech based on a reporter 'calling' the election for Bush; forget waiting for the acutal votes to be counted...

In other words, maybe the unconstitutionality of the Press choosing the President, rather than the Electoral Colleges as determined by the Several States, trumps the unconstitutionality of telling the press that they have to wait until the next day to report something.

But getting back to exit polls; why report them? I'd say that one shouldn't be reporting them during the election lest it sway undecided voters, who should be voting the issues and their consiences, rather than 'gaming' the polls. Of course, this is only a problem in the 'winner takes all' and defacto 'two party' system America has; institute some sort of preference voting, and the problem goes right away, and suddenly the best plan for one side is to run, in addition to their own guy, a moderate on the other side to split their vote. Ref. Ross Perot. Or Nader.

Re:Who needs speed?

[falconwolf]

Look, America has ten times the votes to count, maybe it should just employ ten times the vote counters?

More counters costs more money.

Arguable; there are tons of examples I can trot out of this very thing. Can't report the name of a young offender, for example.

That's to protect the young.

I seem to recall, for example, Gore giving his initial concession speech based on a reporter 'calling' the election for Bush; forget waiting for the acutal votes to be counted...

That was Gore's fault. Just as all too many people in the US are impatient so was Gore.

maybe the unconstitutionality of the Press choosing the President, rather than the Electoral Colleges as determined by the Several States

It was in fact the electoral college that picked the president. What the press did was possibly affect the outcome of the election, which in the end the population is responsible for. I'm tempted to blame those who don't use their critical thinking skills, if they have them, for the outcome they voted for. However those who use their skills also have to pay the price. I have to blame myself for this as well, in 2000 instead of voting for whom I wanted to vote, I specifically voted against Bush by selecting Gore. Though I think Gore was bad to me Bush was worse and the election was too close for me. Unfortunately though Bush's Florida campaign manager was also in charge of elections in Florida and she made sure Bush would win the state.

But getting back to exit polls; why report them? I'd say that one shouldn't be reporting them during the election lest it sway undecided voters

If they, the voters, haven't decided by election day then maybe they shouldn't vote. They had months to decide who they wanted to vote for, what's the problem. Of all the candidates I know who are running now I already know who I'd vote for, Ron Paul. However I need to wait to see who else will run.

Of course, this is only a problem in the 'winner takes all' and defacto 'two party' system America has

I hat how presidential elected are setup so a candidate who "wins" a state carries all of the electoral votes for the state. Instead each candidate should get the number of electors they win in a state. This would allow smaller political parties to have a bigger say, but the Democrat and Republicans would fight tooth and nail to keep their power.

institute some sort of preference voting, and the problem goes right away

I'm not sure what you mean but it ma be like what I'd like to see. That would be that voters would rank candidates in order of preference. Say there are 5 candidates, a voter can give candidate A 5 points. And if A doesn't win but the voter would rather have candidate B win over candidate C, the voter could give B 4 points. Or if the voter doesn't want to give any candidate anything they don't have to. After all voting is done, the points for each candidate are added up and the candidate with the most votes wins. And in the case of the presidential elections, the candidate with the second highest count becomes the Vice President. In 2000 I could have given my candidate, Harry Browne, 5 points, Gore 3, and left it like that. Elections can use one of the Condorcet methods such as Ranked Pairs.

Falcon

Re:Who needs speed?

[SuiteSisterMary]

More counters costs more money.

More money than the electronic voting machines? Also, and don't take this the wrong way, but aren't there volunteers?

As to the other, yes, I think you have the idea. Condorcet, Instant Runoff Voting, there's all sorts of methods. Probably any one of them would have resulted in a far and away victory for Gore in 2000, say, as most of the Nader votes would have gone to Gore after Nader was eliminated.

That, and hard term limits on Congress and Senate will solve quite a few problems with the American electoral system. In, of course, my most "humble" opinion. :-)

Re:Who needs speed?

[falconwolf]

More money than the electronic voting machines? Also, and don't take this the wrong way, but aren't there volunteers?

Workers cost more I think, though I don't know. If the machines are sturdy they should last for years and years whereas pay would have to be paid year after year. And yes there are some who volunteer. I did myself, I was deputized to register people to vote and took part in registering people in a voters' drive.

That, and hard term limits on Congress and Senate will solve quite a few problems with the American electoral system.

I'm torn on term limits. On the one hand I hate how some become professional politicians and get very little if any experience in the real world. As the same tyme though I want to be able to vote for whomever I want to vote for. Say a person can only serve in office for two terms, if they are good I may want to be able to vote for them for a third term, but term limits would mean I couldn't.

Falcon