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anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 2
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, February 5, 2006 - 4:11 pm: | 
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Hello,
It just occurred to me yesterday that the only real technical need may just be a standard for an OCR-able voter verified paper ballot. In that way it should be possible for anyone to count all the ballots using their own OCR software and hardware.
The election results should not be final until all major parties in an election have counted the ballots themselves and agreed on the result. With OCR-able ballots this can be done quickly.
To keep people honest, it seems that one can add the condition that if there is a dispute as to the total count, that a manual recount would give the authoritative result. Any party with significantly skewed results would be liable for the cost of the manual recount.
It seems to me that this is the "check and balance" or redundancy that has been missing in all electronic systems. If you rely on one counter, it's a single point of failure. Any System Administrator (or founding father?) could tell you that this a very bad idea.
I'm a student in Computer Science and for my master's project, I've been looking at the two open source voting systems I'm aware of (OVC and eVACS). I just realized this is the main thing missing in OVC (eVACS has no voter verified paper ballot trail whatsoever). But for that matter, it's what's missing with all current electronic systems. No real redundancy. But with a standard ballot format and OCR it's so easy!
I'm planning on designing a possible standard for the remainder of my master's project(about 1 month left) and implementing a demo system using open software and commodity hardware.
Any ideas as to the vulnerabilities this could have? Any tips?
I would appreciate any feedback whatsoever.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Bob Fleischer
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rjf7r
Post Number: 52
Registered: 09-2005
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, February 5, 2006 - 8:19 pm: |
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When you say "OCR" do you literally mean "optical character recognition", i.e., reading printed or handwritten text? Or do you mean "mark sense" -- the typical optical ballot technology -- in which all the software needs to do is record the presence or absence of a mark in certain places? |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 3
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, February 5, 2006 - 9:41 pm: |
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Sorry I think I used the wrong word. When I said OCR I meant something like mark sense where you just recognize filled in bubbles. But I don't mean filled in bubbles made by human hands. Just standarized, voter-readable marks produced by another machine.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 7
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 8:51 am: |
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Yes, Mr. Fleischer, you're right :-) I'm a little new to the terminology. It apparently is called OMR(Optical Mark Recognition). But, again, it's a limited kind of OMR. The idea I had is basically to limit automation to voter-verifiable, standardized, computer generated marks.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1678
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 9:08 am: |
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I assume you mean "voter-verified"
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anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 8
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 9:19 am: |
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Oops. Yes. I meant "voter-verified" instead of "voter-verifiable" in my last post. Thanks.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 359
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 9:26 am: |
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Currently access to a precinct's votes can be very difficult to get, something that assures people of the right to do this would have to be passed and then you're back into chain of custody problems, again. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 9
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 10:02 am: |
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Hmmm yes the precinct. I guess that makes it so that each party's officials can't be directly involved. But somebody, or some group, is responsible for counting the votes right? Can't they be trusted at all? They would have to be trusted, otherwise even paper-based counting is useless and the situation is quite hopeless right?
So assuming we can trust them, we could make it part of the vote counting protocol for them to use each party's machine and only report to the county when they have a consensus...be it hand-counted or machine counted.
You'd have to make it to that each party's machine could not remember what it counted(or if it did it would be illegal to report what it counted) and the machines would have to be tamper proof and not tamper with the ballots either, but those things I think are all feasible.
what do you mean by chain of custody issues? custody of the ballots or the machines? Am I missing something?
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 06, 2006)
(Message edited by Anwar on February 06, 2006) |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1679
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 10:20 am: |
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Ballots (including blanks and any printer's extras), machines and memory cards (if any) need to be kept under lock and key and fully accounted for. (Logs to show who had access to key and when, ensuring multi-party observers to any access, etc.)
There are a number of threads here that discuss recommended procedures to create a well-documented chain of custody.
Ballots can be switched to guarantee the "success" of a hand recount.
Machines or memory cards can be tampered with if there is access. So-called "tamper-proof" seals can be cut and replaced or resealed. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 10
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 10:54 am: |
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Dear Ms. Ansbro,
Thank you first of all for the feedback. Below are my first reactions based on my initial assumptions. I'll go think about your response some more too.
chain of custody:
Wow. I thought chain of custody of paper ballots was already a solved problem...we've had a hundered years (at least) to get it right. Is there really no workable procedure in current practice? I guess I'll go look at the threads.
