Navigation
Topics
Log In
Log Out
:
Special Search
New Today
New This Week
Advanced Search
Tree View
Your Account
Edit Profile
Register
Forgot Password
Tools
Help/Instructions
Policies
CLICK STATE TO SEE:
"WATCH LIST"
Marked with: 
"OPEN & HONEST"
Marked with: 
...
|
| 4-9-07: Two voting products combine t... |
|
| Author |
Message |
    
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 6169
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 7 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2007 - 5:41 am: | 
|
The government and some of its vendors can now access your secret ballot.
It's true: Two voting products are designed to be used together. When combined, these two products do away with the secret ballot. And this is already being used.
Because this secretive process is split between two products, the sales pitch on each product truthfully claims that privacy remains in place. What they DON'T MENTION is that when the products are used together, privacy evaporates.
The two products that combine to strip away your ballot privacy are:
1. Ballot-marked vote tracker systems (VoteHere and, from reports we have received, Populex)
2. Image-retaining vote counters (Diebold, Hart Intercivic)
Once the bar code containing embedded voter information is on the ballot, the image captured by the vote counter creates a computer file with both votes and voter-tied information.
Persons inside government are in the best position to abuse this feature. In fact, government security experts already have ties to the ballot-marked systems.
Current US Secretary of Defense and former CIA head Robert Gates has been on the advisory board of VoteHere. Former US Secretary of Defense Frank Carlucci, also a former deputy director of the CIA and a long-time Chairman of the Board at the Carlyle Group is on the advisory board for Populex. Surely, these two men know the implications of tracking votes. The second biggest expenditure for the CIA during the 1980s was influencing foreign elections; as a Director of and Deputy Director of the CIA, surely they are aware of the benefits an unscrupulous individual could gain from producing giant vote databases that tie back to voters.
HERE’S HOW THESE TWO SYSTEMS STEAL YOUR POLITICAL PRIVACY
Step 1: Vote tracking system puts bar code on ballot which embeds a connector to your voter registration system ID. Sales pitch: "This allows voters to find out if their vote went through the system."
Step 2: Ballot counting device automatically takes digital photo of each ballot. These images are stored on the computer in ballot image directories.
Here is a copy of a Diebold high speed central count ballot image directory (zip file; does not contain vote tracker bar codes):
http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/72/2002-MarinL_A-46406.zip
With the vote tracking system, the digital image directories contain BOTH the bar code with your ID embedded AND the votes you cast.
More later on how the ballot tracking systems work, and why their use is about to increase. First, let's explore the dangers of allowing our vote secrecy to be stripped away by government insiders, private vendors, and proprietary trade secrets.
IS VOTER PRIVACY REALLY NECESSARY?
Some citizens think we should do away with the secret ballot. That's a radical idea, and as you'll see below, one that carries the risk of destabilizing the nation. But secret government-owned voter+votes databases are no one's cup of tea, unless you wish to live in a carceral state, which seeks to know everything about its inhabitants while hiding information about itself. Even the most radical reformers don't want this evolutionary step towards a police state.
THE USE OF COMPUTERIZED DATABASES INCREASES THE RISK
America didn't always have a secret ballot. Voter privacy laws came about after a frenzy of corruption -- wholesale vote-buying and selling as showcased with the Tammany Hall scandal.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tammany_Hall - See "Tweed Machine"
That was bad, but now it can be much worse: Computers and the ability to manipulate massive databases put political privacy at significantly greater risk. The data-crunching operations provided by companies like Choicepoint have the capability to provide unprecedented power to databases containing personal information. Choicepoint's biggest client is the US government, and Choicepoint's lobbyist is John Ashcroft.
Today, Black Box Voting asked Choicepoint this question:
quote:"It's indisputable that his [Ashcroft's] firm is lobbying for you, so what is Choicepoint saying he is and isn't doing? "
Choicepoint responded:
quote:"Ashcroft and his firm are not lobbying any member of Congress on our behalf nor are we using them to affect any pending or possible legislation in Congress or any state legislature. We are using his firm solely to develop business leads. Both statements have been true since we began a relationship with the Ashcroft Group and remain true today. This is a business development relationship."
