New Backup Voting System May Pose Problems
101412
WASHINGTON - Call it the law of unintended consequences. A new national backup system meant to ensure that millions of eligible voters are not mistakenly turned away from the polls this year, as happened in 2000, could wind up causing Election Day problems as infamous as Florida's hanging chads...
570807
The 100,000 electronic voting machines in use in Tuesday's election have a big downside: Candidates who dispute the results won't have a way to conduct a meaningful recount. Analysis by Kim Zetter.
730234
By Jennifer Davies, The San Diego Union-Tribune  Jun. 22--From hanging chads to computer glitches that mysteriously lose  thousands of votes, Lori Steele figures there has to be a better way to run  elections.
215062
For some, voting day will be violent and disappointing. For others, just plain confusing. And the Sunnis may have to be drawn in after the fact
1130
It&#39;s possible that everyone who votes by Tuesday will wake up Wednesday morning a loser. The presidential election could produce a clouded result because of disputed ballots or challenges to ballot tallies.
749772
(InfoWorld) - The U.K.'s trial of e-voting and e-counting technologies during last month's local elections resulted in crashed computers and technicians scratching their heads while posing new concerns about the systems' security and reliability, a new report has concluded. In one area of England, a manual recount performed after e-counting equipment was abandoned because of delays turned up a raft of uncounted votes, said Jason Kitcat, e-voting coordinator for the Open Rights Group, which deployed observers to polling sites in England and Scotland. The group, which has been critical of e-voting and e-counting, has submitted its 64-page report to the U.K. Electoral Commission, which will publish its own report on the trials on Aug. 3. The Department for Constitutional Affairs, which oversaw the pilot programs, said it welcomed the role of observers but would reserve comment until the Electoral Commission publishes its report. The Electoral Commission also did not comment. The U.K., which embarked on a voting modernization program in 2000, held trials in 13 administrative areas in England. Scotland replaced manual counting with e-counting technologies for the first time. The government has backed e-voting technologies, including postal voting and Internet voting, to increase voter participation. Open Rights Group volunteers watched how polling stations conducted e-voting, but much of the process was opaque due to the nature of how e-voting machines work, Kitcat said. The majority of polling stations experienced technical problems, ranging from laptop problems to unreliable electronic registers, the report said. Employees of vendors whose equipment was deployed refused to interact with observers, Kitcat said. "No one would really say what was going on," Kitcat said. "It was all so mysterious." However, observers did identify potential security problems. The report includes photographs of PC workstations and hubs with open ports, a possible security risk. "Network hubs were left on the floor with power and network connections loose," the report said. "In one case in Edinburgh, a hub was observed in easy reach of attendees, with ports free lying beneath a table providing an opportunity for unauthorized access to the e-counting system's network." E-counting scanners proved finicky due to incorrect paper sizes, scanner sensitivity and trouble in handling low-quality perforations on ballots. The most curious error in e-counting occurred in a ward in Breckland, England, where voters were give two ballots: one each for district council and parish elections. Officials tried an electronic count, but came up with far fewer district ballots than parish ballots when the two counts should be roughly the same, Kitcat said. A manual recount turned up about 56 percent more district council ballots. "We haven't been given an explanation by the election official or suppliers," Kitcat said. In Scotland, observers noted that election officials could log into the e-counting software merely by scanning a bar code on their identification badges, which the Open Rights Group cited as another security concern. Some election officials were positive about using new election technologies, but "the lack of general technical understanding and knowledge about the e-counting and e-voting systems across election staff was perturbing," the report said. Â
129545
Elections experts today questioned the reliability and security of e-voting systems during a congressional committee hearing.
719257
By KELLY WIESE    JEFFERSON CITY, Mo.  -- Missouri will allow members of the military stationed overseas to return absentee ballots via e-mail, raising concerns from Internet security experts about fraud and ballot secrecy...
130044
Pentagon efforts to fix absentee voting problems among U.S. troops that marred the 2000 election have run into trouble as plans to use the Internet crumbled and a fax or e-mail balloting system draws fire.
259856
As elections get tighter and more complicated, it's inevitable that one of them will be so thoroughly botched it'll have to be done over. It's time to start thinking about how. Commentary by Bruce Schneier.
201342
While most experts appear to agree that electronic voting has real problems, few argue that they could completely undermine the November election.
693153
Many state and local officials are making last-minute efforts to limit or reverse the rollout of new machines in the November elections.
664617
In another indictment of the reliability of electronic voting systems, a report released Friday shows some Ohio tallies could be rendered inaccurate using tools as simple as a magnet.
107971
Although some have raised concerns about votes being verified, others say special safeguards secure the system.
50976
Flaw-proof election machines. Easy-to-read ballots. Registration systems that catch double-voters or dead voters still on the rolls.
624413
Six U.S. states participating in Super Tuesday primary elections are at high risk for voting-machine malfunction or tampering because they don&#39;t have paper backups, according to a report released by the Verified Voting Foundation and Common Cause.
105888
Also: E-voting a 'threat' to UK democracy. Read these stories and more from around the Web on News.com Extra.