[SGVLUG] Vote stealing

[Mike Morris]

You might find this interesting:

<http://www.slate.com/id/2107388>

Mike Morris

At 11:27 AM 09/19/06, you wrote:
> > -----Original Message----- Of Don Gibbs
> > >  > -----Original Message-----
> > >>  [mailto:sgvlug-bounces at sgvlug.net] On Behalf Of Zack, James
> > >>
> > >>  I am all for technology, but it needs to be done right.
> > So  if you
> > >> were going to build the perfect, fairest, most secure  voting
> > >> machine, what would you include?
> > >>
> > >>  My list includes paper receipts for each voter to
> > visually  confirm
> > >> on paper their votes cast
>
>[and somewhere in there I wrote...]
>
> > >While this sounds nice, does it actually do any good?
> > >
> > >   -- more than likely, the "paper receipt" will be
> > thermally printed,
> > >which will degrade in ordinary sunlight, placed in a wallet (body
> > >heat), or just "time"; by the time a recount arrives, you're
> > "ballot"
> > >will be as unreadable as a butterfly-ballot from Florida...
> > >
> >
> > Of course, no one would ever be allowed to walk away from a voting
> > station with real proof of how her/his vote went.  If this were
> > allowed, a voter could prove to someone else how they voted, and this
> > would allow them to sell a vote or, worse yet, to be forced to vote a
> > certain way under threat of retaliation.  So anonymous physical
> > records of individual votes must be kept exclusively by the poll
> > workers to run an audit.
>
>Doh!  Wasn't thinking along those lines, but you're right -- yes, it
>would have to be printed and presented to the voter for verification,
>then sealed as backup to the electronic count.  There would be some
>"operational" problems associated with this (as someone else pointed
>out, they may not be able to read the printout for a variety of reasons,
>might not understand what is presented on the verification printout, or
>simply press the wrong key to accept/reject the verification.) but it
>would be far harder to rig the count.
>
>Of course, should a machine be compromised, noone would know UNLESS a
>recount was requested/required, and then it could still come in within
>the "margin for error", and if it does, which way do you think people
>will believe? The machine or fallable humans counting by hand?
>(presuming, of course, it was close enough to begin with that the result
>changes depending on which source you believe)
>
>Personally, I'd say that any "recount" situation would invalidate the
>entire set of results for a given location -- the mechanics of counting
>by hand almost completely guarantees the totals won't match, and in that
>case, you cannot believe EITHER source as "accurate"  (kind of like
>carrying [or relying on] an odd number of clocks on a boat...)
>
>You see, I'd consider it "odd" if a recount matched the machine count
>exactly for anything over a few hundred votes. ;)  [of course, depending
>on the readability and irrefutability of the "printed" version of the
>votes cast, not to mention that one ballot might stick to another and
>not get counted, or get dropped on the floor and re-counted, etc.]