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| 10-28-05: Blackwell Blunders on Votin... |
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BBV Admin
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 2444
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 8 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 11:36 am: | 
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Ohio Secretary of State J. Kenneth Blackwell claimed in 2003 that his office's procedures for identifying potential conflicts with voting machine evaluators have "saved us from embarrassment and probably legal entanglements."(1)
Citing conflict of interest by SAIC, the evaluator originally slated to examine Ohio's voting systems, Blackwell replaced SAIC with CompuWare.
What Blackwell failed to divulge to the public (and perhaps to the vendors as well) was that CompuWare was creating software for a competitor of the companies whose secret software it was evaluating.
(updated 1:10 PST 10/28/05)
After Blackwell assigned CompuWare the task of evaluating voting system vendors, CompuWare wrote a blistering report, citing all four major manufacturers for security defects, rating many as “high risk.”
It should be noted here that Black Box Voting agrees with CompuWare's statement to us today that the CompuWare reports are "indisputably accurate and professional." In fact, our own independent research, examining the programs themselves, and conducting field tests with security experts, do support the accuracy of the CompuWare reports.
Bev Harris, of Black Box Voting, spoke with CompuWare Director of Media Relations Doug Kuiper today. When asked for his comment on CompuWare’s conflict of interest in writing reports critical of the four major vendors while concurrently developing software for a competitor, Kuiper said “There is absolutely no impropriety.”
Harris: “You wrote reports?”
Kuiper: “Yes.”
Harris: “In 2003, 2004, and 2005. And at the same time, you were helping to develop software for a competing voting machine manufacturer?”
Kuiper: “We’re a billion dollar company.”
Kuiper assured Black Box Voting that there was absolutely no connection between CompuWare's evaluation of the voting software made by other vendors and its work with Voting Technology International. Because of nondisclosure agreements, CompuWare says there was no breach of security in proprietary software.
With conflict of interest situations, it is the appearance of impropriety, not whether an infraction actually occurred, and what was disclosed, not whether someone did something bad. What happened in Ohio is undeniably odd.
CompuWare itself did disclose its work with Voting Technology International, because it posted the information on its Web site. CompuWare customer Web page
The question is, did Blackwell do enough due diligence and disclosure to protect the state of Ohio from being sued. What did Blackwell know, what did he disclose, and to whom? Did he tell the vendors what he knew (or should have known) about CompuWare's work with a competing voting machine company? Why did Blackwell eliminate SAIC for conflict of interest, but choose CompuWare, which had an almost identical conflict of interest?
June, 2003: CompuWare published a press release stating that it was developing elections software for Voting Technology International.
Fall 2003: Blackwell chose CompuWare to evaluate the proprietary software of Diebold, Election Systems & Software, Hart Intercivic and Sequoia Voting Systems. He ordered the top four vendors to submit their software to CompuWare if they wanted to sell their systems in Ohio. But did he tell them CompuWare was developing software for a competitor when he ordered them to produce their software?
Voting Technologies International is undeniably a competitor. It recently prevailed over Diebold, ES&S, Hart Intercivic, and Sequoia Voting Systems in selling its voting software in Boone County and Randolph County, Indiana.
According to the company Web site, CompuWare provided development and technical support for VoT Ware, the computerized voting system software sold by Voting Technology International.
“Compuware developers continue to modify the [Voting Technology International] software,“ the CompuWare site reports (Oct 28, 2005).
What was Blackwell's fiduciary duty?
It would appear that the ethical issues here will fall mostly on the shoulders of Ken Blackwell.
1) Did Blackwell ask CompuWare to provide conflict of interest information when he purchased their services?
2) If so, did CompuWare provide that information accurately?
3) If Blackwell did not ask this question of CompuWare, it was still Blackwell's responsibility to the state of Ohio to learn this information. He seems to agree: He terminated an evaluation with SAIC for precisely this reason, conflict of interest.
In 2003, Blackwell had slated Scientific Applications International, Inc. (SAIC) to conduct a security review of voting machines for the state of Ohio.
Hart Intercivic, in the interest of full disclosure and to avoid any appearance of impropriety, sent notice of a potential conflict of interest. Blackwell terminated SAIC in September 2003, citing conflict with SAIC's investments in Triton Ventures, which shares an interest in Hart Intercivic.
Black Box Voting has requested all materials pertaining to the CompuWare contract with Ohio. We want to know what was asked by Blackwell, and what was disclosed by CompuWare.
Blackwell had a fiduciary duty to the state of Ohio to check for potential conflicts before ordering voting machine vendors to turn over their software to CompuWare.
We have requested all correspondence between Blackwell’s office and ES&S, Sequoia, Diebold and Hart Intercivic, to learn when Blackwell disclosed to them that he knew CompuWare was developing a product that competes with theirs.
Blackwell told The Plain Dealer that he found this conflict using his "procedures for identifying potential conflicts". Therefore, Black Box Voting has requested Blackwell’s “office procedures for identifying potential conflicts.”