Tampering:
If a political party with a fierce adversary was in charge of a machine they may be more driven to make their machine tamper proof. I think in the case of the "tamper proof" seals you may be talking about there was not much incentive to have them be really good. Is is also really that hard to make tamper-proof machines? Can't one put the machine in some safe-like structure?
I guess a part of what I'm thinking is that forcing the parties to compete directly to have votes counted would make everyone work harder and be more honest.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 06, 2006)
(Message edited by Anwar on February 06, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 11
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 11:14 am: |
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Dear Ms. Ansbro,
As far as tampering, I forgot one thing. Whoever tampers with the machines has to figure out how to tamper with the machines of all parties and have them all agree...otherwise, most likely a hand count has to be done. Does that help?
I'll go think try to think a little more about what you and also Mr. Lamb said.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 06, 2006) |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1680
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 6, 2006 - 11:18 am: |
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There have been plenty of instances of machines being left in insecure storage areas, in a school corridor, taken home by poll workers days before an election, etc. Procedures are often so bad it is unbelievable, except that unfortunately it's true.
It's not that easy to make a machine tamper-proof, and even harder (or impossible?) to prove that a machine hasn't been tampered with.
There are so many ways to tamper--hardware, software, using more- or less-reliable components, etc. Not to mention those last-minute tampering possibilities (networks, wireless connections, modems). And memory cards, of course.
And/or applying any of these tampering tactics to the central count computer.
Then there are the "shoddy calibration" problems (accidentally or on purpose) that can result in making some votes harder/easier to read than others, creating overvotes/undervotes, etc.
Then there is the signature recognition software for absentee ballots. And ability to tamper with voter registration software to cause election-day surprises. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 15
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 7, 2006 - 3:42 pm: |
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Okay, Ms. Ansbro, I've been doing some thinking about what you said and here are some more responses:
There have been plenty of instances of machines being left in insecure storage areas, in a school corridor, taken home by poll workers days before an election, etc. Procedures are often so bad it is unbelievable, except that unfortunately it's true.
In my scheme the only thing that I think needs to be secured is the ballot counter machine of which there should be very few per precinct. Couldn't a case be made for them to be safeguarded as much as a ballot box?
It's not that easy to make a machine tamper-proof, and even harder (or impossible?) to prove that a machine hasn't been tampered with.
I don't know how to respond now other than to say what I already said about how an adversarial dynamic could drive use of robust tamper-proofing technoloies. I don't know if I agree that tamper proofing is impossible now. In either case I would hope one would have to take a considerable risk and perform widespread tampering to make a difference. I guess I don't know too much about this topic yet. I'll keep thinking about this. This could be a serious flaw in the design.
Also if the ballot counting machines are treated like ballot boxes then it can't be worse than the current system. Ballot boxes are simpler to inspect for tampering, I guess, so adding the machines may make things worse. But I think(at least I hope) this can be managed.
There are so many ways to tamper--hardware, software, using more- or less-reliable components, etc. Not to mention those last-minute tampering possibilities (networks, wireless connections, modems). And memory cards, of course.
And/or applying any of these tampering tactics to the central count computer.
Wouldn't building a counting machine for party X in fierce competition with party Y and Z cause you to not include most of these vulnerabilities in your system?
Then there are the "shoddy calibration" problems (accidentally or on purpose) that can result in making some votes harder/easier to read than others, creating overvotes/undervotes, etc.
The paper ballot open standard would have to be good enough to minimize shoddy calibration artifacts. But that's what open standards are for. If the TCP/IP or HTTP standard wasn't good enough to handle shoddy calibration, the internet would have serious problems, I think. Or is this different?
On top of that I think (and this is a big part of my design) it would be pretty difficult to mess up the paper ballot so that two or three independently produced machines would all miscount them in the same way. In a way, miscalibrated ballot printing machines could actually be an advantage in that they could trigger a hand count since the counters would likely disagree on or flag non-standards-compliant ballots.
Then there is the signature recognition software for absentee ballots. And ability to tamper with voter registration software to cause election-day surprises.
There seems to be no good way of voting absentee but I am not sure how my scheme makes it better or worse.
Also a pure paper *voting* method would have the same problems with software registration too, right? I am a little confused as to how this would relate to my scheme.
I hope these responses are of some satisfaction. I plan to keep thinking about what you said.