That is not particularly informative, and since the US Congress has exempted itself from the Freedom of Information Act, citizens can't even find out what this is all about.
Maybe Choicepoint would never exploit the new vote+voter databases, but instead the files would be slipped to the programmers for Voter Vault, the brawny Republican political database. One of Voter Vault's key contractors, Bruce Boram, has been chastised repeatedly for low-ball political tricks, and is one of the last people Democratic voters would want to view how they voted.
Perhaps it would be some other data mining company, or even some squirrely little custom program on the private laptop of a future Nixonian president. The point is, enabling vote data to be secretly tied to voters and retained in computer directories and/or databases is dangerous.
WHAT CAN GOVERNMENT AND ITS PRIVATE VENDORS DO WITH KNOWLEDGE OF YOUR VOTE?
How long do you think it would take for someone to get the bright idea to check the actual private voting patterns of all political appointees? How about checking on the private votes of military officers? Civil servants? What about an elected official grabbing a sneak a peek at which of his constituents actually voted for him? Redistricting tactics?
Knowing who votes for whom puts winners and losers in unique positions to extract revenge on each other. Those who vote the "wrong" way may be treated unfairly by judges (whether elected or appointed by elected individuals), prosecutors or law enforcement officials who happen to learn how they voted.
HOW DANGEROUS COULD IT GET?
Given time, exploits multiply. In the late 1800s when corporations seized the "right" to corporate personhood, no one dreamed they would end up shoveling hundreds of millions into political campaigns to create candidate dependency.
If the vote-tracking programs continue, sooner or later your private votes will be harvested, whether or not anyone is exploiting this opportunity at the moment.
quote:"As much as it extols political freedoms and governmental openness, the United States government has a long and dark history of rounding up troublemakers, suppressing dissent, criminalizing expression, sowing suspicion, and delaying justice."
This is a quote from No Greater Threat
by C. William Michaels, a book about the rise of the national security state.(1)
ROUNDING UP CITIZENS FOR THEIR POLITICAL OPINIONS
It's been done before. In 1950, Congress passed the Internal Security Act, establishing a new federal agency called the "Subversive Activities Control Board." The act was designed to identify and suppress supposedly subversive individuals and organizations.
quote:
"The chief weapon of the sea pirates was their capacity to astonish. No one could believe, until it was much too late, just how heartless and greedy they were."-- Kurt Vonnegut*
With the re-authorization of the Patriot Act, very troubling powers exist under current law, with obvious implications for what can happen now that the government can obtain information about how you voted:
According to the ACLU, "Section 215 (known as the 'library records' provision, but which actually applies to 'any tangible thing') does not require any individualized suspicion to get a court order for any record wanted." http://action.aclu.org/reformthepatriotact/whereitstands.html
That doesn't mean it's constitutional. And the use of certain kinds of data-mining programs by certain departments is now supposed to require reports to Congress, though it's unclear to any of us whether anyone is following the rules, or even how we would find out if they weren't.
quote:"The information sharing permitted by Title II of the Patriot Act is quite wide ranging. Definitions are broadly defined, and the investigation could involve almost anything. No court order is needed for information sharing. The Act does not specify a limit to the use made of this information by other government officials. The Act does not limit information sharing to more than one official from more than one agency. Information can be "shared" by one to many. There is no limitation of the type of "official" use to be made of shared information. This opens the door to extensive and secretive sharing …" (1)
MORE ABOUT HOW VOTE TRACKING REMOVES POLITICAL PRIVACY
Is this combination vote-tracking/digital imaging system already being used?
Yes. In San Juan County, Washington the VoteHere ballot tracking system is being used with Hart Intercivic vote-counting scanners (capture digital images of the ballots).