BBV’s Bev Harris called Blackwell’s office to ask about the CompuWare conflict of interest, and any possible legal entanglements this may cause. Blackwell's office did not return the call.
Did Blackwell fail in an even bigger duty?
It should be emphasized that the substance of the CompuWare report, at least as far as Diebold is concerned, has been substantiated by several other independent testers.
Black Box Voting is concerned with Blackwell's tendency to withhold information from people with a right to know -- vendors who are giving their trade secrets over to a company that is developing a competing product, and also, election officials who are responsible for running clean elections.
While Blackwell's lack of disclosure (or due diligence) in selecting a voting machine evaluator may have exposed the state of Ohio to potential legal liability from vendors, his failure to disclose the contents of the August 18, 2004 CompuWare report to election officials may cause even greater legal issues.
Blackwell appears to have delayed distribution of the August 18, 2004 CompuWare report until Jan. 2005. The implications of this will be discussed in an upcoming article. Conflict of interest or not, the Aug. 18 CompuWare report contained very serious concerns about the Diebold voting software, along with specific directives to take three steps to mitigate the risks for the GEMS central tabulator, which it rated "high, high, high."
The exploit category described in the Aug. 18 2004 CompuWare report was proven by Dr. Herbert Thompson using the Diebold GEMS system in Leon County, Florida, on Feb. 14 2005 and again, using a second variation of the hack, on May 2 2005. Now we know that Blackwell had been specifically informed of this vulnerability.
Black Box Voting has submitted public records to determine what Blackwell disclosed, and when, to the Election Assistance Commission (EAC) and to county election officials using the GEMS system. Our records requests also seek to learn whether the "high risk" mitigations were in fact carried out by Blackwell or anyone else prior to the Nov. 2004 election.
The Diebold GEMS system cited in the Aug. 18 CompuWare report was used in hundreds of jurisdictions and dozens of states in the Nov. 2004 election, including Lucas and Hardin counties in Blackwell's own state. If Blackwell failed to implement the CompuWare risk mitigation procedures, and if he failed to disclose the information in the CompuWare report to the rest of the U.S., he may very well have put the entire 2004 election in jeopardy.
(1) The Plain Dealer, 30 Sept. 2003: "Ohio replaces voting machine reviewer, Company has financial interest in manufacturer" by Julie Carr Smyth
(2) CompuWare Web site press release, June 2003: "Electing to Use The Best"
"Compuware was responsible for making it all work" -- "The heart of VTI's suite of products is VoT Ware, a software platform that handles all aspects of the voting process for VTI products. |
John Washburn
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Johnwashburn
Post Number: 171
Registered: 04-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 11:48 am: |
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Is this the same VoTing Technologies International from Milwaukee Wisconsin currently seeking to use Wisconsin State Senators to bypass the approval process of the Wisconsin State Election Board?
I may have to take an amble downtown to Broadway a see these offices. I think the address is the M&I bank building.
In Liberty,
John Washburn
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BBV Admin
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 2471
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 1:06 pm: |
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Yes. It was your post that led us to stumble into Ohio's potential liability here, when Blackwell required vendors to turn over their secret software to a company developing competing software. |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1101
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 1:30 pm: |
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Blackwell and Compuware's behavior sure makes a joke out of the whole "proprietary/trade secret" issue, doesn't it?! |
BBV Admin
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 2495
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 3:10 pm: |
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Catherine,
You're right. CompuWare wants us to believe that since they signed a "non-disclosure agreement", this alone was enough to protect the 4 vendor's proprietary software from CompuWare using this information to their financial advantage!
If that's all it takes to "secure" these all important trade secrets, then why not allow election officials and citizens the same courtesy and let us sign a non-disclosure agreement so that we could video the counting of the votes on the central tabulator or the precinct-based optical scan machines!? All we would stand to gain are some needed checks and balances of citizen oversight necessary to ensure an honest election.
If the disclosure of this information doesn't cause significant citizen rumblings, I don't know what will.
Kathleen |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1112
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 4:32 pm: |
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I wonder what those 4 vendors will think about CompuWare having access to their trade secrets, and simultaneously helping to develop similar products for a competitor. |
BBV Admin
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 2496
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 4:45 pm: |
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from Bev - I spoke with Michelle Shafer, a representative of Hart Intercivic. It was ironic that Hart was concerned enough about full disclosure and avoiding any appearance of impropriety that it reported the potential conflict of interest itself, causing the SAIC to be removed by Blackwell.
Hart Intercivic's Shafer indicated to me that Hart was not told CompuWare was developing software for a competitor. |
John Howard
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Harmonyguy
Post Number: 127
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 8:59 pm: |
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Is there not a responsibility on the part of the vendors to decide to whom they will expose their proprietary trade secrets? I find it difficult to believe that any of the four vendors would send their systems to a company without first checking-up on the company to see who they were or what they were up to.