Any more feedback would be ever so greatly appreciated!
peace 2u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 07, 2006)
(Message edited by Anwar on February 07, 2006) |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1697
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 2:32 am: |
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"Anwar: In my scheme the only thing that I think needs to be secured is the ballot counter machine of which there should be very few per precinct. Couldn't a case be made for them to be safeguarded as much as a ballot box?"
Yes. Unfortunately there is a big gap between theory (and even regulations) and practise.
Anwar: "I don't know how to respond now other than to say what I already said about how an adversarial dynamic could drive use of robust tamper-proofing technoloies."
Your assumption that 2 different parties could be counted on to be adversarial may not be as realistic as you think. There is plenty of evidence to suggest that both major parties are ultimately beholden to their sources of funding, which are large corporations. What makes you confident that collusion might not occur?
Anwar: "I don't know if I agree that tamper proofing is impossible now."
I don't know what's possible or impossible but I don't think "tamper proof" has been achieved by anyone yet. Compounding the problem is that there appears to be no political will from the leadership or elected politicians of either party to make meaningful changes.
Anwar: "In either case I would hope one would have to take a considerable risk and perform widespread tampering to make a difference."
What makes you believe this has not happened already? Have you read Black Box Voting yet? What makes you think the risk would be so extreme, when we are surrounded by evidence that there is little political or judicial will to play by the rules?
Anwar: "Also if the ballot counting machines are treated like ballot boxes then it can't be worse than the current system. Ballot boxes are simpler to inspect for tampering, I guess, so adding the machines may make things worse."
I think you have made a crucial point here. No one can "see" votes inside an electronic ballot box. That means the election process becomes inherently unobservable.
Anwar: "The paper ballot open standard would have to be good enough to minimize shoddy calibration artifacts."
This should be straightforward--except that current experience shows that it's not. There are threads here that discuss irregularities caused by different kinds of paper, different kinds of ink, different kinds of light, different kinds of settings on scanners, different ways of folding the ballot, etc. Undoubtedly this could be improved by tightly enforced, uniform standards--though how one would decide who had the right to set the standards could be an issue (states? federal government?)
You are probably right that counting with 2 different machines in the control of different groups would perhaps be better than only using one machine and trusting its results. It's hard for me to envision that both machines would usually agree. I suspect that most results would have to be hand-counted in the end to resolve discrepancies. So why not just hand-count and leave out unnecessary problems? This is my current opinion, anyways.
I could see some value in a device that would mark ballots. (Though something I've never considered before is, if this had a hidden counter built in it could give someone info about what tampering might be needed to ensure a vote comes out right.)
My concerns about a fast scanner count followed by a manual count are that people might not be as interested in observing a hand count under those circumstances, which could lead to carelessness about procedures. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 16
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 3:11 am: |
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Oh my god, I just had an idea! What about having a machine that simply (but quickly) flips through the ballots in plain sight. As many people as possible can simply video tape it or broadcast it live!
You don't need a highly-guarded epecially-designed tamperable ballot counter for that. Given a fast enough video camera frame rate and some simple image analysis, as many people as we want can do the count....and it would be dirt cheap...and fast.
Could this possibly just be too simple!
peace 2u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 17
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 3:21 am: |
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As an example for a machine that would flip through the votes in plain sight, all you have to do is look at an automatic paper feeder from a cheap inkjet printer. Just remove everything except the document feeder and you've got your high-tech publically observable counter!
I'm really curious to see what could go wrong with this scheme now.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1698
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 3:24 am: |
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That's an interesting idea.
Great to have thinking that's outside-the-box. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 18
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 3:32 am: |
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Well I was reading the other threads(looking for chain of custody elaboration) and there was all this talk of videotaping the chain of custody and then it just hit me.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 3589
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 4:21 am: |
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That's a fascinating idea, Anwar. Especially if it worked like this: ballots stored in sealed container at the polling place. Then, WHILE STILL AT THE POLLING PLACE and with all poll workers present, the ballots are videotaped one by one with a high resolution digital video. If done correctly, this would only take about 10 minutes in an average-sized precinct.
If done in a certain position (i.e. with video camera affixed mechanically to a prepositioned spot and ballots fed or placed into a prepositioned hopper) these images would be very consistently captured.
