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Voting Machine Used in Half of US Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds (wsj.com)
Election machines used in more than half of U.S. states carry a flaw disclosed more than a decade ago that makes them vulnerable to a cyberattack, WSJ reported, citing a report which will be made public Thursday on Capitol Hill. From the report: The issue was found in the widely used Model 650 high-speed ballot-counting machine made by Election Systems & Software LLC, the nation's leading manufacturer of election equipment. It is one of about seven security problems in several models of voting equipment described in the report, which is based on research conducted last month at the Def Con hacker conference. The flaw in the ES&S machine stood out because it was detailed in a security report commissioned by Ohio's secretary of state in 2007, said Harri Hursti, an election-security researcher who co-wrote both the Ohio and Def Con reports. "There has been more than plenty of time to fix it," he said.
While the Model 650 is still being sold on the ES&S website, a company spokeswoman said it stopped manufacturing the systems in 2008. The machine doesn't have the advanced security features of more-modern systems, but ES&S believes "the security protections on the M650 are strong enough to make it extraordinarily difficult to hack in a real world environment," the spokeswoman said via email. The machines process paper ballots and can therefore be reliably audited, she said. The Def Con report is the latest warning from researchers, academics and government officials who say election systems in the U.S. are at risk to tampering.
While the Model 650 is still being sold on the ES&S website, a company spokeswoman said it stopped manufacturing the systems in 2008. The machine doesn't have the advanced security features of more-modern systems, but ES&S believes "the security protections on the M650 are strong enough to make it extraordinarily difficult to hack in a real world environment," the spokeswoman said via email. The machines process paper ballots and can therefore be reliably audited, she said. The Def Con report is the latest warning from researchers, academics and government officials who say election systems in the U.S. are at risk to tampering.
The way things are going, American needs the UN to come in and observe the election. It won't be long until the general public no longer trusts the results.
Far from being "great again", the country is turning into a third world shit hole.
(1) The paper can be quickly scanned by machine, for a same-day tally.
(2) However the stacks of paper ballots will provide a verifiable audit trail, which can be hand-counted if the machines' integrity is doubted.
The main flaw with today's system is NO audit trail exists (which is probably what the political bosses want).
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
Look, we all know how to deal with the continual Russian hacking, the EU has demonstrated the only thing that works are paper ballots and non-networked vote counting machines with an audit trail.
And, yes, it's Russia.
Luckily for those of us on the West Coast, Oregon, California, and Washington State all vote by mail using paper ballots.
-- Tigger warning: This post may contain tiggers! --
> As far as Trump and his supporters are concerned, this isn't a bug, it's a feature.
I wish I could blame Trump, but in my home state the DEMOCRATS are in control (75% majority). It was the Democrats that pushed to phase-out paper ballots (which worked perfectly) and replace them with computers (which can be hacked/miscounted).
It was also the Democrats that turned my home state into the most gerrymandered state in the country: https://www.washingtonpost.com...
HONESTLY:
I think both parties suck ass. I wouldn't trust any GOP or DNC politician with the key to my house.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
In good ole UK we use following system
* Every year little form through post to register folk in household for election register ( can state if entry not public info )
* Get card through post about next election
* On day of election go to polling station.
* If you have polling card fine if not any proof of id or even just name and address
* You get ticked off on paper list
* Given your bit of paper go into little booth
* Make X next to candidate ( for EU and local elections may be more than 1 )
* Fold up
* Put in box
* Someone outside will ask you who you vote for. I always decline ( exit poll I think it called )
Then those boxes are taped up and sent to counting station. Lots of paid folk count them out.
They announce vote about 8-12 hours later
Simples
This is what you should be reading: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/0... There are so many problems with our voting system, it can't be attributed to mere greed and stupidity...
We play the game with the bravery of being out of range
are much, much bigger problems than this. If we really care about democracy then we should make voting mandatory (doing so would end voter suppression), require all states to have vote by mail and apply open-source algorithms that are legally required to divide the population equitably (I don't know the algorithms off hand, but there are several that are considered fair and effective). Finally voting rights should be restored when you're done serving your prison sentence. The only reason to take voting rights away from ex-cons is to suppress their (left wing) votes.
But, well, I don't think we really care. There's a significant number of Americans who think it's a bad idea to let the "wrong" people vote. It's funny to see the double think involved when they somehow reconcile this thought with their love of democracy...
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The model 650 is the supersized version of the precint optical scan ballot counter (model 100).
First.. THIS IS PAPER BALLOT! so they can be recounted and recounted by hand. THew same ballots can even be counted on multiple machines. SO yeah paper ballots! The operative word here is "can". Lots of roadblocks to actually recounting. If all the machines are in use you can't just use one machine to recount another's ballots. Well you could and it wold work just fine but there lots of procedure violations in that so it won't happen. Likewise triggering a hand count is problematic in most states. But that said. the paper is there.
Second the archaic nature of these machines is in some ways good. Look at the dot matrix printers it uses. Those are not like modern laser printers which are full up computing machines with lots of flashabvle attack vectors like font files and toner chips and stuff. These very likely have hardwired rom fonts and no perating systems at all. Many of the crazy things you can get modrn OS's so do are foreclosed bu obsolete technology that is just smart enough to do what it does. And scanning an optical ballot doesn't require too much. It's not even doing OCR or imaging processing.
So this machine might have some attack vectors but they are if anything easier to enumerate and thus prevent than something running the very latest Windows 10 or Linux zooey zooey or whatever.
the vendors of course love to hear that the old machines are dangerous and need to be replaced. So no matter where this story originated expaect it to get amplified
Some drink at the fountain of knowledge. Others just gargle.
It's a high speed ballot counter. Back in the day, before the great buyup and consolidation of the elections business, I designed much of a competing machine.
"Eve of Destruction", it's not just for old hippies anymore...
I've heard Wisconsin is bad, but not as bad as Maryland. Here's the relevant quote: "The districts are among the least geographically compact in the nation."
- There are points in Maryland where the district is only one block wide, in order to reach from 40-mile distant mountains into cities like D.C. or Baltimore (which are Democrat).
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
> Wisconsin has 37.5% democratic seats in spite of the fact that the democrats got [49.75%] of the vote.
I corrected you based on the actual results. So that means the Wisconsin gap between popular vote and seats in the U.S. House is about 12 and a half percent.
The gap in Maryland is 60.4% popular vote for the majority party (DNC) and 7/8 of the seats == 27% gap.
CONCLUSION: Maryland is still "more gerrymandered" than Wisconsin, even if I use your methodology.
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
P.S. I should include the GOP too:
The GOP in Maryland got 35.5% popular vote and only 12.5% of the house seats.... which is 23% gap (due to the GOP being gerrymandered out of two of their rural, non-urban seats).
That still exceeds the GOP gap in Wisconsin of just 16.6%.
Maryland is far worse (again using YOUR proposed method).
"I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall