WP: As Elections Near, Officials Challenge Balloting Security (Leon Co.)

[Pirate Smile]

As Elections Near, Officials Challenge Balloting Security
In Controlled Test, Results Are Manipulated in Florida System

By Zachary Goldfarb
Special to The Washington Post
Sunday, January 22, 2006; Page A06

As the Leon County supervisor of elections, Ion Sancho's job is to make sure voting is free of fraud. But the most brazen effort lately to manipulate election results in this Florida locality was carried out by Sancho himself.

Four times over the past year Sancho told computer specialists to break in to his voting system. And on all four occasions they did, changing results with what the specialists described as relatively unsophisticated hacking techniques. To Sancho, the results showed the vulnerability of voting equipment manufactured by Ohio-based Diebold Election Systems, which is used by Leon County and many other jurisdictions around the country.


A touch-screen voting machine is demonstrated. State and county election officials are demanding that electronic balloting systems leave a paper trail that can be audited when results are disputed. (By Kiichiro Sato -- Associated Press)

Sancho's most recent demonstration was last month. Harri Hursti, a computer security expert from Finland, manipulated the "memory card" that records the votes of ballots run through an optical scanning machine.

-snip-
But the questions raised by Sancho, who has held his post since 1989, show how the concerns are being taken more seriously among elections professionals.
"While electronic voting systems hold promise for improving the election process," the Government Accountability Office said in a report to Congress last year, there are still pressing concerns about "security and reliability . . . design flaws" and other issues.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/01/21/AR2006012101051.html

[gristy]

1. Wow.

I am speechless. The MSM covering vote-counting fraud? Knock me over with a feather...

on edit: thanks for posting this!

on 2nd edit: well, there is one problem:

Critics have not demonstrated that any real elections have had returns altered by the manipulation of electronic voting systems.

Well, none reported by the MSM, anyways...

And with fraud committed behind locked doors and compiled source code, does the author not put any credence to the fish in the milk?

[Fredda Weinberg]

3. Vulnerability ... not fraud

I've also seen the Diebold code - there was nothing nefarious there, but Professor Rubin was right: it lacked the latest encryption protocol.

This test only showed that physical access could violate security - paper ballots are just as vulnerable to that kind of tampering.

The hackers were unable to penetrate the Diebold system remotely, which means that elections officials won't feel any sense of urgency to respond - these same vulnerabilities were well-publicized in the HAVA hearings.

[KittyWampus]

8. The New York Times Had A Series Of Editorials Last Year

perhaps if DU'ers had paid more attention to them...

[Pirate Smile]

2. More

"The events that set in motion Hursti and Sancho meeting, and a new wave of concern over today's voting technologies, started in 2003, when a Seattle-based activist named Bev Harris released thousands of Diebold documents she said she found on an unsecured portion of the company's Web site. Some computer scientists said the documents showed Diebold's systems were vulnerable to attack. Today, more than 800 jurisdictions use their technology, Harris said.

-snip-
In May, two more tests were held, this time with Hursti present. Using a device bought for about $200, he was able to easily alter the final vote by changing the program stored on the memory card.
"You have to admit these systems are vulnerable and act accordingly," Hursti said.

Diebold took a dim view of the experiments. On June 8, a senior company lawyer faxed Sancho: "You have willfully and intentionally allowed the manipulation of memory cards related to your elections. . . . We believe this to have been a very foolish and irresponsible act."

The response frustrated Sancho. "More troubling than the test itself was the manner in which Diebold simply failed to respond to my concerns or the concerns of citizens who believe in American elections," he said. "I really think they're not engaged in this discussion of how to make elections safer."

[Wilms]

4. kick

[Justice Is Comin]

5. The MSM can't ignore it now.

It's out of the dark shadows of local newspapers and disgruntled "conspirators". Ha ha ha. Last thing in the world Diebold needed to see was the WA PO blowing a hole in the side of their secret rigged machines. :woohoo:

It's also in a "special" to the Washington Post. I wonder if that's an insert or what.

[Lochloosa]

6. Kicking for my home town...

get 'em Ion Sancho

[greekspeak]

7. I feel lucky to be a citizen of Leon County...Ion Sancho is a great man

Rarely have I seen the integrity, honesty, and honest hard work for the people as that Ion Sancho puts forth. I met him once during the early voting in 04. He was down with the voters, making sure everything went as smoothly as possible. I hope that after he is done in his current job he aspires to higher positions. I think he would make an excellent governor for Florida.

[livvy]

9. Kick for early morning visitors. n/t

[freedomfries]

10. Time to clean up our elections! Pass HR 550 now!

with Bob Ney out and Vernon Ehlers now chairing the House Committee on Administration there's actually a good chance for passage of Rush Holt's e-voting clean up bill HR 550.
Please take a few second to sign his petition and ask your Rep (R or D) to co-sponsor it.
Put them to shame!
Are they afraid of visible and verifiable elections???
http://www.rushholt.com/petition.html

[EFerrari]

11. Kick

[Amaryllis]

12. kick

[Wilms]

13. kick