GAO report on electronic voting machines

Of late, I've neglected vote fraud -- the second most important story of our time (the first being the upcoming war with Iran, which will likely go nuclear). Time to rectify that situation.

The non-partisan Government Accounting Office offered its report on electronic voting, and found many problems -- the audit logs and the vote itself can be hacked. Left-wing bloggers have been making this argument for months -- years, actually -- while the mainstream media ostriches simply kept repeating such-things-cannot-be.

Does the report go far enough? I've only skimmed, but so far, I would have to say no. The argument remains in the theoretical stage. More people need to show the guts required to say that vote fraud did take place.

(And not just in this country: The administration implemented fraudulent elections in Iraq, as well. Of course, the only time most people heard that news was when Sy Hersh appeared on The Daily Show.)

We also need much more scrutiny of the voting machine companies themselves. They have a history of offering sweetheart deals with state election officials, who, in too many cases, have gone onto pleasant post-political sinecures with these firms. Here's a good example, which comes to us by way of Daniel Hopsicker:

Back in 1993-94, many observers wondered why new Clark County elections chief Kathryn Ferguson would commit to what turned out to be tens of millions of dollars in expenditures to adopt Sequoia Pacific’s electronic voting machines.

So determined was Ms. Ferguson to buy the Sequoia machines for Las Vegas that a former member of her elections department team stated Ferguson resorted to the simple exigency of having Sequoia Pacific's representative send a list of bid specifications designed so that Sequoia's machines were the only ones that could meet them.

This hardly seems sporting. And its definitely illegal. Asked at the time, Ferguson said she had no concern that her acceptance of a job at Sequoia Pacific might appear to be a payoff for favors rendered.

Today Kathryn Ferguson is ES & S's chief spokesman. She's good to go.

Sequoia execs Pasquale "Rocco" Ricci and Phil Foster were indicted after they were caught paying a Louisiana Elections official an $8 million bribe to buy their voting machines. That sort of thing goes on all the time. Why else would any politico have anything to do with these devices, given the widespread public distrust?

Let us not forget Howard Ahmanson, the money-man behind ES&S. He is a firm backer of the Christian Dominionist movement -- a movement that hopes to do away with democracy altogether. This man once said that "My purpose is total integration of Biblical law into our lives." No man who thinks that way should be allowed anywhere near any company entrusted with counting our votes.

(The two great unrecognised villains of our time -- in my view -- are Michael Ledeen and Howard Ahmanson.)

(To read the rest, click "Permalink" below)

I hope these topics will be addressed in Stepen Freeman's new book on vote fraud. Today's focus is on the GAO report, and John Conyers, writing in a Daily KOs diary, puts the matter more eloquently than I can:

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) issued a report today I requested with Rep. Henry Waxman and other Members Of Congress. In sum, the GAO found that "some of [the] concerns about electronic voting machines have been realized and have caused problems with recent elections, resulting in the loss and miscount of votes." GAO found that these concerns "merit the focused attention of federal state and local authorities responsible for election administration."

What does this mean? Much has been made about this issue during the 2004 Ohio election debaclehere on DailyKos and elsewhere, however, this is the first time Congress' investigatory arm has weighed in on the problems with our voting machines. The GAO studied the work of others and ultimately put their stamp of approval on it. That lends important credibility to the cause of election reform generally, and more specifically to requiring that every machine have a voter verified paper ballot that is used in election days audits and, if discrepancies are found in those audits, becomes the official record for the election.

Congressman John Conyers's diary

On this site and elsewhere, there have been discussions and debates about whether this or that election was "hacked." I would like to suggest putting that discussion aside for the moment (or longer -- I understand some such discussions can result in a ban from this blog community). In this context, we should focus on what we all agree on, and what the GAO found: these machines have substantial problems. To me, in addition to being an issue that goes to the heart of our democracy, this is a consumer protection issue. There are certainly voting machine manufacturers who produce a good product. But by and large, when it comes to a voting machine, the average voter is getting a lemon -- the Ford Pinto of voting technology. We must demand better.

More specifics about what GAO found: Serious problems were identified regarding the security control system, access controls, hardware controls, and the voter-verified paper audit trail system. Among the security shortcomings identified by GAO:

1. Some electronic voting systems did not encrypt cast ballots or system audit logs, thus making it possible to alter them without detection.

2. It is easy to alter a file defining how a ballot appears, making it possible for someone to vote for one candidate and actually be recorded as voting for an entirely different candidate.

3. Falsifying election results without leaving any evidence of such an action by using altered memory cards.

4. Access to the voting network was easily compromised because not all digital recording electronic voting systems (DREs) had supervisory functions password-protected, so access to one machine provided access to the whole network.

5. Supervisory across to the voting network was also compromised by repeated use of the same user IDs combined with easily guessed passwords.

6. The locks protecting access to the system were easily picked and keys were simple to copy.

7. One DRE model was shown to have been networked in such a rudimentary fashion that a power failure on one machine would cause the entire network to fail.

8. GAO identified further problems with the security protocols and background screening practices for vendor personnel.

The suggestions made by GAO to ensure the security of machines barely scratch the surface of the problems what is needed to improve the national voting systems standards. Their report divulges that, despite the many official assurances that the problems of the past elections were isolated and few, the election system is indeed riddled with problems and flaws.

The bottom line is until we make a serious commitment to address the significant security and controls concerns we have regarding our voting machines, American citizens have no reason to have complete confidence in our democracy.