It is a known fact that the security of e-voting machines is too easily compromised and resultantly, vulnerable to fraud. Recently, there is cause for worry as a new threat surfaces. Smartmatic is a foreign company (based in Venezuela) which owns one of the most used voting machines in the United States. This is a private company and one which is, in some ways, running US elections. The urgent issue here is that the software which it uses to count the votes is held as a "trade secret" - one which allows no one to review the source code and is kept secret from voters. There is no room for auditing the company and it is under the control of foreign entities. This seems very bothersome. Venezualan president Hugo Chavez comes to mind - for the results of that very election have been questioned.
Some US jurisdictions have opted to return to the paper ballot method due to the fact that it is more accountable. Without paper trails, how can one verify the accuracy of such machines?
Another concern deals with voting machines with wireless communications. Theoretically, a hacker could infect the system with a virus or alter the software all from a remote location. Voter fraud is a very serious issue and one which some states are trying to alleviate the issue by banning machines with wireless capabilities completely.
Friday, September 12, 2008
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That is really disheartening information to hear. When I orignally heard about electronic voting machines I always felt the idea sounded good in theory and assuming that some paper voting record was left, I always felt it would be good in practice. However, given that there is very little if any paper record it seems like anyone could potentially rig an election just as easily as changing a line of code in a voting machine's software. This is troubling for any voter and really makes you wonder how much your vote does count. It scares me even more and makes me even more uncomfortable that a man such as Hugo Chavez who is one of the most outspoken critics of America in all aspects of foreign policy has the potential to decide who is running America. The voting system needs to be revamped and it should start with American copmanies running the AMERICAN electoral process.
ReplyDeleteI agree that this article is very disturbing. First, why isn't the voting process/method uniform across all the states? And how can the states feel comfortable purchasing a product like this? They have no idea what may be hidden in the program since the company hasn't allowed the public to test it. If the United States isn't able to produce their own election machines, then maybe they're not ready to be using them. None of us really knows what happens when we press the button to submit our votes. We don't know it's recording who we really voted for or counting the equally. There's no way to verify the programs and I would trust a program developed in another country that has a huge impact on the way our country is run for the next four years.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Megan that there probably should be uniform voting across the United States, as it would be easier to regulate and count (for instance, there wouldn't be the issue of "hanging chads"). In addition, the issue of voter fraud is definitely a big one. This is an even bigger issue now that names and social security numbers are kept in many electronic databases that could be compromised (such as the VA database). It would be very easy to register to vote as someone else with that information. Using electronic voting in this case is a double-edged sword. On one hand, it would be easier for someone to hack in and, possibly using stolen information, greatly change the outcome of the election. On the other hand, it may be easier to check for double votes, voters that are dead, etc. on an electronic system.
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ReplyDeleteAlthough uniform voting would be a huge solution. There still remain a huge threat. I think this is actually making it easier to rig an election. It’s kind of like the kerberos theory we heard about in class but in a negative sense, putting all the election votes in one place. My problem with this is if it were possible to hack into the system and do what you wanted, how could we prove the election was tampered with. And what type of protection measurement would we have to go thru so this system would be impenetrable? What are some of the strongest uncrackable systems out there?
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