Monday, March 27, 2006
General Accounting Office to Congress 11/6/05
Report from the Non Partisan General Accounting Office to Congress in September 2005.
“The United States is the only major democracy that allows private partisan corporations to secretly count and tabulate the votes with proprietary non-transparent software. The CEO of one of the most crucial suppliers of electronic voting machines, Warren O'Dell of Diebold, pledged before the 2004 campaign to deliver Ohio and thus the presidency to George W. Bush.”
http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2005/1529No
This GAO’s report raises questions about the results in Ohio, Iowa, Nevada and New Mexico where last minute shifts changed the results of the election.
“Examples of Voting System Vulnerabilities and Problems
• Cast ballots, ballot definition files, and audit logs could be modified.
• Supervisor functions were protected with weak or easily guessed passwords.
• Systems had easily picked locks and power switches that were exposed and unprotected.
• Local jurisdictions misconfigured their electronic voting systems, leading to election day problems.
• Voting systems experienced operational failures during elections.
• Vendors installed uncertified electronic voting systems.
While electronic voting systems hold promise for a more accurate and efficient election process, numerous entities have raised concerns about their security and reliability, citing instances of weak security controls, system design flaws, inadequate system version control, inadequate security testing, incorrect system configuration, poor security management, and vague or incomplete voting system standards, among other issues.
For example, studies found
(1) some electronic voting systems did not encrypt cast ballots or system audit logs, and it was possible to alter both without being detected;
(2) it was possible to alter the files that define how a ballot looks and works so that the votes for one candidate could be recorded for a different candidate; and
(3) vendors installed uncertified versions of voting system software at the local level.
It is important to note that many of the reported concerns were drawn from specific system makes and models or from a specific jurisdiction’s election, and that there is a lack of consensus among election officials and other experts on the pervasiveness of the concerns. Nevertheless, some of these concerns were reported to have caused local problems in federal elections—resulting in the loss or miscount of votes—and therefore merit attention.”
2GAO’s Executive Council on Information Management and Technology is made up of
leading executives in government, industry, and academia.
“The United States is the only major democracy that allows private partisan corporations to secretly count and tabulate the votes with proprietary non-transparent software. The CEO of one of the most crucial suppliers of electronic voting machines, Warren O'Dell of Diebold, pledged before the 2004 campaign to deliver Ohio and thus the presidency to George W. Bush.”
http://www.freepress.org/departments/display/19/2005/1529No
This GAO’s report raises questions about the results in Ohio, Iowa, Nevada and New Mexico where last minute shifts changed the results of the election.
“Examples of Voting System Vulnerabilities and Problems
• Cast ballots, ballot definition files, and audit logs could be modified.
• Supervisor functions were protected with weak or easily guessed passwords.
• Systems had easily picked locks and power switches that were exposed and unprotected.
• Local jurisdictions misconfigured their electronic voting systems, leading to election day problems.
• Voting systems experienced operational failures during elections.
• Vendors installed uncertified electronic voting systems.
While electronic voting systems hold promise for a more accurate and efficient election process, numerous entities have raised concerns about their security and reliability, citing instances of weak security controls, system design flaws, inadequate system version control, inadequate security testing, incorrect system configuration, poor security management, and vague or incomplete voting system standards, among other issues.
For example, studies found
(1) some electronic voting systems did not encrypt cast ballots or system audit logs, and it was possible to alter both without being detected;
(2) it was possible to alter the files that define how a ballot looks and works so that the votes for one candidate could be recorded for a different candidate; and
(3) vendors installed uncertified versions of voting system software at the local level.
It is important to note that many of the reported concerns were drawn from specific system makes and models or from a specific jurisdiction’s election, and that there is a lack of consensus among election officials and other experts on the pervasiveness of the concerns. Nevertheless, some of these concerns were reported to have caused local problems in federal elections—resulting in the loss or miscount of votes—and therefore merit attention.”
2GAO’s Executive Council on Information Management and Technology is made up of
leading executives in government, industry, and academia.
# posted by Florence Vincent @ 5:06 PM 
