Cincinnatti Beat: The Truth About Diebold and Your Ballot

[NoBushSpokenHere]

The Truth About Diebold and Your Ballot

By Pete Shuler


Diebold Election Systems of North Canton, Ohio, is taking a beating. As outlined in last month's Statehouse, a recent study found that the AccuVote-TS, the company's touch-screen voting system, contained five high-risk security flaws and 15 overall security flaws. The analysis discovered that, among other things, Diebold failed to properly encrypt sensitive election data; employed an insecure smart-card access system that can be manipulated; and provided only rudimentary, easily decoded password protection on significant functions such as ending the election and erasing votes.
A similar September 2003 study commissioned by the Maryland Board of Elections also found the Diebold system lacking.

"This risk assessment has identified several high-risk vulnerabilities in the ... AccuVote-TS voting system," the report says. "If these vulnerabilities are exploited, significant impact could occur on the accuracy, integrity and availability of elections."

-more- http://www.citybeat.com/2004-02-11/statehouse.shtml

[SeanQuinn]

1. Yep. Death to Diebold. nt

[Joanne98]

2. Look at this part......

If ballots are not correctly counted by a malfunctioning AccuVote-OS, the Diebold manual instructs employees to tell election officials that poll workers "were not observant when using the AccuVote-OS." After delineating numerous reasons that a recount might not be accurate, including "slightly skewed sensors" on the unit and the smearing of the ballot by the voting machine, the manual reminds employees, "Irrespectively, we must always promote the consistency and accuracy of our voting system."

In other sections of the manual, Diebold similarly directs its employees to conceal the truth or lie: "Do not offer damaging opinions of our systems, even when their failings become obvious ... Do not promote the fact that the AccuVote-OS is anything but absolutely accurate ... In case you encounter numerous undefined marks, indicate that ballot printing is at fault ... Be very diplomatic in both cases (of machine failure), offering the minimal amount of information to officials."

Bastards! NOMINATED

[burythehatchet]

3. please don't insult people who may be bastards

[meganmonkey]

4. Seriously -

people make broad brush statements about monkeys all the time around here, too. It's hard not to take it personally :P

[burythehatchet]

5. yuk...yuk..

I'll stop using chimp-in-chief
:)

[sunnystarr]

6. Isn't that fraud?

That's incredibly damaging testimony in a court of law. imho

[bvar22]

7. Diebold is EXPERT at designing SECURE systems....

...like ATMs which are 100% reliable and accurate to the last penny!

The insecure BBV machines and tabulators were PURPOSELY designed to be hackable.

[eridani]

11. Not the only explanation

Not that I wouldn't put it past them, but complex systems MUST be banged up against reality hard and often to get the bugs out of them. ATMs are in constant use, so the bugs that cause serious trouble have mostly been fixed. We only vote a couple of times a year, and it is flat out impossible to have appropriate real world tests of voting machines--every election is inevitably a beta test.

Diebold also advertises OPEN SOURCE software for ATMs. Seems their banking customers disapprove of the pig in the poke that they are trying to push onto election officials.

[roseBudd]

8. Send this to every single elected official in Butler County, OH

They just chose diebold last week.

[Kip Humphrey]

9. LIVE FREE or DIE-BOLD. Choose!

[Bill Bored]

10. Link to the manual cited in this article:

Enjoy!

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0309/S00157.htm