Bar codes on the ballot - VoteHere ballot tracker:
http://votehere.net/ballottrackermailin.php
Citizens to the rescue:
Tim White and Alan Rosato, two extraordinary San Juan County citizens, along with the help of the Green Party of San Juan County, have filed a lawsuit contending that the use of the ballot tracking program is illegal. You will find much more information here: http://www.mindspring.com/~sjmedia/
BUT CAN THESE BALLOT IMAGES BE EFFICIENTLY CONVERTED TO DATABASE FORMATS?
Yes. The ballot images are stored in directories, which can then be run through a program like Hursti's Votoscope to convert the pictures into data tables.
Black Box Voting obtained the ballot image files from the Diebold high speed scanner, another voting machine that produces ballot images. (As you may recall, we used to think this was a cool feature.)
In a project sponsored by Black Box Voting, Finnish computer programmer Harri Hursti created a working version of the "Votoscope", which he proved can quickly process hundreds of thousands of ballot images, converting them to a database.
Only one step remains: To add the bar code conversion feature into the data program. Both the vendor and various government entities are in a position to do this. Not only that, but under the mushy provisions of the Patriot Act, it's probably legal for certain divisions of the government to do this, even if it is not for a "security" reason.
Vendors will tell you that the bar code containing your identifier is encrypted. Who cares? The only question that remains is what subset of individuals have the key!
CURRENT LEGISLATION IN THE US CONGRESS WILL PUT MANY MORE LOCATIONS AT RISK
1. The Holt Bill (HR 811) attempts to create permanent voting system authority for White House appointees. This unwise move will be the subject of another article, but the application to ballot tracking is simply this: White House appointees, under the Holt Bill, get regulatory power over the mechanics of voting systems. At whatever time, a small handful of politically chosen individuals can decide for American voters, "Hey, this ballot tracking concept is very good, let's require it for everybody."
It is not inaccurate to characterize the proposed permanent funding for White House appointee-led regulatory power over election systems as "a clear and present danger" which, if carried out, will destabilize our great country.
2. Bills have been submitted both in the U.S. Congress and in many states to increase mail-in voting, which already openly uses ballot-marked vote tracking. Some of the bills even try to require ballot tracking, perhaps not realizing that ballot-tracking systems can optionally put a voter-tied code on both the mail-in envelope and the ballot itself.
http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/17337/47137.html
http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/17337/47163.html
A ballot vote-tracking system was recently used by the United Aerospace and Machinists union in a union election. Who knows how many other places this is being used.
And it sounds so warm and fuzzy: "You get to check that your vote was counted."
Unfortunately, so can others, and they can do a whole lot more than that.
(1) C. William Michaels, in a book on the rise of the national security state, No Greater Threat
PERMISSION TO EXCERPT OR REPRINT GRANTED, WITH LINK TO http://www.blackboxvoting.org
* Thanks to the many voting rights advocates who have helped so very much in developing effective communications frames for elections issues – Pokey Anderson, whose “Sea Pirates” quote I borrowed, and the many others who have been contributing such pithy phrases as “The United States of Amnesia” and others via working groups and listservs. |
Russell Novkov
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rnovkov
Post Number: 177
Registered: 02-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, April 9, 2007 - 8:35 pm: |
|
There needs to be better safeguards.
Russell J. Novkov
|
Patricia Gracian
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Patginsd
Post Number: 5
Registered: 06-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, April 9, 2007 - 10:49 pm: |
|
Bev,
I thought things could get no worse for our elections.
I was wrong.
This is a veritable nightmare.
We all need to spread the word immediately.
Thank you again for the heads up.
- Pat |
John Dean
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Bozosforbush
Post Number: 913
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, April 9, 2007 - 11:15 pm: |
|
Great article Bev! I had no idea this crap was going on.
No doubt, the phony voting activists are busy plotting more mischief tonight!
