Sequoia voting systems

[Caligirl]

These are different machines than Diebold, but still bad news.

The California Sec of State ordered a top-to-bottom review of our voting technology when she was elected. Today, there's reports of a three second hack, which is very hard to spot at all.

The Computer Security Group at the University of California Santa Barbara (UCSB) has released a short, chilling video demonstrating how a single person can hack an election on a touch-screen voting system --- even one with a so-called "Voter Verifiable Paper Trail" (VVPAT) added to it --- in such a way that it is highly unlikely that the manipulation would ever be detected by either the public or election officials.

The video which shows "just examples of the different ways in which the system can be compromised" is the latest in a similar string of such demonstrations that have been released over the last two years, all showing how easily electronic voting systems can be tampered with, often undetectably.

In the UCSB video posted below, the hack of Sequoia voting system being prepared for use in an entire county, is done in approximately 3 seconds, by a single person with simple insider access and a $10 USB thumb drive. Every machine used in the county, in such a case, would be effected. Moreover, the viral hack would not be discovered by pre-election "Logic and Accuracy" testing --- in cases were election officials actually bother to perform such tests prior to elections --- nor would it likely be discovered even in the event of a complete, 100% post-election audit of the touch-screen "paper-trail" records.

And:

The Sequoia Edge system seen being hacked in the video above is the same type of system on which The BRAD BLOG had revealed another serious flaw, just days before the 2006 general election. As we reported at the time, a yellow button on the back of each voting machine (as can be seen in the UCSB video as well) can be pressed in such a way as to put the system into "manual mode," allowing for an unlimited number of votes to be cast by a single individual.

The BRAD BLOG : UC Computer Scientists Release Video on How to Hack a Sequoia Touch-Screen Voting Machine

...that's a blog, linked, well written, and referenced. For the initial report from the computer guys, and a reference for their article describing the 'fatal flaws' in the machines, go here:

Evaluating the Security of Electronic Voting Systems

 

[MalibuMan]

I still don't see what was wrong with the ole punch card system. I mean come on. How hard was it? LOL

 

[sealybobo]

These are different machines than Diebold, but still bad news.

The California Sec of State ordered a top-to-bottom review of our voting technology when she was elected. Today, there's reports of a three second hack, which is very hard to spot at all.



And:



The BRAD BLOG : UC Computer Scientists Release Video on How to Hack a Sequoia Touch-Screen Voting Machine

...that's a blog, linked, well written, and referenced. For the initial report from the computer guys, and a reference for their article describing the 'fatal flaws' in the machines, go here:

Evaluating the Security of Electronic Voting Systems

Also look at ES&S machines.

We are not getting fair elections. You can't trust these voting machines. It's not even debatable. May be easier and quicker, but it is stealing our democracy to not have a paper ballot. That's why everyone should ask for a fucking absentee ballot and mail in your vote.

Screw these voting machines.

If 45% of the time the anomalies went in favor of Gore and Kerry, you can say these voting machines are just flawed, but when 95% of the errors go in favor of Bush, you have to assume they are corrupted!!!!

Glad to see someone else posting this stuff. Conspiracy theory my ass.

 

[MalibuMan]

That's why everyone should ask for a fucking absentee ballot and mail in your vote.

Screw these voting machines.

I'm sure some people can still screw that up.

 

[sealybobo]

I'm sure some people can still screw that up.

Sure, but if I'm a poll watcher and I have my eye on the paper ballots the whole time, then it's a lot harder than rigging these machines.

The GOP in fact did get caught throwing out ballots. So 2 Ohio election officials (both females) are serving 18 months.

And these machines have been proved to be hackable.

Ohio also ended the tradition of sleepovers where election officials spend the night with the voting machines before they turn them in the next day. God knows what happened.

 

[sealybobo]

These are different machines than Diebold, but still bad news.

