Update of March 16, 2005: The Federal Voting Assistance Program today sent us an email informing us that their website is now available to all citizens worldwide at http://www.fvap.gov/ and there is no need to go to our outdate mirror of their site. They wrote:"We believe that you did this in good faith to support citizens outside the United States who were having access issues with our site. We appreciate your support to our citizens."
Verified Voting Foundation Media Advisory
For Immediate Release: Tuesday, September 21, 2004
Contact:
Will Doherty
Executive Director
Verified Voting Foundation
press@verifiedvoting.org
Pamela Smith
Nationwide Coordinator
Verified Voting Foundation
pam@verifiedvoting.org
Overseas Voter Website Censored by U.S. Government
Verified Voting Foundation Provides Workaround
The International Herald Tribune reported on September 20 that "the Pentagon has begun restricting international access to the official Web site intended to help overseas absentee voters cast ballots." Pentagon spokeswoman Lieutenant Colonel Ellen Krenke confirmed that a number of Internet service providers worldwide had been blacklisted "to thwart hackers." Such measures are generally recognized to be ineffective against hackers while blocking legitimate users.
Apparently, the Federal Voting Assistance Program (FVAP) website is now blocked to some civilians overseas trying to find out how to obtain absentee ballots in at least 25 countries including Japan, France, Great Britain, and Spain although military personnel overseas have other mechanisms for requesting absentee ballots.
As a service to overseas U.S. citizens, the Verified Voting Foundation (VVF) is making the FVAP website available through connections in the U.S. at http://register.verifiedvoting.org/
"We at the Verified Voting Foundation are shocked that the Pentagon has decided to prevent overseas civilians from accessing absentee ballot information," said the organization's Executive Director Will Doherty. "We abhor any policy that prevents or deters eligible voters from voting and having their votes counted accurately."
Although other governments -- notably the People's Republic of China and Saudi Arabia -- prevent citizens' access to certain websites through official censorship and blocking, this is an unusual case because it blocks the government's own public information site from certain groups of citizens.
Two states currently allow military voters overseas to email their votes. Twenty others permit faxed votes. Verified Voting Foundation Nationwide Coordinator Pamela Smith commented, "It is an excellent use of electronic resources to email or fax a blank ballot or instructional materials to a voter, but for a voter to return a voted ballot by email or fax is NOT a secure system of voting."
In a recent article, a spokesman for the email voting program suggested this was a better alternative to "ballots getting lost in the mail"but ballots could also be "lost" via email.
Even worse, voters who fax or email their votes lose the benefits of a long tradition of secret ballots in the U.S.
For the page that permits access to the FVAP site and
provides further information on this topic:
http://register.verifiedvoting.org/ [this mirror is now out-of-date]
To register to vote: http://www.yourvotematters.org/VerifiedVoting
For media coverage of this story:
PRESSLIST: Media professionals are invited to subscribe to the Verified Voting presslist by sending an email to press@verifiedvoting.org with their contact information. About Verified Voting Foundation:
The Verified Voting Foundation is a nonprofit organization championing reliable and publicly verifiable elections. Founded by Stanford University Computer Science Professor David Dill, the organization supports a requirement for voter-verified paper ballots for all voting technology, including electronic voting machines, to allow voters to inspect individual permanent records of their ballots and election officials to conduct meaningful recounts as needed. The organization's website is at http://www.verifiedvoting.org/
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