Who has information on Kevin Shelley / computer voting in California??

[shance]

Is there anything Californians should know about Kevin Shelley and what is happening in California? The more information we have, the better.

Thanks.

[judy]

1. I don't know anything about him, but if you go to his web site

http://www.ss.ca.gov/elections/taskforce.htm

He is asking for public comment on these touch screen machines. Now is the time to be heard.

What I sent:
Dear Secretary Shelley,



Thank you for requesting comments on this particularly important issue.

There is no way that touch screen voting can happen WITHOUT A VERIFIABLE, UNDISPUTABLE PAPER TRAIL.

I am a software engineer, and I know that it is very easy to lose all your data for all kinds of reason, and that computers are as we know susceptible to hacking.



Touch screen, OK. But it will produce a paper receipt that the voter can verify and then deposit in a SEALED container (yes, just like in the old days. The difference, however, will be less to zero errors, and a more compact format for the paper ballots, easier to recount if needs be).

If you go ahead with non paper trail touch screen voting, you will forever erode the already thin confidence that the voters have in the current system.



Sometimes, I even feel that I would refuse to vote on a touch screen if there was not a verifiable paper trail that I could deposit myself in a sealed container.



Please, do the right thing, and defend our very precious right to vote !!



Thank you,



Judy Barton
SF, CA

[Clete]

2. Good letter.

I will write him too from an acctg. point of view of what fraud is invited with a single entry system as contrary to a double entry system (one with an audit trail).

[Eloriel]

4. Good letter -- but everyone else, PLEASE don't forget

to add Open Source Software Code.

First, there doesn't need to be anything "proprietary" about vote tabulating software. It should be simplicity itself: add the votes for each candidate!

But security and encryption issues ARE critical, and much more complex (as I understand it). And that's where open source code becomes very helpful: you've got students, nerds, professors, etc., etc., eyeballing the software all over the country. Mistakes get caught. Better ways of doing things get suggested. Everybody gets the same software, and EVERYONE feels comfortable with what they've got. (Folks familiar with how open source works feel free to chime in.)

Second, as you'll find out if you don't know already, National Certification and probably most if not all State certification is a JOKE. There is no evidence that I've seen that ANYone has EVER looked at all the code -- which is a step that's supposed to be an integral and essential part of the certification process -- at either the national or (most if not all) the state level. THIS IS A RECIPE FOR DISASTER, as in vote-tampering, rigged elections, etc.

If NO one surveyed and approved the software (til the researchers recently), who knows except Diebold what we've got? Do YOU trust a private company with apparent conflicts of interest and partisan ties to put together thousands and thousands if not millions of lines of code to run a simple election? I don't.

Further, why is the certification \handled by ONE man, a private individual working under the cover of several different companies in turn, who won't answer any questions from anyone and isn't accountable to ANYone in any way? We're gonna trust his word for it? Not me!

Open source code solves all this. If everyone knows what's in the software and how it's put together, then certification of the software almost (almost, not quite) takes care of itself.

Eloriel

[judy]

5. Good point, Eloriel!

We need to corner the Diebold types on all fronts...

[shance]

6. Thank you Eloriel!***

I am sooo technically challenged!!

My mantra is now OPEN SOURCE CODE :)****

[twilight]

3. Shelley ...

He's a straight up guy from San Francisco and he went to school at St. Ignatius.

He is a liberal Democrat from what I know and he has a very fine reputution for being an honest (wow!) man.

I think he's doing a good honest job right now under some very difficult times.

I like him. :)

:dem: