Your Vote Counts Better on Paper

[kster]

by Fred Foldvary
Article Launched: 05/14/2008 02:11:41 PM PDT

California should replace all voting machines and scannable forms with papers ballots, hand-counted in each precinct.

The problem with computerized voting is that it is an opaque box whose inner operations are unobservable. Hackers can tamper with the programming and with the data, and there is no way to be sure that the tallied voting totals are genuine. A printed record of each vote is better than nothing, but doing a recount with the printed records is costly. And if the recount is itself done with computerized data processing, we are back to square one.

With the use of punched cards or scannable forms, most elections will not be recounted. If the votes for a candidate or proposition are not closely tied, it is unlikely that one side will demand a recount.

Under the current system, mail-in ballots of absentee voters are hand-marked but computer-counted. Again, the data processing can be tampered with. Any time a machine tallies a total, the sums are subject to doubt. There is no way to fix this situation. A machine or computer program can be tested and certified to be correct at one time and then subsequently hacked to produce a manipulated result. Similarly, programming can be set to switch on at a particular time, so that a prior test gives a correct answer but in the actual voting the secret code kicks in to skew the outcome.

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