This could be a relatively low tech procedure. Supplies:
- 1 camcorder per precinct
- a hopper to place or catch ballots one by one keeping them in same position
- Some authentication method that would tie it to the precinct location. I think it might be intrusive to film faces of poll workers, but you could record their voices very easily. For example, on the video, "My name is Esther and I'm at precinct 102 in Jefferson County, Missouri." The voiceprint, especially if it takes place during scanning, can also serve as an authenticator for the location/people present needed.
It would take about 1 second per ballot if hand placing them. For a precinct with 1,000 ballots, that would be 1,000 seconds times 2 sides (most ballots are 2-sided). It would take about 14 minutes to videotape all the ballots, front and back, for a moderately large precinct.
Most precincts are only about 600 voters -- 10 minutes. The videos wouldn't be particularly big!
They could be released to the public. This is a simpler, lower tech version of the Votoscope concept, where ballot images are examined.
Mail-in balloting and provisional balloting would take more thought, but this is a very creative and practical idea. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 3590
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 4:28 am: |
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I'd like to see people vet this out. In fact, this is an idea that is sufficiently practical that it could potentially be put into use for election 2006, at least if permission was granted to allow a citizen to videotape using own camcorder (removing the need for procurement of cameras, so that the only change needed would be procedural.) |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 366
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 6:42 am: |
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Questions:
Does this necessitate a by-eye count, hand viewing the ballot viedos?
Should this be allowed to be digital video? (You can really play games with digital video, can't you?)
Realistically, can/would BOE-unauthorized personnel be granted this access?
If the video is to have meaning as evidence, do you have to have well documented chain of custody and follow security protocols on the video, as well?
If these ballots have no ballot ID or sequence number on them (or the count wasn't recorded using them), you must challenge the entirety of the precinct's counted votes to do anything about errors you spot, and you must go through the entire thing, by hand, doing a recount, no?
Pros:
Raw data collection is quick.
The raw data is really the raw data.
With appropriate 'background' in frame it can be shown to have reasonable assuredness of being the scene at the balloting place.
Cons: You do need to an original count or handcount of the ballots to make sure you didn't have multi-ballot feeds. Stuffing still needs to be addressed, as does anything that affects the legibility/clarity of the ballot (presentation-related, etc.). Unless the votoscope or something similar can be adapted to this, you have to count them by eye. |
Bev Harris
Board Administrator
Username: Admin
Post Number: 3594
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 9:15 am: |
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Good points, Brant.
This could be implemented fairly quickly and cheaply.
A Votoscope-style tool could probably be developed with procedures to include fixed stationary camera angle, fixed ballot position, full face ballot shot at same size each time. That would be a lot of work, but could become a next step.
Since this could be done both at the precinct and for central count, it would provide some very good public oversight.
- This might be something to pitch to the public officials who are already cooperative, as a test run, requesting procedural agreements but not procurement of anything.
This could be a MUCH more powerful spot-check tool than the parallel election tool being done by citizens, though that is turning up very interesting results in a particular county right now (more votes on one ballot choice reported by a parallel election sample than there were votes on that same ballot choice from the entire pool reported by touch-screens).
It might be easier to get this in as a pilot project in a set of precincts than in all of them.
Very interesting concept. I see it as a practical, do-able step toward further enhancements of the basic idea. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 368
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 11:38 am: |
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One major change should be to picture the ballots just before they're dropped in the ballot box. To prevent stuffing and hanky panky of replacement by say, phoning in a terror alert, or perhaps just pretending you got one? |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 22
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 8, 2006 - 4:36 pm: |
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Bev Harris:
A Votoscope-style tool could probably be developed with procedures to include fixed stationary camera angle, fixed ballot position, full face ballot shot at same size each time. That would be a lot of work, but could become a next step.
Well I've got a month left on my master's project dedicated to producing a decent open-source voting system. I can hopefully put in at least month's worth of full-time programming and design. But this seems to have so much potential I'm almost afraid to mess it up. I think it has got to be done as diligently as possible. Also I hope nobody tries to patent or copyright this out of existance. It's such a simple idea using readily available technology -- if it works it should be free for all to use.
But I guess we're still not sure if it's got any glaring holes in it.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 08, 2006) |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 372
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 9, 2006 - 5:27 am: |
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Anwar please have a look under Tech Central, under this topic for a scheme that may mesh with this. Here's the URL:http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/9707/17304.html?1139491204 .
I think these ideas may go well together. |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 12
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? 
