From NEWSWEEK, May 29, 2006 issue:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12888600/site/newsweek

Will Your Vote Count in 2006?

'When you're using a paperless voting system, there is no security,'
says Stanford's David Dill.

By Steven Levy
Newsweek

May 29, 2006 issue -

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the voting booth,
here comes more disturbing news about the trustworthiness of
electronic touchscreen ballot machines.

Earlier this month a report by Finnish security expert Harri Hursti
analyzed Diebold voting machines for an organization called Black Box
Voting.

Hursti found unheralded vulnerabilities in the machines that are
currently entrusted to faithfully record the votes of millions of
Americans.

How bad are the problems?

Experts are calling them the most serious voting-machine flaws ever
documented.

Basically the trouble stems from the ease with which the machine's
software can be altered.

It requires only a few minutes of pre-election access to a Diebold
machine to open the machine and insert a PC card that, if it contained
malicious code, could reprogram the machine to give control to the
violator.

The machine could go dead on Election Day or throw votes to the wrong
candidate.

Worse, it's even possible for such ballot-tampering software to trick
authorized technicians into thinking that everything is working fine,
an illusion you couldn't pull off with pre-electronic systems.

"If Diebold had set out to build a system as insecure as they possibly
could, this would be it," says Avi Rubin, a Johns Hopkins University
computer-science professor and elections-security expert.

Diebold Election Systems spokesperson David Bear says Hursti's
findings do not represent a fatal vulnerability in Diebold technology,
but simply note the presence of a feature that allows access to
authorized technicians to periodically update the software.

If it so happens that someone not supposed to use the machine--or an
election official who wants to put his or her thumb on the scale of
democracy--takes advantage of this fast track to fraud, that's not
Diebold's problem.

"[Our critics are] throwing out a 'what if' that's premised on a basis
of an evil, nefarious person breaking the law," says Bear.

Those familiar with the actual election process--by and large run by
honest people but historically subject to partisan politicking, dirty
tricks and sloppy practices--are less sanguine.

"It gives me a bit of alarm that the voting systems are subject to
tampering and errors," says Democratic Rep. William Lacy Clay, who
worries that machines in his own St. Louis district might be affected
by this vulnerability.

(In Maryland and Georgia, all the machines are Diebold's.)

The Diebold security gap is only the most vivid example of the reality
that no electronic voting system can be 100 percent safe or reliable.

That's the reason behind an initiative to augment these systems,
adding a paper receipt that voters can check to make sure it conforms
with their choices.

The receipt is retained at the polling place so a physical count can
be conducted.

"When you're using a paperless voting system, there is no security,"
says David Dill, a Stanford professor who founded the election-reform
organization Verified Voting.

To their credit, 26 states have taken action to implement paper
trails.

But the U.S. Congress has yet to pass legislation introduced last year
by Rep. Rush Holt, Democrat of New Jersey, that would extend this
protection nationwide.

Holt says his bill is slowly gaining support.

"The voters are saying that every vote should count, and the only way
to do this is by verified audit trails," he says.

But even an optimistic scenario for passage would challenge his goal
of mandatory paper receipts for November's elections.

In other words, it's unlikely that every voter using an electronic
voting device in 2006 will know for sure that his or her vote will be
reflected in the actual totals.

Six years after the 2000 electoral debacle, how can this be?

_____________________________________________________

Will Your Vote Count in 2006? Depends on where you live. Didn't know
you lived in a banana republic, did you.

Harry

From NEWSWEEK, May 29, 2006 issue:
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/12888600/site/newsweek

Will Your Vote Count in 2006?

'When you're using a paperless voting system, there is no security,'
says Stanford's David Dill.

By Steven Levy
Newsweek

May 29, 2006 issue -

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the voting booth,
here comes more disturbing news about the trustworthiness of
electronic touchscreen ballot machines.

Earlier this month a report by Finnish security expert Harri Hursti
analyzed Diebold voting machines for an organization called Black Box
Voting.

Hursti found unheralded vulnerabilities in the machines that are
currently entrusted to faithfully record the votes of millions of
Americans.

How bad are the problems?

Experts are calling them the most serious voting-machine flaws ever
documented.

Basically the trouble stems from the ease with which the machine's
software can be altered.

It requires only a few minutes of pre-election access to a Diebold
machine to open the machine and insert a PC card that, if it contained
malicious code, could reprogram the machine to give control to the
violator.

The machine could go dead on Election Day or throw votes to the wrong
candidate.

Worse, it's even possible for such ballot-tampering software to trick
authorized technicians into thinking that everything is working fine,
an illusion you couldn't pull off with pre-electronic systems.

"If Diebold had set out to build a system as insecure as they possibly
could, this would be it," says Avi Rubin, a Johns Hopkins University
computer-science professor and elections-security expert.

Diebold Election Systems spokesperson David Bear says Hursti's
findings do not represent a fatal vulnerability in Diebold technology,
but simply note the presence of a feature that allows access to
authorized technicians to periodically update the software.

If it so happens that someone not supposed to use the machine--or an
election official who wants to put his or her thumb on the scale of
democracy--takes advantage of this fast track to fraud, that's not
Diebold's problem.

"[Our critics are] throwing out a 'what if' that's premised on a basis
of an evil, nefarious person breaking the law," says Bear.

Those familiar with the actual election process--by and large run by
honest people but historically subject to partisan politicking, dirty
tricks and sloppy practices--are less sanguine.

"It gives me a bit of alarm that the voting systems are subject to
tampering and errors," says Democratic Rep. William Lacy Clay, who
worries that machines in his own St. Louis district might be affected
by this vulnerability.

(In Maryland and Georgia, all the machines are Diebold's.)

The Diebold security gap is only the most vivid example of the reality
that no electronic voting system can be 100 percent safe or reliable.

That's the reason behind an initiative to augment these systems,
adding a paper receipt that voters can check to make sure it conforms
with their choices.

The receipt is retained at the polling place so a physical count can
be conducted.

"When you're using a paperless voting system, there is no security,"
says David Dill, a Stanford professor who founded the election-reform
organization Verified Voting.

To their credit, 26 states have taken action to implement paper
trails.

But the U.S. Congress has yet to pass legislation introduced last year
by Rep. Rush Holt, Democrat of New Jersey, that would extend this
protection nationwide.

Holt says his bill is slowly gaining support.

"The voters are saying that every vote should count, and the only way
to do this is by verified audit trails," he says.

But even an optimistic scenario for passage would challenge his goal
of mandatory paper receipts for November's elections.

In other words, it's unlikely that every voter using an electronic
voting device in 2006 will know for sure that his or her vote will be
reflected in the actual totals.

Six years after the 2000 electoral debacle, how can this be?

_____________________________________________________

Will Your Vote Count in 2006? Depends on where you live. Didn't know
you lived in a banana republic, did you.

Harry