Registered: Aug 2000
Location: In a Blue, Blue State
Posts: 12601

Diebold, the maker of the only approved electronic voting machines, has started a campaign to shut down websites that contain information on how their machines can be subverted in an election. Some of this information are company documents that show that they know of the flaws.

In internal memos published by Scoop ( http://www.scoop.co.nz/mason/stories/HL0309/S00150.htm ), Diebold's officials admit that their voting records database is (and has been for a long time) hackable ( [anyone can] "access the GEMS Access database and alter the Audit log without entering a password" ) but that this isn't necessarily a problem because "It has a lot to do with perception. Of course everyone knows perception is reality."

Recently it was reported in the mainstream media that vote totals from an election in progress where Diebold machines were used had vote totals posted to a public website by error, where the totals could have been manipulated by any modestly talented computer user.

And here is a good site that contains a lot of info and links about Diebold's faulty machinery.
http://www.equalccw.com/voteprar.html

I guess hanging chads aren't that bad after all.

This site has copies of the Diebold legal letters being sent out:
http://www.equalccw.com/liebold.html

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Registered: Sep 2001
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quote:

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Originally posted by billgerat
Diebold, the maker of the only approved electronic voting machines, has started a campaign to shut down websites that contain information on how their machines can be subverted in an election. [/url]

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: The Bottom of the Toyem Pole
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Did you know that the head of Diebold is also a big financial supporter of the Republican party and President Bush? Info here. This isn't a partisan complaint either; I think it is a bad bad bad idea to put the electoral process in the hands of people with a severe interest in a particular party winning, especially when the process isn't transparent and numerous flaws have already been identified.

If we really want to have electronic voting in this cuontry, we need to enlist the open source movement. Only way to ensure transparency and security.

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Registered: Aug 2000
Location: In a Blue, Blue State
Posts: 12601

Voting machine controversy

08/28/03

Julie Carr Smyth
Plain Dealer Bureau


Columbus - The head of a company vying to sell voting machines in Ohio told Republicans in a recent fund-raising letter that he is "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year."

The Aug. 14 letter from Walden O'Dell, chief executive of Diebold Inc. - who has become active in the re-election effort of President Bush - prompted Democrats this week to question the propriety of allowing O'Dell's company to calculate votes in the 2004 presidential election.

O'Dell attended a strategy pow-wow with wealthy Bush benefactors - known as Rangers and Pioneers - at the president's Crawford, Texas, ranch earlier this month. The next week, he penned invitations to a $1,000-a-plate fund-raiser to benefit the Ohio Republican Party's federal campaign fund - partially benefiting Bush - at his mansion in the Columbus suburb of Upper Arlington.

The letter went out the day before Ohio Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, also a Republican, was set to qualify Diebold as one of three firms eligible to sell upgraded electronic voting machines to Ohio counties in time for the 2004 election.

Blackwell's announcement is still in limbo because of a court challenge over the fairness of the selection process by a disqualified bidder, Sequoia Voting Systems.
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The rest of the above story is here: http://www.cleveland.com/printer/pr...07171078040.xml

Let's review the quote - "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president next year." This comming from the chief exec of a vote counting machine company? Reguardless of his own personal political leanings, didn't this guy ever think once about the implications of his words to the the public?

If Bush and Republicans gain more votes on Diebold machines, as a percentage, than from handcast ballots, I would hope that all votes registered by e-voting would be thrown out as vote fraud.
It's chilling to think that this guy would participate in politics for
any political party.

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Registered: Feb 2003
Location: Oceanside, CA
Posts: 5073

On the face of it, I have to agree with billgerat. That quote, coming from that person in that position, makes me question the integrity of those voting machines. I don't want to be paranoid here, but...that's just such an ominous quote.
Having a company with very strong political leaning making voting machines does seem problematic. I like Nutrimentia's idea; the open-source movement is probably a good way to design the software. It'll probably end up as secure and fair as possible.

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
Posts: 13002

what's wrong with using a pencil a piece of paper and a shitload of volunteers to count, doublecount and tripplecount votes?

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Registered: Feb 2003
Location: Oceanside, CA
Posts: 5073

EDIT: Removed the stupid parts.

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Registered: Sep 2000
Location: The Bottom of the Toyem Pole
Posts: 9454

quote:

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Originally posted by Talarohk
EDIT: Removed the stupid parts.

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Registered: Jul 2000
Location: Location Location
Posts: 26385

hahaha

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Registered: Jan 2002
Location: UK
Posts: 13002

hey I was only asking because it's what happens in the UK... personally I don't see how manually counting ballots is any more, or any less, open to abuse than the computerised way..... if you want to rig a ballot then you are gonna rig a ballot.

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Registered: Apr 2001
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Posts: 16691

No I dont trust it at all.
The whole business going on about voting machines and the disenfranchised (Im so sick of that word) stinks to me, its enough to send conspiracy theories running through my coffee deprived brains.
If people aren’t smart enough to follow simple instructions fuck them and their vote.

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taste the fucking rainbow

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