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Brazilian Breaks Secrecy of Brazil's E-Voting Machines With Van Eck Phreaking

Posted by timothy on from the old-ways-are-best dept.

After the report last week that Brazil's e-voting machines had withstood the scrutiny of a team of invited hackers, reader ateu writes with news that a hacker has shown that the Linux-based voting machines aren't perfectly safe; he was able to eavesdrop on them (translated from Portuguese) by means of Van Eck phreaking.

7 of 157 comments (clear)

  1. Whew, that was a close one... by robwgibbons · · Score: 4, Insightful

    "Listening in" and actually breaking the security of the machine are two entirely different things. What's the most someone could do with this exploit? Basically it just allows for a more accurate exit-poll. As far as I see it, the machine's security has still yet to be bested.

    1. Re:Whew, that was a close one... by Animaether · · Score: 4, Insightful

      What's the most someone could do with this exploit? Basically it just allows for a more accurate exit-poll.

      Basically.. all of the reasons you want voting to be done anonymously apply here.

      If you can couple the emissions at the location of the machine with the emissions from a particular user - say, their mobile phone's signature - then you can go back to forcing people to vote for X and make sure that they do, roughing them up as an example to the others you told to vote for X if you detected a vote for Y instead, without a need to plant something on them or leaving any trace.

      In theory, anyway.

  2. Re:Honestly by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Easy. Take the machine, hollow them out, put a board in and use their shell as a guard from prying eyes for pen&paper voting. The manufacturers of the machines get the money and we get secure and anonymous voting.

    --
    We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  3. Re:Honestly by Nimey · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Low-contrast fonts are probably right out, since you don't want to disenfranchise old folks and others with vision problems.

    --
    Hail Eris, full of mischief...

    E pluribus sanguinem
  4. No technology will prevent that by lwoggardner · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Not to say that secrecy isn't important, but once it requires a certain level of technology to eavesdrop then surely you just pick some random people and rough them up anyway telling the people you are intimidating that you have this "magic" eavesdropping technology.

  5. Re:Van Eck Phreacking will always exist by Frankie70 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If your country really is free (something that Brazil is good at) there is no problem telling everybody who you voted on..
    Vote's anonymity only makes it easier to fake elections.

    Don't be silly.
    Secret ballot is one of the cornerstones of democracy.

    In a secret ballot, you don't get bribed to vote for a particular person because you can
    always say you voted for him while voting for him.
    Likewise, about getting pressured about voting for someone.

  6. As a person in the infosec field by seifried · · Score: 4, Insightful

    This is why I love the Canadian method: paper with circles, make an "X" in the circle you want, fold the paper and put it in the ballot box. Good luck hacking that on a large scale (what with scrutineers from multiple parties watching the election and the count and each other, plus the people there as independent scrutineers watching everyone else), and monitoring it (little cardboard voting booth on a table, voila, privacy. The only argument I could imagine is finger prints on the ballots, but you can wear gloves if you want.