Handy Guide to show how easy it is to hack e-voting machines in the next races

[zulchzulu]

43 states use the ES&S (Election Systems & Software) electronic voting machines and will do so this year. The iVotronic touch screens, the very machines everywhere in South Carolina, have the easy hackable vulnerability that are ready to be exploited if the machines are not heavily monitored and observed. A recent study shows just how easy it is to do with the closed systems:

December 17, 2007

A new study on the security of voting machines was released in Ohio. The report, one of the most comprehensive and informative that I've seen yet, contains some pretty astounding information about the security of voting machines that hasn't been revealed before. Unfortunately, the report isn't receiving the kind of attention it deserves.

It's the first independent study to examine machines made by Election Systems & Software, the largest voting machine company in the country -- the company's machines are used in 43 states. (A similar study of voting systems done in California earlier this year did not examine ES&S machines.)

What the researchers discovered is pretty significant.

They found that the ES&S tabulation system and the voting machine firmware were rife with basic buffer overflow vulnerabilities that would allow an attacker to easily take control of the systems and "exercise complete control over the results reported by the entire county election system."

They also found serious security vulnerabilities involving the magnetically switched bidirectional infrared (IrDA) port on the front of the machines and the memory devices that are used to communicate with the machine through the port. With nothing more than a magnet and an infrared-enabled Palm Pilot or cell phone they could easily read and alter a memory device that is used to perform important functions on the ES&S iVotronic touch-screen machine -- such as loading the ballot definition file and programming the machine to allow a voter to cast a ballot. They could also use a Palm Pilot to emulate the memory device and hack a voting machine through the infrared port.



Study: http://www.sos.state.oh.us/sos/info/EVEREST/14-AcademicFinalEVERESTReport.pdf
http://blog.wired.com/27bstroke6/2007/12/report-magnet-a.html

There were voting discrepancies in New Hampshire and South Carolina certainly will have similar problems. What happened in the GOP South Carolina primary this past week is a harbinger of what the Democratic primary in South Carolina will be. This small story from the AP shows what will probably happen in the Democratic primary there:

Voting machine problems hinder South Carolina GOP primary

Associated Press - January 19, 2008 5:23 PM ET

COLUMBIA, S.C. (AP) - Voting machine problems are plaguing today's South Carolina GOP primary.

In one coastal county, as many as 90% of the electronic voting machines did not work when polls opened. A State Election Commission spokesman says some of the machines were not properly tested. He says a final step that resets the machine for voting wasn't done, and that prevented them from starting up.

John McCain's campaign says it is disturbed by reports that voters were turned away in the morning when the machines were down. The campaign is encouraging voters to return to the polls to exercise their constitutional right to vote.

Polling officials in some parts of the state say they believed turnout was heavy early because of forecasts for snow later in the day.

http://www.woi-tv.com/Global/story.asp?S=7746022

What will equally a story on February 5th will be problems with electronic voting machines. Here are the states that vote electronically and have no paper trail (in red). States that vote electronically with a paper trail (which can be from tampered results) is in blue:

January 26, 2008
South Carolina - primary

February 5, 2008
Alabama - primary
Alaska - caucus
American Samoa - primary
Arizona - primary
Arkansas - primary
California - primary
Colorado - caucus
Connecticut - primary
Delaware - primary
Democrats Abroad - primary
Georgia - primary
Idaho - caucus
Illinois - primary
Kansas - caucus
Massachusetts - primary
Minnesota - caucus
Missouri - primary
New Jersey - primary
New Mexico - caucus
New York - primary
North Dakota - caucus
Oklahoma - primary
Tennessee - primary
Utah - primary

New Hampshire and South Carolina are just previews of February 5, "Super Tuesday" when primaries will be held in 24 states.

These states have voting and vote counting that is conducted in secret by machines made and serviced by private firms; and voting that cannot be easily and quickly verified. The citizens' right to know is casually surrendered to e-voting manufacturers by the officials sworn to serve those very citizens.

Almost all of the states have restrictive recount laws that require a very close election, a 1% or less difference in some cases. This effectively bars recounts unless "malfunctions" or vote stealing is marginal. Even if election fraud or "machine malfunction" is suspected for very good reasons, the right to recount is limited to only elections where mistakes or stealing produce a very thin margin.

These touch screen "ballots" are nothing more than a computerized record (not a ballot). After the election, citizens almost always lack the right to examine that computerized records and are typically barred from reviewing the paper forms they mark for optical scan voting machines.

How can those elected claim to rule when they're unable to prove the first and most fundamental requirement of an election – that they have the right to serve by having legitimately claimed a plurality or majority of the votes cast.

http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL0801/S00233.htm

Here's an overview on how states will vote in 2008:



Green: VVPR + manual audits required (16)
Dark Yellow: VVPR required; No audit requirement (14)
Yellow: VVPR not required but in use statewide; No audit requirement (8)
Red: No VVPR requirement; No audit requirement (12)

VVPR: Voter-Verified Paper Record

http://www.verifiedvoting.org/

We'll see what happens in the next races. I would hope people would not look at this issue from how their candidate might do, but rather that we really need to make sure a vote really counts.

[zulchzulu]

1. No one cares?

[dailykoff]

2. Hilly's secret weapon

Works best when there's enough crapola flying around (values voters, emotional moment) to fool anybody gullible enough to believe what CNN or the NYT tells them.

[zulchzulu]

3. I'm thinking...

...that GOP operatives would love to have the Clintons to run against and what better way than to tamper with democracy.

Who knows... it's just entirely too troubling for me that we let the "management" allow such voting machines in without getting some geeks to look over the shoulder and say it's not the way to go.

No receipt from a voting machine from the same company that makes ATMs that print out a receipt? A Palm Pilot can beam into the memory card with ease? Are we that stupid?

[dailykoff]

5. The way I see it is, it's a win-win for the GOP if Hilly gets the nom.

They win the general whether they steal it or not, and they know where the ballots are buried just in case the Clintons get any funny ideas about not obeying their MIC masters, which they never do anyway. With Obama all bets are off.

[EFerrari]

4. Of nine states covered in the National Votng Rights Act, 6 use

systems that provide no paper record: AK,GA,LA,SC,TX,VA.