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 9, 2006 - 4:38 pm: |
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I don't like the idea of imaging the ballots as they are boxed... way to easy to also capture the voter's image at the same time & tie vote to voter.
To my mind, and I've worked with computers for 20 years, it's impossible to create any tamper proof system where the ENTIRE process isn't transparent. If the most brilliant programmer created the ultimate system, which no one else could hack, then you'd only need to influence that one programmer with money or power to control the whole electoral procedure. Concentrations of power are anti-democratic. All power corrupts.
Here's the KISS principal solution...
Physical voter verifiable ballot, placed into a transparent ballot box that is visible continuously to any interested party, until it is hand counted in public view at the precinct level. Each voter can have confidence their vote was correctly counted, since they watched it was included & watched the procedure of counting was unbiased. Local totals published to the local observers immediately, so central tabulation of precincts can be verified. No 'trust us' security, or transport, or black box machines. Maximum distribution of power. Sunshine is the cure... |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 29
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 9, 2006 - 4:49 pm: |
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please see bev's post above describing the entire process. The idea is to videotape someone showing all the ballots after taking them out of the (transparent ), secured, ballot box.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 09, 2006) |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1708
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 3:18 am: |
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Anwar,
Is what you're suggesting a potential widening of the possible observers (because of videotaping the removal of each ballot), but without removing any of the existing observers who are physically present?
That would seem to offer more, and lose nothing.
You'd have to videotape the process of opening up the ballot box so that nothing is missed. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 374
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 6:56 am: |
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The idea that you have a transparent ballot box doesn't avoid slipping one ballot in with another (stuffing). Even if you videotape it and catch any number of incidents of stuffing (and your avoiding taping the people, remember), how do you remove the contamination from the results? You need some kind of ID number that allows the voter to vouch for his ballot, and you need to have given him something when it was cast which he can use as his proof of this, in order to separate the wheat from the chaff.
One of the easiest things to do in oncoming elections is to pollute a vote in an area that you know would go strongly to the opposite side. If you can be sure that the stuffing (and not you) is going to be caught, stuff it for the opposition, then it looks like your opponents cheated! |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 375
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 7:18 am: |
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The idea that you have a transparent ballot box doesn't avoid slipping one ballot in with another (stuffing). Even if you tape it and catch any number of incidents of stuffing, how do you remove the contamination from the results? You need some kind of ID number that allows the voter to vouch for his ballot, and you need to have given him something when it was cast which he can use as his proof of this, in order to separate the wheat from the chaff.
One of the easiest things to do in oncoming elections is to pollute a vote in an area that you know would go strongly to the opposite side. If you can be sure that the stuffing (and not you) is going to be caught, stuff it for the opposition, then it looks like your opponents cheated! |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 30
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 7:54 am: |
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Brant Lamb:
Anwar please have a look under Tech Central, under this topic for a scheme that may mesh with this. Here's the URL:http://www.bbvforums.org/forums/messages/9707/17304.html?1139491204 .
I think these ideas may go well together.
Dear Mr. Lamb,
Thank you for the kind invitation. I actually have been meaning to look at your ideas in detail since last weekend. I even printed it out. After a precursory reading, I feel like I need to allocate at least a good hour (or two) of quiet time to really examine it and think about it and think about any possibly useful response I would have given my limited knowlege on the different aspects of your idea. I just have not had the quiet time (probably due to my flaky time-management skills). I hope to get to it by the end of this weekend.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 10, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 31
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 8:07 am: |
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Catherine Ansbro:
Anwar,
Is what you're suggesting a potential widening of the possible observers (because of videotaping the removal of each ballot), but without removing any of the existing observers who are physically present?
That would seem to offer more, and lose nothing.
You'd have to videotape the process of opening up the ballot box so that nothing is missed.
Lose nothing? I hope so. I mean how could anyone be opposed to that? I think most humans love the perfect ray of sunshine! Although credit goes to bev for saying you videotape the actual poll worker without giving away their identity too much.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 10, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 32
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 3 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 8:21 am: |
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Brant Lamb:
The idea that you have a transparent ballot box doesn't avoid slipping one ballot in with another (stuffing). Even if you tape it and catch any number of incidents of stuffing, how do you remove the contamination from the results?
Yes, that seems to be a weakness. But given what we have, isn't it better than DRE's or centralized counts(as bev pointed out) after passing through so many hands to get to the precinct?
