Diebold Election Audit Logs Defective

mtrachtenberg writes "Premier Election Solutions' (formerly Diebold) GEMS 1.18.19 election software audit logs don't record the deletion of ballots, don't always record correct dates, and can be deleted by the operator, either accidentally or intentionally. The California Secretary of State's office has just released a report about the situation (PDF) in the November 2008 election in Humboldt County, California (which we discussed at the time). Here's the California Secretary of State's links page on Diebold. The conclusion of the 13-page report reads: 'GEMS version 1.18.19 contains a serious software error that caused the omission of 197 ballots from the official results (which was subsequently corrected) in the November 4, 2008, General Election in Humboldt County. The potential for this error to corrupt election results is confined to jurisdictions that tally ballots using the GEMS Central Count Server. Key audit trail logs in GEMS version 1.18.19 do not record important operator interventions such as deletion of decks of ballots, assign inaccurate date and time stamps to events that are recorded, and can be deleted by the operator. The number of votes erroneously deleted from the election results reported by GEMS in this case greatly exceeds the maximum allowable error rate established by HAVA. In addition, each of the foregoing defects appears to violate the 1990 Voting System Standards to an extent that would have warranted failure of the GEMS version 1.18.19 system had they been detected and reported by the Independent Testing Authority that tested the system.'"

Comments

Fraud

[Hatta]

Ok, so when do we get to throw Diebold exec in jail for election tampering already?

Re:Fraud

[TheGratefulNet]

life sentence.

seriously. one of the purposes of jail is to send a CLEAR MESSAGE that behavior such as this is not to be tolerated.

and no hiding behind corp names - individuals at the top of the company should do jail time. no debate about that - they must directly feel the pain for the LOSS OF DEMOCRACY we suffered.

200 yrs ago, give or take a few, people would be HANGED for this for treason. how is this not treason?

I don't agree with hanging but I do agree with a 20+ year jail sentence. let the CEO's of the world know that there are some things that are so holy, you JUST DON'T MESS WITH THEM. democracy and fair voting is such a fundamental thing.

a message should be sent. mandatory jail time with 20 years min. drug offenders who do FAR less damage to society are doing this today; why not punish REAL criminals for a change?

Re:Fraud

[Ethanol-fueled]

We should change the laws to hold devices used in state and federal elections to similar or same standards as life-critical medical devices.

In which case the engineers who signed off on the thing and any executives who knowingly pushed defective gear out the door would be punished and sanctioned.

"Hold a voting machine to similar standards as critical care life-support? that's ludicrous!", some might say. But if a corrupt group of politicians could rig the machines to get into power and (hypothetically, of course) start a war and that would cause many more deaths than some spurious bug in some medical equipment.

Re:Fraud

[Anonymous Coward]

I vote we throw them all in jail!

YOU HAVE SELECTED ICE CREAM PARTY.

Wait. Now wait one minute, I *know* I voted jail...

Re:Fraud

[geobeck]

But if a corrupt group of politicians could rig the machines to get into power and (hypothetically, of course) start a war and that would cause many more deaths than some spurious bug in some medical equipment.

Pfft, like that could ever happen. And if it did, they'd be unceremoniously thrown out after a single term.

Re:Old news

[Anonymous Coward]

Only a VB programmer could make something as simple as:

candidates[choice]++;

as complicated as using Access on Windows.

The real problem

[WindBourne]

Ou banking system makes heavy use of Diebold. One of two things is happening.

1. Diebold is inept and we have mass issues in our banking systems.
2. Diebold has PURPOSELY done this.

I have not seen a single issue in my accounts due to ATMs.