The Latest on Diebold
I'm back in California for the holidays, where there's recently been more trouble for Ohio-based voting machine vendor Diebold. On Tuesday, California Secretary of State Bruce McPherson issued this press release and letter announcing "significant security concerns" with Diebold memory cards that prevent the state from acting on the company's application for certification. CNET News has this report. The Secretary of State's letter to Diebold reveals that the memory cards in questions are used in both paper-based optical scan and electronic touchscreen voting systems. The Secretary of State's letter asks Diebold to submit the source code for testing by a federally approved independent testing authority ("ITA"), after which Diebold's application for state certification will be reconsidered.

This follows reports from Florida's Leon County, where a computer scientist was reportedly successful in tampering with Diebold memory cards. The AP has this report. What's difficult to assess is whether the conditions under which the Leon County test occurred replicated real-world conditions. Any system, after all, can be tampered with if proper procedures aren't in place -- with a paper-based system, for example, one can manipulate the results without a trace by replacing a stack of paper ballots with another stack marked with a different candidate. That's not to say that there aren't problems with Diebold's system. It is to say that we should treat reports that voting systems can be "hacked" with a grain of salt, unless and until we know that the conditions in which the tests were conducted are realistic. There's reason for questioning whether that's the case in Leon County, particularly given that well-known electronic voting critics were reportedly behind the test.

What is critical to the functioning of any system, paper-based or electronic, is that there be adequate procedures in place and transparency in the process from beginning to end. The California Secretary of State's demand the Diebold release its source code to testing authorities is thus a step in the right direction.

Whether or not there really are serious problems with Diebold's voting system, one likely consequence of all this is that it will be more difficult for some jurisdictions to meet federal deadlines for the replacement of old voting equipment. The Help America Vote Act requires that every polling place have at least one disability-accessible unit by 2006. In addition, those states that received HAVA funds for the replacement of punch-card and lever voting equipment have to replace these machines by 2006. In this week's newsletter, electionline.org projects that one-third of the states will miss one of HAVA's deadlines for voting system replacement. Assuming this happens, it will be interesting to see how the U.S. Department of Justice responds. - posted by Dan Tokaji @ 1:59 PM