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E-ballot security

Did you not see I told you deal with the expert?


Please ignore me. I am no expert.

You are the expert here.

Why do you refuse to deal with Spoonamore?
 
Jay

Screw my "claim"

Please with all due respect, Deal with Spoonamore. Not me.

I mean that Lovingly. I am no expert. You are an expert.
 
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Posted by Bubba View Post
fer cripes sake Jay Utah,

where do you stand here?
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Yo, Jay,

I'm gonna be in Utah in January.

Hows about lunch.....My treat?
 
bruto said:
I have a question that perhaps some expert on electronic voting machines could answer.

Is there any reason why a voting machine could not be set up at the last minute to randomly decide which party lines go to which counters?

If you're afraid, as some people seem to be, that dishonest electronic machines might dump votes, it would be a bad bet to have them do so if one can never know which votes are being dumped.

You can't add votes practically, because the poll checking process is too well organized for that. I don't know any place where every voter is not checked off against a paper list, and the overall count of ballots cannot exceed the number of voters who appear.

Back when I worked the polls in Connecticut, we had a rigid two party system, in which every vote was checked on the lists of both parties, and the mechanical voting machines counted the number of entries as well. The total votes for any candidate could be, and often were, less than the total, since one is not obligated to vote for anyone, but they could never be more.

The machines were also double checked for operation before the election, to make sure that they were counting correctly.

Because the party levers and lines were always in the same order (Democrats had the top lever), there was still some room for fraud in losing the count for one party or the other, but it was small, and as far as I can see, the problem of line familiarity that dictated this for mechanical machines could easily be addressed by allowing a variety of connections in an electronic machine.

Here in small town Vermont, we use paper ballots. Every voter is counted going in, handed ballots, observed putting them in the boxes, and counted on the way out. Fraud would require considerable collusion between all the poll workers.

Now electronic machines have some possibility for skulduggery that the old fashioned ones do not, but it seems as if one ought to be able to control that pretty easily.
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Alright, it's complex. In my jurisdiction, we operate PR (Proportional Representation). Now because of the complexity of calculating transfers, eliminations and whatnot, under the old manual system, estimates were used.

So, if the least popular candidate was eliminated due to lack of votes, then their votes would be redistributed to their second preference candidate. So far so good. However, it would not be unusual in a closely contested election for this to require 10, 11, 12 recounts which was onerous to do manually, so estimation was not only used but built into the constitution. If candidate A is eliminated through lack of votes, then their second preference votes are assumed effectively to divide proportionately among the leading candidates subject to a count of a random selection. When the next candidate is eliminated third preference votes come into play and so forth.

When the electronic voting came into play, suddenly, this ambiguity by dint of too many votes to physically count was potentially eliminated. Thus, the machines were intentionally programmed to replicate this ambiguity. You read that right, they were programmed to guess on purpose. End result? My vote for Joe Bloggs may very well get assigned to Jane Doe because of a pseudo-random number generator.

And where are those machines now? Wrapped in cling film in a warehouse never to be used again, but the storage costs apparently exist in perpetuity.
 
I voted "electronically" this year for the first time in my city -Buenos Aires- and it was great! All the worries, suspicion and doubts I ever had completely dispelled. One hour and a half after the ballots closed the final tally was informed. Later, parties' attorneys could check vote by vote, like in the era of paper ballots, if they wanted.
 
aleCcowaN said:
I voted "electronically" this year for the first time in my city -Buenos Aires- and it was great! All the worries, suspicion and doubts I ever had completely dispelled. One hour and a half after the ballots closed the final tally was informed. Later, parties' attorneys could check vote by vote, like in the era of paper ballots, if they wanted.
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The concern about electronic voting is not the process the voter goes through to cast their votes, but what happens (electronically) within the voting machine and the rest of the voting equipment. It is the uncertainty that is created that raises alarm.

If I were to judge our voting process - I take advantage of early voting - which allows fill-in-the-bubble or electronic voting, I would say that everyone was pretty conscientious about doing their tasks. I do not recall there ever being any real controversy, here, about the actual process of counting the votes being anything but honest.
 
Earthborn said:
Why electronic votibg is a bad idea:
https://youtu.be/w3_0x6oaDmI
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Its not good enough, arguments. I mean sure, make arguments but to make case there need to be evidence that the risks mentioned are indeed real and significant.

Does this person use internet banking and/or NFC phone or does it not meet the level of paranoia we are dealing with here, I wonder. Is he running for something? He should.
 
fezzic said:
The concern about electronic voting is not the process the voter goes through to cast their votes, but what happens (electronically) within the voting machine and the rest of the voting equipment. It is the uncertainty that is created that raises alarm.

If I were to judge our voting process - I take advantage of early voting - which allows fill-in-the-bubble or electronic voting, I would say that everyone was pretty conscientious about doing their tasks. I do not recall there ever being any real controversy, here, about the actual process of counting the votes being anything but honest.
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That was my concern too. And that's why I said: It's great!

If they tried to do something with the machines, they'd get easily busted and the fraud corrected.

That's why I said that video in a post above is fully crap and this thread being in conspiracies theories is well deserved.

That's why I criticize a mass of forum members that participate in many subforums, for whom "scepticism" is just a buzzword that makes them look good though they don't understand what it is about.

The correct action was asking: why do you think the system is secure? (I suppose any sound person will consider "secure" to be included in "great!" when voting systems and ballot control are discussed).

