E-Vote Still Flawed, Experts Say

Found on Wired on Thursday, 29 January 2004
Browse Politics

Computer security experts hired to hack electronic voting machines manufactured by Diebold Election Systems found that flaws in the machines could result in malicious insiders or outsiders stealing an election.

William Arbaugh, a University of Maryland assistant professor of computer science who participated in the test, graded the system an "F," "with the possibility of raising it to a 'C' with extra credit -- that is, if they follow the recommendations we gave them."

"I was really surprised with the totality of the problems we found. Just about everywhere we looked we found them," Arbaugh said.

Diebold President Bob Urosevich said in the release that the Raba Technologies report confirmed "the accuracy and security of Maryland's voting procedures and our voting systems as they exist today."

"They took a study that was highly critical of them and claimed victory. I don't understand the continuous need to insist that things are OK," said Avi Rubin, director of the Information Security Institute at Johns Hopkins University and author of an earlier report critical of the Diebold system.

Wasn't there any security at all? People freak out if their mail does not work for one day, but nobody seems to care about unsafe voting systems. Looks like Dubya will get another round in the ring.