If Compuware issued a press release about their work with VTI, surely David Bear and his Public Strategies Inc. (Diebold's crisis management advisor) buddies would know about it. If I was a Diebold shareholder I'd be demanding to know why Bear and company didn't know. The same goes for the other companies. They certainly SHOULD have known, and SHOULD have protected their investors from having the company's intellectual property revealed to a competitor. Do they even understand the concept of DUE DILIGENCE? Can all four companies be so incredibly stupid as to make the identical mistake at the identical time under identical circumstances?
That FOUR separate competing companies appear to have submitted their product 'secrets' to a fifth competitor apparently without so much as a whimper causes me to wonder if there wasn't some 'other' deal promised to the vendors.
Was there a backroom deal to keep the Compuware report from seeing the light of day?
Was there a backroom deal to keep VTI out of the running?
Was something else promised? By whom?
HG |
James Zukowski
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Jimz
Post Number: 153
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, October 28, 2005 - 11:25 pm: |
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And the irony of it is that BBV looks like it's on the side of the Big 4 vs Blackwell/Ohio...
Peace!
James Zukowski
The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.
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Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1113
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, October 29, 2005 - 4:06 am: |
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One could argue that it's CompuWare that should have had the obligation to disclose any potential conflict of interest to all the companies involved. CompuWare is the one that would have the awareness of its own customer base.
One customer wouldn't necessarily know who the other customers are of a given service provider; though if there were potential for a conflict of interest you'd think it might have occurred to them to ask in order to protect their own interests. |
Bev Harris
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Bevharris
Post Number: 2
Registered: 10-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, October 29, 2005 - 6:06 am: |
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to James Zukowski - We have, periodically, seen stories that seem to conflict with other things we are doing. We have a major project going on now regarding the CompuWare Aug. 18 report, which we'll report more on as the records come in. For that reason, at first, for a hot second, we wondered if we should report this.
The same thing happened when we discovered, through Harri Hursti's wonderful work, the "mother of all security holes" in the optical scan -- while paperless touch-screens have been the favored attack point for activists.
The same thing happened when we learned of significant licensing issues with OVC, yet we support the concept of open, or at least disclosed, source code.
Our policy is to report what we find if it is relevant to election integrity even it it conflicts with our strategic priorities. It is tempting to release news stories based on other goals, but we think that is a way of manipulating a message and is not, in the long run, wisdom. |
Bev Harris
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Bevharris
Post Number: 3
Registered: 10-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, October 29, 2005 - 6:08 am: |
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To John Howard -
Yes, the vendors have a responsibility to do due diligence also, though they appear not to have done so. CompuWare is a big company, and its representative told me they've had 30,000 customers -- but they do only list a couple dozen on their Web site, and VTI is one of those.
I am sure the vendors did not consider VTI to be a viable competitor at that time, since it hadn't sold anything. Maybe the vendors had a bigger reason to avoid SAIC (it had only evaluated Diebold before, not the others.) Whatever. This situation is undeniably odd.
However - If Blackwell thought avoiding conflict of interest could put the state in legal jeopardy, as he states he did when halting the SAIC deal, it makes no sense that he would invoke the identical (or greater) level of legal jeopardy by hiring CompuWare.
If Blackwell stopped the SAIC deal on conflict of interest grounds, but DIDN'T ASK CompuWare about potential conflict of interest, that would make Blackwell look like an idiot.
If Blackwell asked CompuWare but CompuWare omitted the information, it would reflect badly on CompuWare. My hunch is they were never asked, but we'll see.
If Blackwell didn't ask, given that he believed a conflict of interest could involve the state of Ohio in litigation, he should at least have had someone on his staff do a cursory look at the web site.
Blackwell either knew, or he didn't, but either way it doesn't speak well of his competence. |
James Zukowski
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Jimz
Post Number: 154
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, October 29, 2005 - 11:21 pm: |
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Bev--
I understand and fully agree. It's simply that, in fully engaging integrity at all levels, we get to support the process, even if it "supports" those we usually don't.
In this case, if Blackwell did check into possible conflict considerations with CompuWare, but proceeded anyway, it sounds like somebody should sue his butt on behalf of the people of the State of Ohio, if not the country.
On the other hand, if he (or his staff) didn't do that, they should also be sued for negligence.
I don't really like the idea of suing someone -- it's not how I would care to spend my time -- but there are times when enough is too much, and this is one of them.
Peace!
James Zukowski
The people who cast the votes decide nothing. The people who count the votes decide everything.
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John Washburn
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Johnwashburn
Post Number: 180
Registered: 04-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, October 31, 2005 - 11:23 am: |
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And the irony of it is that BBV looks like it's on the side of the Big 4 vs Blackwell/Ohio...
All the better to dispell the falsehood election-integrity movement is an anti-Diebold or anti-Republican movement.
I did the same for Diebold against VTI. I do not think Diebold should be approved in Wisconsin, but I am doing so within the approval framework. VTI's attempt to bypass that framework is manifestly unfair to Diebold ES&S, AccuPoll, and Populex the current and past applicants.
I believe IF a machine survives the WI application process it will be adequate. I just do not believe any product on the market currently would be approved under the established system in WI.
In Liberty,
John Washburn
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