Overview of Computers and Elections

[kster]

DATED......


Copyright (c) 1993 by Eva Waskell

My purpose in writing this overview is threefold. 1) To raise some questions about the impact of computers on the election process and to propose ways for citizens to become involved in helping to find solutions. 2) To encourage an informed public debate about the risks and reliabilities of electronic vote tabulating systems. 3) To point out the lack of scientific studies and factual data in this area and to demonstrate the urgent need for some comprehensive research upon which to base public policy.

An in-depth evaluation of the technologies and the businesses that control elections is long overdue. It is my hope that what follows is thought provoking and leaves the reader wanting to know more.

When voters went to the polls in November 1992, few realized that their ballots were being counted privately. Yes, that's right. The majority of votes cast in the recent presidential election were tabulated by secret programs under the proprietary control of the companies that design and sell electronic voting systems to election jurisdictions throughout the country. The instructions in these programs are known only to the people who were paid to create them. The courts have protected the rights of these companies to prevent anyone from independently auditing their tabulating software.

These circumstances have a direct impact on the integrity of elections. First, other than the programmer, there is no one, including election officials who "certify" the accuracy of vote totals, who can say how election results are actually determined. Most of what we can know about the accuracy of vote tabulation is what the company representatives tell us.

http://archive.cpsr.net/conferences/cfp93/waskell.html

[cdsilv]

1. I've worked with a variety of computers over the past 24 years....

...and can state emphatically that if you give me physical access to the machine in question I can make it say (output) whatever I want.

Really.

And so can any kid who can read, these days.

If you give me access to the machine remotely, I can probably do the same.

My brother, who was tasked to do this very thing across gov't networks was able to do this -he was a 'government sponsored' hacker/cracker until his recent job change.

The 'internet' by design (remember, the Defense Advanced Research Project Agency?) - DARPA commissioned the development of ARPAnet (Advanced Research Project Agency Network). ARPANET was developed to create networks of supercomputers dedicated to weapons research that could withstand nuclear attacks from the soviet union or their proxies.

ARPAnet evolved into the Internet.

That is why the internet is so decentralized.

Yes, there are centralized points (the root DNS servers, the carriers, etc...).

The whole point of the internet is that by disabling a node or a cluster of nodes, the entire net cannot be disabled.

However, if the carriers decide to throttle or block traffic then the whole assumption breaks down.


We are dependent upon the will of the carriers. If dipsh*t manages to scare them then the internet will end.

Period.

[kster]

2. Are you

going some where with this?