The California Sec of State ordered a top-to-bottom review of our voting technology when she was elected. Today, there's reports of a three second hack, which is very hard to spot at all.
And:
The BRAD BLOG : UC Computer Scientists Release Video on How to Hack a Sequoia Touch-Screen Voting Machine

...that's a blog, linked, well written, and referenced. For the initial report from the computer guys, and a reference for their article describing the 'fatal flaws' in the machines, go here:

Evaluating the Security of Electronic Voting Systems

About one-third of the absentee ballot applications received at the Hamilton
County Board of Elections have been ruled invalid because Republican Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign printed a version of the form with an extra, unneeded box on it.

http://news.cincinnati.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/AB/20080911/NEWS0108/309110032/



McCain is already sending out bad absentee ballots.

 

[MalibuMan]

How is a unneeded box going to help him exactly?

 

[sealybobo]

How is a unneeded box going to help him exactly?

All those votes will be thrown out.

I bet if it were 1999 you'd be asking me right now, "how is a hanging chad going to help Bush exactly?"

 

[editec]

What was wrong with the systems we had in place before electronmic voting machines?

Not a damned thing.

FWIW, we still use paper ballots in my town.

 

[MalibuMan]

All those votes will be thrown out.

I bet if it were 1999 you'd be asking me right now, "how is a hanging chad going to help Bush exactly?"

Couldn't that hurt McCain too? lol

 

[dilloduck]

What was wrong with the systems we had in place before electronmic voting machines?

Not a damned thing.

FWIW, we still use paper ballots in my town.

Were you not around in 2000 ? Floridians couldn't figure out the punch cards.

 

[sealybobo]

Couldn't that hurt McCain too? lol

Again, if it hurt Gore/Kerry 55% of the time and Bush 45% of the time, it'd be about voting machine error. But because all these mistakes seemed to benefit Bush 95% of the time, it must be voter fraud.

 

[dilloduck]

Again, if it hurt Gore/Kerry 55% of the time and Bush 45% of the time, it'd be about voting machine error. But because all these mistakes seemed to benefit Bush 95% of the time, it must be voter fraud.

why haven't the dems fixed this obvious flaw in 8 years ?

 

[sealybobo]

What was wrong with the systems we had in place before electronmic voting machines?

Not a damned thing.

FWIW, we still use paper ballots in my town.

Just like the GOP asked us to sacrafice some freedoms for security, they also asked us to trade in our reliable voting system on paper because machines would be quicker/easier. They probably also said they wanted to be GREEN. LOL.

 

[Caligirl]

why haven't the dems fixed this obvious flaw in 8 years ?

Feinstein and Holt (D) have tried by introducing several bills that would require paper trails. These have been shot down by republicans.

Despite the quickly mounting scientific evidence persuading against the use of such systems in American elections, Congressman Rush Holt (D-NJ) and Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA) have proposed a number of bills which would allow for the continued use of touch-screen voting systems with paper-trails. The Republican caucuses in each chamber have so far stymied all such legislation, even as they argue in favor of the use of all such electronic systems, with or without the often misleading paper-trails.

One example of this type of legislation, introduced by democrats and shot down by republicans, is HR811

Q. What does the bill do?

The bill mandates several measures to make electronic voting substantially more secure and reliable. Most dramatically, it bans all paperless electronic voting in federal elections. By November 2008, all states will have to use voting systems that produce a voter verifiable paper record. In other words, voters will vote on systems that give them an opportunity to review or fill out a piece of paper that contains a record of their votes.

Just as importantly, the bill mandates random manual counts comparing that voter verified paper to the electronic tallies, in order to “check” the electronic count and ensure that programming errors, software bugs or other corrupt software did not cause the electronic voting machine to miscount federal election results. Currently, only 13 states require this important security measure.