Deserter, brain is fried, no WMDs, yada yada yada. No wonder we clowns laugh.
|
Nancy Tobi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ntobi
Post Number: 104
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 6 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2007 - 1:07 pm: |
|
The Holt Bill also requires a text converter device in every polling place in America. One of the companies pitching itself to be able to provide this is Carlucci's oddly named Populex, which uses bar code technology.
Is the text converter a red herring? A way to impose technology into every polling station, but just not the technology they SAY they are imposing?
It is commonly understood among industry and election experts that the text conversion technology required by both Holt AND the EAC - those four White House appointees - does not currently exist.
So WHY do they both require it? The EAC, in its "voluntary" voting system guidelines, which go into effect December 2007, and Holt, in its mandate to "convert ballot text into accessible media". Why do they both require something that experts say doesn't even exist?
Populex President Sanford Morganstein claims their product meets the EAC and Holt requirements for text conversion. Experts state unequivocally this is untrue. Word on the Hill is that Populex has been reviewed and favorably received by those on the Hill pushing passage of the Holt Bill.
If the Holt Bill passes, will Populex be positioned to push its technology into every polling place in the nation just cuz they SAY it meets requirements? Won't be the first time America has been sold a bill of goods by the voting industry. Remember all those billions that bought the phony DRE technology? Technology promising to deliver accessibility and failing on such a large scale that it baffles the mind consumer protection laws have not kicked in to invoke masses of multibillion dollar refunds to those states who bought that particular government-sponsored snake oil.
Then we have VoteTrustUSA. Yes, the self-positioned "Activist Voice On The Hill". Which "activists" do they represent? VoteTrust, you may recall, is the "grassroots" organization that sprouted fully grown with the assistance of Choicepoint-associated funding seemingly for the sole purpose of pushing through the Holt Bill.
VoteTrustUSA has never denied its Choicepoint ties; it simply likes to say "it is a nonissue."
Excuse me?
The founders of VoteTrustUSA, as insiders from that time report, began as hand count advocates, but following a meeting with Holt's office turned to the verified voting scam/scheme, accepted funding from the wife of Choicepoint CEO, and became a nonstop advocacy tool for passage of the Holt Bill.
So looking at the constellation of players in the Holt Bill galaxy, we have the EAC, whose voting technology guidelines provided Holt with the cover to insert the text converter into his bill, we have Populex, favorably-received-on-the-hill voting technology vendor, who claims their bar code-based technology meets the text converter requirements, and we have VoteTrustUSA, funded by Choicepoint, the data mining company, pushing hard for passage.
If the stars are aligned the right way for this constellation but the wrong way for America, the Holt Bill will make it through Congress and the Senate, and we may just be lined up to experience a cataclysmic destabilization of our entire system of governance.
You don't have to be too paranoid to be involved in this business. You just need to look at patterns and keep an open mind.
The scenario described above is one possibility. It's hard to know really what is going on because so much of this defies all logic, especially any logic supporting true American patriotism and the pursuit and defense of our American democracy.
What we do know is this: Holt's office has been completely immovable on the matter of the EAC, and the text converter was snuck into the language of the bill late in the game, hidden in plain sight, concealed in language so deceptively benign that even people who knew it was there couldn't see it until specifically pointed to it.
Something is rotten on Capital Hill, and the stench is coming from the direction of HR 811 and everything it represents. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 6170
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2007 - 2:09 pm: |
|
Added to this mix are the "Holt Hit Squads," a roving band of mudslingers who attack and smear anyone who gets in the way of Holt bill passage.
You don't see "Hit squads" mobilizing when I bring up the issues with, say, the bills to reform the electoral college, or even when discussing the mail-in voting bills. Out they come with timing you can set your watch by, any time someone dares to discuss the Holt Bill in an unfavorable way.
The last time I saw blatant propaganda like this was when they were fixing to invade Iraq. There are a lot of good people, sincere people, well meaning people who have bought into the Holt Bill, but the smear squads indicate we should be taking a closer look.
