I'm reading this - have viewed their video. This is not the model I was trained on nor is it the procedure I was trained in here in Ohio. There is no 'logic checking' procedure. We are supposed to check/verify that there is NO DATA on the recording data card and all pollworkers - 1 Republican and 1 Democrat at each precinct area table - must sign off on that.

I'm not naive. I can understand clearly how someone who gets past the pollworkers to the machines might place malicious code on an individual machine that might cause problems. But this is predicated on the belief that most of us will be willing to allow someone to move around between machines. It is possible in a busy polling center.

My question for you all that are more technical skilled than me is how can any of the following be an issue if the machines are not in fact networked and most definitely are not on the Internet?

* Step 1: The machine could be tainted with vote-stealing software, or the voter could taint the machine with vote-stealing software by gaining access to it.

If a whole room full of people from both parties can be snuck past?

* Step 2: If the machine is tainted, then it can incorrectly record the vote. Or, if the voter has managed to make a supervisor card for himself, he can vote multiple times, delete votes, or disable the machine entirely.

If you insiste on sharing all the code publicly I think this is likely :) But I don't think the supervisor card will work the way this example test presumes. I will have a supervisor coding device and the one I practiced with wipes and resets the information on the voter card - it does not do anything at all to the machine as far as I can imagine...even if I got really paranoid. The only cards that I will have to deal with are the voter cards and the voting recording card and that is locked into place first thing. I will be wearing that key on my wrist all day.

* Step 3: If the centralized machine that does the vote tallying is tainted, then not only can it skew the election results, but it can also infect any DRE that connects directly to it, or it can taint any storage card that's plugged into it.

Step 3 is the critical issue and that is what you observers should be paying attention to. But as far as I am aware there will be more than one of these per Board of Elections and our people said their will be virus scanning, dual-party checking and at least our tech guy here in Medina County sounded like he knows what he is talking about.

I do not believe voting is always honest - never has been. I grew up hearing stories of the Chicago political machine and the dead walking to vote... but I don't know that these new problems are anything more than the old problems and I think honest pollworkers and good faith efforts are still the only real solution :)

Yours Optimistically,

Di

I've been trying to identify the Ohio county - if it really is Ohio? That this author is from. It is extremely unlikely to be Cuyahoga County as they are paying substantially higher than this author mentions. They have had difficulty recruiting Republican pollworkers to meet the requirements for many of the inner city precincts. That was what was reported in our news so they raised the pay. http://boe.cuyahogacounty.us/jobopps/default.htm

If you want some facts. Medina County is just south of Cuyahoga County.

I will be very curious to know what county this person is working in. I'm trying not to be judgmental or mean but if this person does not feel qualified than she/he should stay at home or go to her/his regular job.

Di

My own personal computer security guy (aka husband) tells me that code transparency means something different than I was thinking. I agree with the idea now that it has been explained. The code should be available for objective - non-affiliated, non-Diebold technical testing and verification before the machines are in place and after as well. I'm shocked if it is not.

swokm no worries :)

Di