Nieman Watchdog > Ask This > HR 811 would require a paper trail

I can't tell how this bill was stymied, or what happened to it, but it never passed. You can look at the google results for the bill here:

H.R. 811 - Google Search

There are other reports in the news about ongoing failures of electronic voting:

The District of Columbia has witnessed yet another triumph of electronic voting this week, when a computer malfunction inflated records of write-in votes in the city's Tuesday primary elections by insane amounts:

D.C. election officials blamed a defective computer memory cartridge yesterday for producing what appeared to be thousands of write-in votes that officials say did not exist.... For example, in the Republican at-large race, 1,560 write-ins at 9:50 p.m. dwindled to 18 by 12:16 a.m. The problem also added thousands of votes to individual candidates, inflating vote totals. At 9:50 p.m. 8,246 ballots were recorded cast in the at-large Republican primary, but that shrank to 3,735 by 12:16 a.m.

Hmm. This time around, the malfunction was caught and corrected. But how it happened remains something of a mystery. The firm that supplied D.C.'s voting machines, Sequoia Voting Systems, says that its database and software functioned just fine, so something else must have gone wrong:

Instead, the company pointed to possible static discharge or other scenarios, including the possibility of human error.

Could be. But that's what concerns me. A voting system should not be susceptible to math errors this large because of minor goofs like, say, somebody dragging their feet on the carpet and picking up too much static that zaps a memory card when they pick it up.

To recycle a concept I've used before, the problem isn't that electronic voting systems can fail--it's that they can fail badly.The efficiency of computers can make any mistake widespread and, at worst, undetectable--Florida voters can only guess if an e-voting malfunction might explain why 18,000 people had no votes recorded in a 2006 congressional election who did cast votes in other races.

Ohio voters were luckier--local election officials noticed a bug that would have lost votes in the March primary vote.

Fortunately, the e-voting fad seems to have passed, as states move to scrap their electronic voting systems and return to paper-based systems that provide a final record that can't be instantly modified or erased by a programming error. But it will take years to retire all the e-voting machines states and counties have purchased at vast expense. I, for instance, will apparently be using the same "WinVote" terminals this year that I've used since 2004.

Electronic Voting Follies Continue - Faster Forward

 

[CA95380]

*News Flash* - September 2007 ---> 8 BILLION texts sent every day. Or 92,000 text messages sent every second of every day. | About Mobility Weblog

Do you think that by election day 2008 they will have finally figured out how to use a voting machine

I doubt it!

 

[DiveCon]

wow, the dems SCREAMED for these after 2000, now its all Bush's fault
my God people, is there ANYTHING that goes wrong in your life that ISN'T Bush's fault
i swear some of you people scream out "damn you Bush" when you stub a toe

 

[del]

Again, if it hurt Gore/Kerry 55% of the time and Bush 45% of the time, it'd be about voting machine error. But because all these mistakes seemed to benefit Bush 95% of the time, it must be voter fraud.

is that a black helicopter behind you?

duck!

 

[Caligirl]

wow, the dems SCREAMED for these after 2000, now its all Bush's fault
my God people, is there ANYTHING that goes wrong in your life that ISN'T Bush's fault
i swear some of you people scream out "damn you Bush" when you stub a toe

Does it bother you that the manufacturer admits that the software they wrote drops votes, and that those votes tend to be dropped in republican districts?

Does it bother you that this might hand the election to Obama unfairly? That it's too late to fix the problem before the general election? And, that the glitch can't be spotted after the fact.

I am surprised you aren't more outraged by this.


Ohio Voting Machines Contained Programming Error That Dropped Votes | The Trail | washingtonpost.com

 

[DiveCon]

Does it bother you that the manufacturer admits that the software they wrote drops votes, and that those votes tend to be dropped in republican districts?

Does it bother you that this might hand the election to Obama unfairly? That it's too late to fix the problem before the general election? And, that the glitch can't be spotted after the fact.

I am surprised you aren't more outraged by this.


Ohio Voting Machines Contained Programming Error That Dropped Votes | The Trail | washingtonpost.com

yes, but if you guys had left things alone we wouldnt have this mess NOW
back after the 2000 elections you all screamed we had to go with electronic voting machines
well, we did, now you bitch about that
if you could only get your supporters to learn how to use a normal ballot this would never have happened

you can believe me when i say, conservatives did NOT want to be spending all this money on these machines