People are being told that dreadful things will happen in 2008 if we don't "fix it now" even though, as Kurt Bellman has pointed out, nothing in the Holt Bill stands any chance of being put into effect by 2008, even if it passes. Because the deadlines are patently impossible, what will happen is that we will be rushed into passing a very dangerous and flawed bill, which will then -- like the HAVA "checks and balances" -- have its deadlines extended.
As we were during the Patriot Act frenzy, we are being told "watch what you say!" and as we were after 911 we are told to "trust our leaders" and that they are "very nice people, they know best, just do what they say." Frankly, it gives me the willies.
What none of the Holt supporters will do is engage in rational debate. I spent nearly 12 hours one day trying to get a single answer to the simple question as to why the benefits justify the risks with HR 811. Not one Holt supporter would even touch the issue of transferring control to White House appointees. Every time, the subject was changed to propaganda. Like this:
"Maryland, Virginia and Florida will NEVER get paper trails unless we federalize elections." Well guess what? Just days later, Maryland passed paper trails, and a DRE ban is on the table in Virginia as well. Even Florida is moving towards paper.
There is something driving this bill, and it does not feel wholesome.
I agree that the bar-code-driven text converters (which may not even do the text conversion they purport to do) should get a much closer look. When someone wants something this badly, and uses these kinds of strong-arm and deceptive tactics to get it, we need to become visibly more prudent.
Con men tell you to hurry and do it RIGHT NOW. Reputable brokers expect and encourage due diligence. |
John Gideon
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Johngideon
Post Number: 243
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2007 - 7:56 pm: |
|
Nancy,
With all due respect. You say, "The founders of VoteTrustUSA, as insiders from that time report, began as hand count advocates, but following a meeting with Holt's office turned to the verified voting scam/scheme, accepted funding from the wife of Choicepoint CEO, and became a nonstop advocacy tool for passage of the Holt Bill." That is just not true.
VoteTrust (VT) was founded by Joan Krawitz who came from a hand-count group but was not, herself, an advocate of hand-counted paper ballots. Warren Stewart who has never been an advocate of hcpb, to my knowledge. Kevin Zeese then of TrueVoteMD who was not. Linda Schade, also of TrueVoteMD, who was not. Andy Stephenson who was, famously, for a paper ballot. Susan Truitt, of CASE-Ohio. Ellen Theisen and myself. Neither Ellen or I have ever been advocates of hcpb.
We also never had a meeting with Holt's office except that many had worked on the support of HR-2239 and then HR-550. And Michelle Mulder attended the first conference in Washington DC.
There was never some secret coming together and scheme as you suggest. Yes, we all worked for passage of 550 but most of the work done by the group, at that time, was to support the state groups in their efforts.
I just wanted to clear this up. The rest of the stuff has been discussed ad nauseum and I won't get into it again.
And just so everyone knows; though I was a founder of VoteTrust, I no longer have anything to do with the organization except as one of many who share information on their mailing list.
Executive Director, VotersUnite.org
|
Vickie Karp
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Vickie_karp
Post Number: 32
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 10, 2007 - 7:38 pm: |
|
Bev,
Another amazing job! I don't know how you continue to come up with these explosive exposes, but please keep it up! This is so disturbing, it really takes the issue into a whole new level, IMHO.
I'm going to take this story down to the Austin Capitol tomorrow and see if there's a seque where I can insert this information into the record for the House Committee on Elections.
If the American people were really informed on this, they would have a s--- fit! I'm certainly going to do my part shine a light on your story.
Thank you, Bev!
Vickie |
Sherry Healy
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Sherry_healy
Post Number: 2
Registered: 11-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 1:14 am: |
|
Not only is the apparent "set up" of two vendors to steal our identities for screening something deserving of an in-depth investigation, but also the insanity of voters WILLINGLY giving up their secrecy of the ballot to vote by mail, e.g. in CA more than 2 in 5 ballots are now absentee.