As nobody asked, I will monologue:

When I voted:

  • I was identified. The register has even the photograph of every voter to avoid your id to be handled to a strange.
  • A sealed clean cardboard ballot with microchip was taken and the seal broken. The vice-president of the polling station retained the seal.
  • I went to the machine which offered me the option to vote for a complete list or category by category. I selected the last option.
  • I voted for head of government, city legislators and local representatives from two different parties. The screen showed me the composed "paper ballot" and offered the option of changing it.
  • The machine asked for the cardboard ballot to be printed and the exact image of the ballot appeared, as if on paper from the very beginning.
  • The machine asked for the microchip to be placed on a sensor to show me what was recorded. The screen showed my exact vote.
  • I went back to the polling desk and the vice-president checked if the cardboard (already bent and fastened as instructed, to conceal my vote) I was handling to her matched the security code printed on the broken seal she retained -to avoid voto en cadena-
  • I inserted my vote in the box, as if it was an election with paper ballots and left with a "receipt" that was die-cut from my very entry in the voter registry I had signed before.
  • Once the election came to an end, the president of the ballot station printed the act with the number of votes, she opened the ballot box in front of the vice-president and the representatives of parties or candidates (there were two of them the moment I voted), she counted the number of cardboard ballots and checked it matched the printed act. As it surely did, each one of them signed the act and sent the databank in the machine and the cardboard ballots in the box -sealed and signed- to the proper authorities.
  • The databank was read and the votes were added to the tally very quickly.
  • Two hours after closing the winners were celebrating, the losers were lamenting.
  • The next day started the legal tally. Representatives of parties or individual candidates would object the result of any ballot station they consider to be suspicious. The recorded result would be checked against the manual recount of cardboard ballots.
  • If nobody shouted fraud, a manual check of ballot boxes would be performed anyway in a sample, for instance, one each twenty boxes, selected at random. If something hadn't matched, additional sampling or even a complete manual recount would have been performed.
  • The few cases the machine broke or the printed act didn't match the number of votes in the ballot would be solved on a one by one basis, with manual recount.
My conclusion is: this system is unbeatable -unless you want to develop a fru-fru conspiracy theory and have every person bought or microchips and ink printed ballots changing into a consistent different tally, or ballot boxes substituted in a system with heavy controls in every step.

If your system has no such steps or controls, don't criticize electronic vote against paper ballot vote just for shooting the breeze (as that video does). If you have a "as we are first world we have a fourth world voting system, so there may be some degree of fraud and George W. be elected for a third period" situation, tant pis, fight for a better system and don't criticize just for the pleasure of it.
 
aleCcowaN said:
(Buenos Aires system description)
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That system seems to keep the best of both worlds, the quickness of the electronic voting systems and the accountability and transparency or the paper voting system. Sounds good. I´m very suspicious of purely electronic voting systems. Very.
 
Abooga said:
That system seems to keep the best of both worlds, the quickness of the electronic voting systems and the accountability and transparency or the paper voting system. Sounds good. I´m very suspicious of purely electronic voting systems. Very.
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I agree, it sounds like a good and balanced system.
 
I dont know if a comparator should be in a voting machine. I may have mis-quoted Spoonamore from memory of his statements.

I dont recall if Spoonamore actually said there is no need for a comparator in a voting machine, so I will retract that.

His point was, according to his video presentation, Diebold said a certain patch was a clock. Spoonamore said, paraphrasing, Diebold lied. It was a comparator, not a clock.

Whatever it was thatthe judge heard from Spoonamore and or his associates apparently led to W's man Mike Connel being called to the next hearing which didnt happen due to Connel perishing in an accident the day before he was to appear.

Here is search results for mike connel dies before testifying.
I see a combination of facts and speculation in the results.


https://www.google.com/search?q=mike+connel+dies+before+testifying+&ie=utf-8&oe=utf-8
 
Abooga said:
That system seems to keep the best of both worlds, the quickness of the electronic voting systems and the accountability and transparency or the paper voting system. Sounds good. I´m very suspicious of purely electronic voting systems. Very.
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catsmate said:
I agree, it sounds like a good and balanced system.
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The system is a little bit expensive and it its current state it demands visually handicapped people to vote with a relative, a friend or trust the authorities of the polling station -and lose their right to privacy-, but it's good.

I would like to add two notes.

A historical note:
Voting fraud was almost a constant in Argentina, specially in what is called "the infamous decade" (1932-1943) and it was said that "ballot boxes were magical as they turned any kind of vote into a conservative government". Legislation from 1916 onwards -except that period- tried to guarantee clean elections.

But also from 1943 to today there is a lot of "almost fraud". People who were asked to vote for some populist party. They were given the envelops with the votes inside. They were given the left shoe and if the party won the polling station, they'd were be given the right one (multiply this by thousands of tricks). No electronic system can totally wreck this ill-intended system, but it helps as it is "the voter and his or her conscience". Poor people may be needy but they resent the fact that they are being used as animals. No matter theirs stomachs may be making noises.

A social note:
One of the most dangerous problem of paper ballots -in many places both the primary and the general election takes place at the same time, so you have up to 200 paper ballots to choose from-. People is so confused that they tend to vote because of the higher office at stake -say, president or governor- or for the first name in a list. It's called "bed sheet vote", you vote the label and the whole piece of fabric goes in.

This system makes easier to choose (they put dummy voting machines for people to practice even many days before -grandchildren training grandparents are a common image-, if you don't have Internet connexion or are unfamiliar with it). If some mistake is made, an undereducated person will vote for the governor or first senator and all the leeches like councilpeople will be left blank (humble people has the right to be instructed or helped in a way "I want to be sure to vote for my councilman").

Expensive system, both in cash and resources. But after decades of fraud and/or populism alternating with coups d'etat which would get some degree of "legitimacy" from the scandalous practice of whom they took down, I would shout a resounding "DEMOCRACY IS WORTH IT".
 
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