Voting Machines - Hacking

iVillage Member
Registered: 05-28-2003
Voting Machines - Hacking
4
Tue, 08-24-2004 - 3:18pm
This was an e-mail posted on another site. Thought I'd share just how easy this election will be to rig. Maybe we should start polling hackers to see if Elmer Fudd or Bugs Bunny will win the Presidential race?



Wednesday Bev (Harris of Black Box Voting) and her team of experts, including a brilliant computer

programmer, Dr. Hugh Thompson, did the Diebold hack for members of the

California Sec. of State's Voting Panel. They (the State) carefully

rearranged her meeting from last week, (after she had driven 10 hours

from Washington state to be there), when all eight members of the panel

were present, to this week, when only three members were present. (Bev

guessed that they did this so they wouldn't have a quorum present.)

They had other guests there, too, at Bev's requests: an accountant,

since she uses the analogy that running an election is essentially

bookkeeping, and that all records for an election should be kept in the

same responsible way as a good set of books is kept; and their own

computer programming expert from the state's side (who is also one of

the Voting Panel). Also present was one of the attorneys from their

AG's office.

Bev and Hugh Thompson clearly demonstrated her latest bombshell

finding: that the Diebold GEMS software, in most versions or maybe all

that are currently in use around the country (this I would have to

doublecheck with her) has a hidden, second set of books on the central

tabulator that can be accessed from a "back door" where, to use one of

Bev's earlier phrases, "any hacker with a laptop" could jump right in

and change the final vote totals. Hugh Thompson also demonstrated that

even a hacker who didn't have Microsoft Access on their computer, the

program necessary to run an election on the GEMS software, could write

a simple 7 LINES of code and still hack in anyway. He affirmed that

"hundreds of thousands" of people out there had the level of expertise

to do just that.

Also present was Andy Stephenson, former candidate for Secretary of

State for Washington, with evidence that one of Diebold's programmers

named Jeffrey Dean (now in jail) had also been in jail prior to being

hired by Diebold for 23 counts of felony theft, including charges of

embezzling using sophisticated software programming methods to commit

his crimes.

The invisible "second set of books" appeared on the GEMS program

versions that came out just after Jeffrey Dean was kept on as a

consultant for Diebold after they purchased Global Election Systems

(GES) a few years ago.

Probably the most notable thing about this event was the lack of any

clear outrage or shock on the part of the Sec. of State's witnesses, or

any commitment to take any particular action based on what they had

just seen. They thanked Bev for coming in and said they would "take the

information under consideration" or some such BS language. No one on

"our" side believes they will do anything with the information. We all

hope we are wrong.

The invisible "second set of books" is present on Diebold's optical

scan counting software as well, not just the DRE's. This is pretty bad

stuff!

iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Wed, 08-25-2004 - 11:05am
I still think that the old fashioned voting machines, with the paper record is the only way to go.

This electronic voting is a nightmare waiting in the wings.

I hate the idea, unless someone can prove that it is impossible (1000000%) to hack into the system (which will never happen as hackers can get into the Penatgon computers, and the FBI, which have some of the most severe encryption systems in the world in place).

Avatar for tmcgoughy
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-08-2003
Wed, 08-25-2004 - 12:54pm

Thank God my county is fairly rural and still uses paper ballots.

The first key to wisdom is constant and frequent questioning, for by doubting we are led to question and by questioning we arrive at the truth.  -
iVillage Member
Registered: 04-16-2004
Wed, 08-25-2004 - 4:08pm
If you can do anything in your area to convince those responsible for making the decision not to switch until it is proven to be 1000% safe, then I would say to do so.....
iVillage Member
Registered: 05-24-2004
Wed, 08-25-2004 - 7:39pm
Just for general info. I live in Florida. I'm in Brevard County we weren't really effected by the massive recounts, chads, connect the dot ballots, etc. Our ballots were already pretty simple, fill in your choices, then they run your ballot through a machine that automatically checks the ballot if it's messed up the machine will spit it back out. Anyhow, ours aren't suppose to get changed, the others in the mess in 2000 are suppose to get new electronic voting machines which have already been used in the last regular election. The people on the local news claimed they are not hooked to any kind of network, so they are suppose to be hack proof. I just wonder what they are suppose to do if these machines crash during the votes. The reporters I watched claim that the last election went off without a hitch. I hope they are right, we shall see come November.

Venus