It seems our citizens are forgetting history and why we ever bothered to confer this virtue of "secrecy of the ballots" to improve our voting system.
Here's what it was about:
An aim of the secret ballot was to prevent intimidation and bribery by employers and landlords, made possible by the public voting system.
The demand for a secret ballot was one of the six points of the People’s Charter. The 1838 petition stated that ’suffrage, to be exempt from the corruption of the wealthy and the violence of the powerful, must be secret’. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 6172
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 12:11 pm: |
|
Correction - Choicepoint has issued a clarification to Black Box Voting as to the statement that the government is Choicepoint's "biggest" client:
quote:
Date: Wed, 11 Apr 2007 14:51:28 -0400
From: Matt Furman <[redacted@choicepoint.com]>
To: Black Box Voting
Subject: ChoicePoint update
As you know, we are a publicly traded company and have to fully report revenue we derive from our different business units. We have said that our government services business accounts for approximately 15% of our total revenue. Nearly ¾ of that revenue comes from the sale of software and technology services that has absolutely no consumer data associated with it. The remainder (less than 4% of our total revenue) comes from our sale of largely publicly available data to local, state and federal agencies.
I point this all out to you by way of disputing your recent assertion that the US Government is our largest customer. In fact, our government services operation is not our largest business unit nor is any government agency with which we do business even on our top 20 lists of biggest customers.
Thanks for posting my last response. Hope all is well.
Matt
Taken literally, "biggest" could be defined variously as: (1) having the most employees (2) having the most revenue (3) comprising the largest portion of revenues. Matt's correction shows that taken in the context of #3, we were incorrect on this point.
Appreciation to Matt Furman for correcting the record. |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 3786
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 2:05 pm: |
|
"the sale of software and technology services that has absolutely no consumer data associated with it" could include the sale, licensing, servicing or consulting related to software for manipulating or mining data bases. It may therefore be relevant in the context of the original discussion. From the percentages supplied by Matt Furman, this could be a significant part of Choicepoint's business. |
John Dean
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Bozosforbush
Post Number: 914
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 11, 2007 - 9:16 pm: |
|
Yea, Matt's spinning like a top there. What surprises me is he did not clarify anything else.
FOR EXAMPLE (and this deserves BIG print) - HE DID NOT CLARIFY OR DENY IN ANY WAY THAT CHOICEPOINT IS FUNDING SOME SO-CALLED ACTIVISTS.
Wow, it sure gets easier to breathe when the air freshens up a bit 
John
Deserter, brain is fried, no WMDs, yada yada yada. No wonder we clowns laugh.
|
Sherry Healy
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Sherry_healy
Post Number: 3
Registered: 11-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, April 13, 2007 - 2:25 pm: |
|
Data Mining (e.g. ChoicePoint, Accenture), at the behest of the gov't are doing what it is illegal for the gov't to do: keep dossiers on private citizens
This industry needs regulation
AND few people understand how sophisticated this technology now is:
Read this link and replace the word "doctor" with "voter" and tell me if you hair isn't on fire when you realize the secrecy of our ballots are now very much in jeopardy:
After reading that you'll appreciate the significance of what "data miners" can now do.
http://www.physorg.com/news95607638.html
(data miners have collected files on what medicines EVERY doctor has prescribed and use the data base to focus on who to target for sales calls) |
Jason Aaron Osgood
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Zappini
Post Number: 49
Registered: 12-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 17, 2007 - 9:41 pm: |
|
Diebold's ballot tracking system was briefly discussed during a demo of their highspeed tabulation system to King County's Citizen Election Oversight Committee mid March 2007. I pointed out such an item is unconstitutional in Washington State. Our constitution and laws do not allow unique marks on ballots. The vendor retorted that their system is "secure", which is the standard spin when someone points out that system eliminates the secret ballot.
King County Washington intends to buy these Diebold tabulators and use the ballot tracking barcodes.
I can't find any information on the Diebold system.
