Security vulnerabilities in voting machines show America still isn't ready for the 2020 election

[Newest Reality]

Though researchers discovered a fundamental security flaw in voting machines months ago, the company behind the machines may still be advertising them to states in a way that allows the vulnerability to persist, according to a letter sent to the US Election Assistance Commission and reported by NBC News.

In Aug 2019, a team of independent security experts found that, contrary to popular belief, many digital voting machines were connected to the internet, sometimes for months on end, Motherboard reported. This, the experts feared, could give hackers a window through which to manipulate votes.

The company that makes the machines that the researchers found to be flawed is called Election Systems & Software (ES&S) (company officials disputed this characterization of its systems). About 70 million Americans’ votes are counted using one of ES&S’ machines, which make up about half of the election equipment market, according to ProPublica.

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Since the report broke, several states, such as North Carolina and Florida (pdf), have either adopted or continue to use ES&S equipment, despite warnings of the machines’ security vulnerabilities. Some believe the EAC, an agency that is consistently understaffed and underfunded, lacks the authority to protect voters in this year’s election. “Perhaps not surprisingly, the last two major meetings of the EAC and local election officials about the certification process have resulted in screaming matches over the slow pace of progress,” according to a ProPublica story published on Oct 28.

https://qz.com/1783766/these-voting-machine-security-flaws-threaten-election-2020/

[aeromanKC]

1. It's what Trump and the GOP are counting on

[Newest Reality]

2. It's kind of a...

It's kind of a one, two punch.

You have the tampering with results AND undermining the faith of the public in the process. What more could a dictator for life ask for? It may be the PERFECT election, by his standards if we don't get some oversight quick.

[Wounded Bear]

3. We haven't been "ready" since 2000...

[abqtommy]

4. It's obvious that the fascists in America are ready...the rest of us, not so much.

[Igel]

5. Link.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/3kxzk9/exclusive-critical-us-election-systems-have-been-left-exposed-online-despite-official-denials

Leave out the caveats, and the claims grow. It's a problem, but they found a few back-end systems, some of which were vulnerable and used to produce the official vote tally. Most of the others they found, not used for that. And many of those they found were later found to be disconnected from the Internet. So the most sensationalistic evidence was at least partially mooted.

It's a problem, but even the original article (as opposed to the selected cuts) knew when to stay evidence based. And didn't call them "voting machines," usually not the same as those tallying the vote.

Hyperbole and exaggeration also produce distrust.

[Hermit-The-Prog]

6. Paper ballots everywhere.

[Newest Reality]

7. Yes!

I am a proponent of that, as well. It is a simple solution.