Why We Fear the Digital Ballot
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While most experts appear to agree that electronic voting has real problems, few argue that they could completely undermine the November election.
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They love using their iPods, laptops and cell phones for political information, yet many young adults say they aren't quite sure how to get a ballot in the first place.
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(InfoWorld) - The U.S. House of Representatives is set to vote as early as Thursday on a bill that would require a paper record for electronic voting machines. Representative Rush Holt's Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act, which has 216 cosponsors in the 435-member House, would require that all e-voting machines used in the November 2008 U.S. elections be accompanied by a voter-verified paper ballot. E-voting critics have been calling for paper-trail ballots for several years, arguing there's no way to audit e-voting machines without them. Holt, a New Jersey Democrat, said on his Web site that he's pleased the House is set to move forward with the legislation. His bill would require random audits of voting results in 3 percent of all U.S. precincts, and it would prohibit e-voting machines that include wireless or Internet connections. While groups like Common Cause and VerifiedVoting.org have called for paper trails, groups like the National Federation of the Blind have resisted efforts to slow the adoption of e-voting machines, saying e-voting allows blind people to vote without assistance for the first time. The Holt bill faces several obstacles to becoming law, said Matt Zimmerman, a lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, which supports the bill. "It is not at all clear whether the bill will pass or, even if it does, whether a substantively similar companion bill will then pass the Senate," Zimmerman wrote on the EFF blog. "Like it or not, with election officials arguing that they're running out of time to implement wholesale changes, this likely amounts to Congress's only attempt to make any serious improvements to the nation's election procedures ahead of the 2008 presidential election." Common Cause sent an alert to members Wednesday morning, urging them to contact lawmakers in support of the bill, said Mary Boyle, a Common Cause spokeswoman. "This is the last chance for Congress to ensure that ballots are backed by paper records in the critical 2008 presidential election," she said.
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Learns that technology is no panacea Florida, the epicentre of hopelessly confused US elections, is chucking touch-screen ballot machines in favour of optical scanners, the Associated Press reports.â¦
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Last month, a group of Princeton University researchers discovered how easy it was to inject malicious software into a Diebold voting machine, enabling it to flip votes between candidates. This isn't a new problem. You'd think the solution might be better cryptography, but just what constitutes "better?"
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As the primary season continues, observers of the electronic-voting scene ask whether it's possible to tally the ballots efficiently while restoring Americans' faith in the process. Random, mandatory audits of cast ballots show promise, but even after demonstrated successes, not everyone's on board.
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(InfoWorld) - The U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has recommended that the U.S. government require touch-screen electronic voting machines to include independent audit technology, such as printouts. "The lack of an independent audit capability in systems is one of the main reasons behind continued questions about voting system security and diminished public confidence in elections," says a NIST paper released this month. "In practical terms the software-dependent approach cannot be made secure or highly reliable." The Technical Guidelines Development Committee of the U.S. Elections Assistance Commission (EAC) is scheduled to review the NIST's recommendation that direct record electronic (DRE) machines include voter-verified paper trails or other auditing mechanisms at a meeting Monday and Tuesday. DREs do not assure that voting records are accurate, and 15 states using the e-voting machines do not use independent audit mechanisms statewide, the NIST paper says. "Trust in an election outcome relies heavily upon trusting the correctness of the DRE's software and upon trusting that the DRE software has not been replaced or tampered with," the paper says. "Simply put, the DRE architecture's inability to provide for independent audits of its electronic records makes it a poor choice for an environment in which detecting errors and fraud is important." A spokesman for the Information Technology Association of America (ITAA), representing e-voting machine vendors, didn't immediately return a message seeking comment on the NIST recommendations. The ITAA has argued that paper trail ballots may simply print out the same results stored on the DREs. Paper trail systems can be costly to add on to DREs, and printer breakdowns can cause problems during elections, the ITAA has said. One e-voting critic praised the report. "That's really good news," said Barbara Burt, director of the election reform program at Common Cause, one of several groups calling for e-voting paper trails. "It looks like it's going to help us finally get rid of the paperless DREs." NIST's recommendations come after scattered reports of problems with DREs in the Nov. 7 U.S. elections. In Florida's 13th congressional district, Democratic candidate Christine Jennings has filed a lawsuit asking for a revote after 18,000 voters failed to cast a vote in the U.S. House of Representatives race. Two recounts found Republican Vern Buchanan the winner of the race, but Sarasota County did not require the Elections System and Software (ES&S) e-voting machines to include paper printouts to back up the electronic vote. While e-voting supporters say the machines make it hard to undervote, Sarasota County voters cast about 16,000 more votes in the Florida governor's race and in the Florida Senate race than were recorded in the House race. About 4,000 more people cast ballots for the county's Southern District Hospital Board than were recorded in the House race. Thirty-five states either mandate voter-verified paper-trail systems or use them statewide without a mandate, according to the NIST report. But 10 states use paper-trail ballots on a county-by-county basis, and five states, including Maryland, Georgia and Louisiana, use DREs statewide without paper- trail ballots. The NIST paper published this month recommends states use "software-independent" voting systems, using either paper-trail ballots or cryptographic audit systems instead of relying on the "correctness of the software" for election results. The paper suggests that the EAC require audit mechanisms in e-voting machines, and recommends that federal election officials stop certifying e-voting machines without independent audit systems after 2009 or 2010.ADVERTISEMENTNEW IT SERVICES FROM IBM: EASIER TO BUY AND IMPLEMENTDiscover a simpler, more cost-effective way to get the solutions your company needs to grow more flexible and efficient.
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Delaying the January vote would raise new dangers. So will going ahead
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Flaw-proof election machines. Easy-to-read ballots. Registration systems that catch double-voters or dead voters still on the rolls.
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People hoping to stay awake long enough to see who wins California's primary might have a very long night because of what could be record-breaking voter turnout and a change back to paper ballots. Because of concerns over reliability, California decertified many of the state's electronic voting machines.
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More weaknesses appear in the Diebold electronic voting system that activists say could be used to rig the November election. The company says auditing procedures would catch any vote fraud. By Kim Zetter.
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Voters living abroad face an unwieldy system of absentee balloting that could prevent their votes from being counted.
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Vendors make plea for reality Electronic voting machines used in Ohio contain critical security failures that could jeopardize the integrity of state elections, according to a study commissioned by Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner.â¦
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Ever wonder why fear-mongering seems to work so well at the pollsâwhile appeals to reason often leave the electorate cold? A new book applies neuroscience to politics to figure out why the Democrats struggle to push the buttons in voters' brains.
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I think that deciding to vote for someone is an important and a tough choice. You know there are Democrat voters and Republican voters so you know who they are going to vote for.
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A report by Princeton University researchers questions the security measures used in Diebold Election Systems' touch-screen voting systems. But the company disputed the concerns, saying its e-voting hardware is safe from tampering.
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Inside the battle for a critical chunk of votes