I've filed an open records request to learn more.
Meanwhile, if anyone finds something concrete, please share.
---
zappini.blogspot.com
|
Joe Callahan
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Colojoe
Post Number: 1
Registered: 04-2007
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 10:52 am: |
|
I have limited knowledge here so please bear with me. Where and how does the tracking system get the voter specific ID to include in the bar code? Or where is a record created and kept to correlate the voter's real ID with whatever ballot ID is used? Why couldn't and wouldn't the tracking system just generate a unique random code for each ballot and give the voter a copy of that to use for verification? |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 6216
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 11:11 am: |
|
Joe, this is mail-in voting. How would a "unique random code" make its way into the voter's hands through the mail if it cannot ever be associated with who the voter is? |
V. Kurt Bellman
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Formerelecdir
Post Number: 954
Registered: 04-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 11:28 am: |
|
Bev,
Why does anything need to be coded on the ballot? I can appreciate the appeal of a voter ID barcode on the outside affidavit envelope. It makes "logging in as received" ballots easy to do.
I can think of NO justification for any ID mark on the ballot OR the inner security/secrecy envelope. Can you? What am I missing?
Is anyone asking the vendors this? |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 6218
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 12:03 pm: |
|
Kurt,
As usual, you hit the nail on the head. Envelope isn't the issue here.
Here's the real danger with the ballot tracking systems: The vendors allow the user to optionally add the feature of bar coding the BALLOT with a tracker as well. Thus, when the jurisdiction buys the envelope tracker, this is what citizens think they are paying for. But after purchasing the system, some jurisdictions are taking advantage of the added "feature" that the ballot tracker systems can also put the tracker on the ballot.
This subjects the citizenry to an unreasonably high need for ongoing vigilance.
San Juan County Washington was dumb enough to send a press release out about their decision to add ballot tracking. (By the way, US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates, who had been on the advisory board for VoteHere, reportedly has a summer cabin in tiny San Juan County).
The very important citizen lawsuit in San Juan County addresses not only the fact that by putting the mark on the ballot the system is illegal in this state, but from what I understand they have uncovered evidence that it isn't even accurate.
But from the standpoint of the unreasonable citizen vigilance imposed when an envelope tracking system is purchased that -- oh by the way -- can also, if you like, add that feature to the ballot -- is this: Suppose San Juan didn't send a press release? The Hart Intercivic ballots there already have bar codes on them to identify precincts. How would citizens even know their ballots were being tracked?
Here in King County, as is the case in so many other locations as well, citizens practically have to sic a pack of bloodhounds after the frequently changing and poorly disclosed should-be-public meetings, just to get the CHANCE to follow elections decisionmaking. Yes, we have public meetings laws, but actually trying to use the meetings laws ends up like trying to guess which walnut shell they hid the pea under each time. And sometimes, they just clam up and claim the meetings aren't public at all.
So you buy one-half the privacy stealing system, the digital image optical scanner to count the votes. Then you buy the other half of the privacy stealing system, the ballot tracking program, but promise not to use it for its improper purpose, sticking trackers on the ballots themselves.
Do you see the danger? Every single election, citizens have to post guards at every window, checking to see if THIS time the "steal privacy" switch is turned ON.
This is like letting a toddler play at the top of a steep flight of stairs. Instead of trying to make the citizens watch every move, a more prudent solution is to install a gate across the head of the stairs. Why are we buying systems that have these options in the first place? |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 6219
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 12:03 pm: |
|
Adding to the concern: The Chairman of the Board for VoteHere, the company that pushed this illegal scheme into place in San Juan County and elsewhere, is Ralph Munro. He has been extremely influential on the national scene -- was one of the cronies who participated in the Carter-Baker panel dog & pony show -- and, most important in this situation, he was Secretary of State in Washington state, the very place VoteHere implemented this scheme.
