FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday,
June 8, 2006
Contact:
Courtenay Strickland Bhatia, President & CEO, Verified
Voting Foundation
+1 415 487-2255 work or +1 415 235-0126 cell, courtenay@verifiedvoting.org
Pamela Smith, Nationwide Coordinator, Verified Voting
Foundation
+1 760 613-0172 cell, pam@verifiedvoting.org
SAN FRANCISCO – Verified Voting today released a preliminary*
summary of states whose elections are at risk due to newly-revealed
security vulnerabilities in Diebold voting systems, including the
Diebold TSx, TS, and optical scan machines, as uncovered by computer
expert Harri Hursti of Black Box Voting.
The summary, which is the first part of an ongoing Verified
Voting effort to track voting equipment in use throughout the country
from all vendors, was presented yesterday at a Capitol Hill briefing
held by Verified Voting and the National Committee for Voting
Integrity. The briefing provided technical information on the recently
revealed Diebold vulnerabilities. The vulnerabilities would allow
substitution of false vote totals without any trace or the insertion of
malicious software, using the smart card technology and design features
integral to the machines.
“These security vulnerabilities are classic examples of why we
worry about electronic voting,” said Verified Voting Founder David L.
Dill, who is a Computer Science Professor at Stanford University.
“There will be an endless series of security holes, and not just with
Diebold equipment. Instead of trying to make perfectly secure systems,
we need to plan for security problems, by ensuring that we can
independently check the results of the machines. That's what
voter-verified paper records are all about.”
According to the Verified Voting’s preliminary information on
the Diebold systems, 27 states are at risk with varying degrees of
vulnerability, depending in part on whether the jurisdiction has a
voter-verified paper record. Diebold TSx touch screen machines can be
equipped to produce such a record, although not all jurisdictions with
the TSx chose that option. Diebold TS systems do not offer a
voter-verified paper record. Optical scan voting systems use a paper
ballot (inherently voter-verified), but they too must be audited to
check for accuracy. The three largest states in the country –
California, Texas, and Florida – all fall into the at-risk group.
“It’s important for policymakers, local election officials, and
voters to know whether their state or local jurisdiction is at risk so
that appropriate action can be taken immediately for upcoming
elections,” said Courtenay Strickland Bhatia, President & CEO of
Verified Voting. “But states and jurisdictions without Diebold
equipment should not rest easy,” Bhatia added. “Because these
vulnerabilities are emblematic of the problem overall, every
jurisdiction should require voter-verified paper records and routine,
random, manual audits to provide for election integrity.”
Eight states had primaries this past Tuesday, and four more hold
their primaries next week. Twenty-six more states throughout the
country have primary elections from late June through September.
Of the 27 states listed in the report, nine are at high risk,
using paperless Diebold TSx and TS machines without any means to
recover from exploitation of this vulnerability. Hundreds of counties
are at medium risk, having a blended system of Diebold TSx, TS, and
optical scan systems, with some votes in some jurisdictions capable of
being recovered through paper records. Eighteen states are at lower
risk, but only if meaningful audits are carried out using manual counts
of the paper record to check the machine vote totals. Most states do
not have audit requirements at this time.
For very close races, votes in just a few jurisdictions can
determine statewide results. In such cases having just one unverifiable
jurisdiction throws the entire election into doubt.
In order to provide a way to verify accuracy of election results
and allow for recovery in the event of voting system problems, Verified
Voting urges all states that have not yet passed legislation mandating
a voter-verified paper record and routine, random audits to pass such
laws this year. In states that already have a voter-verified paper
record, random audits should be conducted prior to certification of
election results.
“Such audits can and should be voluntarily undertaken by
election officials whether or not a law requiring them has been
passed,” Bhatia stated.
For jurisdictions where there is no voter-verified paper record,
Verified Voting urges voters to insist that local officials provide
paper ballots as an alternative way to vote at the polling place.
Pennsylvania provided an example of the critical importance of
providing paper ballots as an alternative in the polling place two
weeks ago, when hundreds of voting machines failed to start on time or
malfunctioned during the day, and thousands of voters used paper
ballots successfully. Recent experiences in California and Georgia,
where thousands of voters were disenfranchised by machine malfunctions,
have shown that no electronic voting jurisdiction can afford to go
without paper ballots.
Voter-verified paper records provide the necessary tool to
conduct routine, random audits: manual counts of a significant portion
of the paper records, compared to the machine totals. Such auditing
facilitates detection of problems before election results are
certified, and makes recovery possible when machine counts are in
error, whether due to fraud or machine malfunction. These diagnostic
and recovery systems are all the more important because voting system
software is proprietary and, for the most part, not available for
inspection.
At present, Verified Voting encourages the use of precinct-count
optical scan voting systems and accessible ballot-marking devices,
combined with audits, as a practical, cost-effective and accessible
means of providing verifiability and recovery capabilities.
The Verified Voting preliminary summary of Diebold equipment
vulnerability by state and county is attached.
Updates to the Verified Voting database of voting equipment in use
throughout the country will be posted to our web site as they become
available.
* This preliminary report does not claim to be
complete; information subject to change, addition or correction.
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