More on the voting machine issue
You know that very critical report on voting machines by The Information Security Institute at John Hopkins? The one I said looked like it was about the files Scoop published and asked security experts to examine?
Well, it was.
Diebold has published a press release responding to the report. It's a pdf file; googling "diebold technical response voting" gets you a pointer to a web page containing the press release, which has been removed. Google, of course, has it's cached copy available.
The response was fisked within an inch of its life
1) The software that's been examined is old and not used in elections. Easy to prove:
a) The FEC requires that each software version be certified.
b) The certification number is assigned by the National Association of State Election Directors (NASED) and is accompanied by a "version number."
c) Matching version numbers are included in the source code examined by the Hopkins Heroes.
2) The research "overlooked the total system of software, hardware, services and poll worker training that has been so effective in real-world implementations." / They ran the tests on the wrong hardware.
a) These factors are irrelevant to the specified defects in the implementation code. "Hardware, services and poll worker training," no matter how good they are, don't fix flawed software code.
4) Diebold software undergoes a series of certification processes
a) Certification is not relevant to demonstrated code defects.
b) Shall we ignore the fact that the old horrifying code also passed the 'certification' and the certification is therefore worthless?
5) "We have been using the systems now for a year and a half, with great success."
a) Time in the field is not relevant to demonstrated code defects.
b) Define "success."
8) The system could be manipulated only by someone who brought a laptop to the voting booth and modified the voting machine. (From a Georgia official, Michael Barnes of the Georgia Elections Division)
a) Two words: Palm Pilot
b) What about an iPaq? Small, powerful, easily concealed.
c) In fact all you need is a forged voter card.
That's not all the points, or all the responses. Just the ones I enjoyed the most.
Is it clear yet we need to do what
Pima County, AZ Democratic Party is doing?
“The PCDP is committed to ensuring the integrity of our vote here in Pima County. We plan on educating our voters, elected officials and both local and national press about these major voting flaws. And if we need to take legal action to repair those flaws, we’re ready to do just that,” Eckerstrom concluded.
Is it yet clear that this is the most important non-partisan issue we have?
posted by Prometheus 6 at 8/1/2003 07:50:38 AM |
Posted by P6 at August 1, 2003 07:50 AM
| Trackback URL: http://www.prometheus6.org/mt/mt-tb.cgi/1339