Munro was Secretary of State until Dec. 31, 2000, when his protege, Sam Reed, took over. In a violation of Washington state ethics laws, which require waiting 1-3 years to go from his position to one with a vendor, just days after leaving office Munro took the position with VoteHere.
As a former SoS, he was responsible for knowing the law. As Chairman of VoteHere, he has been responsible for a company that is pushing a system he knows to be illegal in this state.
Folks, the pieces ARE coming together for RICO-style conspiracy and racketeering charges. The problem is, our nation seems to lack the will to prosecute because the guys involved are so tightly connected politically.
Oh and yes, those of us with Black Box Voting did file an ethics complaint against Munro. Nothing was done about it. |
Joe Callahan
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Colojoe
Post Number: 2
Registered: 04-2007
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 12:05 pm: |
|
Bev -
I can see the problem in the case of mail-in voting.
But where in the article did it say this was only about mail-in voting? The vendors mentioned sell a polling place ballot marking device (Populex) which seems to be of no use for mail-in voting, and a parallel audit system for DREs and precinct optical scan as well as mail-in (VoteHere). |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 6220
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 25, 2007 - 12:54 pm: |
|
Joe, the first implementation of this (that we know of) has been with mail-in voting.
I don't know enough about Populex, but have been told by someone who has been doing very good research for years now, that Populex has something in the bar code that connects back to the voter in some way.
VoteHere has been pushing the DRE product, but that's not what this article is about. The VoteHere product they are busily SELLING and USING is a vote tracking device used with mail-in votes.
I have questioned the ethics of the VoteHere management team before. They are relevant. This company was involved in an entrapment scheme back in 2003, which ended up with my getting harassed through a series of interviews by the Secret Service cybercrime task force, consummated with a gag letter from a US attorney and actions to put me in front of a federal grand jury. (See: http://www.seattleweekly.com/2004-05-19/news/www-bigbrother-gov.php) It was a totally bullshit investigation, under the guise of a theory that I was going around hacking into voting companies with a plot to steal source code. A setup, engineered with the management of VoteHere, and thank goodness I publicly warned other activists off of it at the time it took place (October 2003). For those not familiar with that over-the-top example of a bunch of thugs getting together to break the law, VoteHere -- this supposedly brilliant company run by cryptographers and CIA-types -- claims that it was "hacked into" and someone "stole" its source code. Jim Adler, VoteHere's founder, claimed that VoteHere had somehow "tracked" the intruder and that it was a certain election reform activist. Within days, I was told to appear at the FBI building downtown for an interview with the CyberCrime task force, a division of the Secret Service set up under the Patriot Act. Unfortunately for them, I not only had had nothing to do with a solitication to download their source code, but I had posted a contemporaneous warning publicly to others to avoid such a solicitation because I believed it was a trap.
VoteHere is currently chaired by a former Washington Secretary of State who knows that what they are selling is illegal, and who committed an ethics violation (against the law, not just against someone's moral code!) when he took the position with VoteHere. This company has had current US Secretary of Defense and former head of the CIA, Robert Gates, on its advisory board.
It is absolutely the LAST company that should be involved in creating and selling vote tracking programs, because they are politically connected high-tech thugs. |
Jason Aaron Osgood
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Zappini
Post Number: 52
Registered: 12-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 7:31 am: |
|
Just in case people don't notice, I posted our meeting announcement here:
Protect Our Secret Ballot
---
zappini.blogspot.com
|
John Washburn
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Johnwashburn
Post Number: 276
Registered: 02-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, April 26, 2007 - 2:13 pm: |
|
I have examples of the following barcoded material.
Eight AccuPoll Proofs of Votes with PDF417 barcodes.
Fifty Populex Digital Ballots with PDF417 barcodes.
And about 40 feet of Diebold VVPAT tape with suposed ballot image data under CODE128-B barcodes.
I tried to upload the images of the 4 ballots I have scanned (2 each from AccuPoll and Populex), but I have exceeded the image upload limit.
I will work to upload the images on my site and link to it. |
|
|