I'm surprised they have not come up with a fairly stuffing-proof ballot box in the 100 years (at least?) that they were used. Can't you make a metal funnel that narrows down to about the width of one ballot?
Also, I think bev said that most known stuffing in history was done after the ballot box left the polling place.
So to me it seems like a problem, but hopefully not a significantly big enough problem and hopefully one that can be overcome by small changes to existing procedures.
My gut also tells me that most people are honest when someone is watching, I think they've even studied that.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 10, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 33
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 8:30 am: |
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Catherine Ansbro:
You'd have to videotape the process of opening up the ballot box so that nothing is missed.
I think the whole spectacle could be a beautiful celebration of openness and democracy!
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 10, 2006) |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 379
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 9:30 am: |
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You can get it down to the width, it's the thikness that's the fly in the works, they'd be going in stacked. Ballot stuffing used to happen in the precincts, too. Remember last year's famous 'terror alert' in a precinct down in Ohio?
Throw a large scale smoke bomb or small scale incendiary into a precinct and pay one of the fireman to stuff the box. You know that you've got too many votes, but which ones? |
Kerry Kimes
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Kerrykimes
Post Number: 4
Registered: 02-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 10:07 am: |
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Regarding the ballot box stuffing issue. I don't recall ever being allowed to place my ballot in the box, myself. And I've been voting for 30 years.
I handed my ballot to a volunteer, who then placed the ballot in the box without moving it away in any way so that slight of hand couldn't be claimed. This person also maintained a tally sheet or tear-off of serial number from each ballot. This is a double check on ballot box stuffing and votes being added or removed from the box before tallying in front of observers.
This seems to me to be sufficient since there are then two records of number of ballots in the box. With serial numbers it also ensures the ballots in the box are in fact the ballots placed in the box.
In fact scannable mark and punch card ballots are unreadable by the voter anyway. Always have been. Not that I think that's absolutely right but, it does serve the function of keeping the secret ballot more secret. Which makes coercing votes, ballot buying and box stuffing a matter of the voter's conscience. Not much you can do about that electronically or otherwise.
Trusting polling place volunteers is a given. Chain of custody is only used, as far as I know with criminal evidence. Not even civil case evidence is handled this way. You've got enough checks on the ballot delivery and return of ballot boxes as is.
The problem of preventing voter access to the polls in "unwanted" precincts has not been solved by any of the proposed systems I've seen so far. If anything it has exacerbated the problem.
Problems at the central tabulation and scanners have been made worse also by complexity. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 36
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 10:14 am: |
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moderators:
I woudn't mind if bev's post summarizing the process and adding her ideas was put on top with a note saying to scroll down for more details(which is kind of implied anyway).
I think people are misunderstanding the idea because of the long preamble that pretty much documents the genesis of the idea but probably confuses those doing a quick browse.
I've seen at least two people (one personal email and one on this board) apparently getting confused.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 13
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 10, 2006 - 2:23 pm: |
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Anwar... I understand the idea of imaging all ballots for public view, and think it's a great idea... but I'm a bit skeptical of the method Brandt suggested of imaging ballots as they enter the box - it would be technically simple to associate the ballot & voter then.
Kerry, trusting polling place volunteers is NOT a given! That's why we have observers... just like the famous Reagan double-talk "Trust, but verify!" I only KNOW you're not pulling an ace out of your sleeve if you have no sleeves & I'm watching your hands!
That 'Homeland Security Alert' Brandt mentioned really got to me as well... amazing the so-called "DHS Agent" got away with that, considering there ARE no "DHS Agents"... only agents of the subsumed departments of FBI, Secret Service, FEMA, etc... it was just a brazen bluff by someone confident they would never be held accountable because of partisan control of the oversight. Would have been a great place for a 'Public Eye' camcorder, but I doubt the results would have been any different... there were hundreds of complaints ignored by a Secretary of State that could see no evil. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 382
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 14, 2006 - 5:24 am: |
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Unfortunately the serial number write up is in the hands only of the elections workers. I put my own ballot into an optical scanner in the 2004 election, if I could have counted on a recount, could I have physically stuffed 2 instead of 1 at the same time? I don't know. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 70
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 14, 2006 - 4:56 pm: |
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So I've been trying to find ways of breaking this scheme. Only thing I can think if is faking the video.
I'm curious what people think of digital video assuming you released the video very shortly after the ballots are filmed.
I'm thinking if, for instance, you filmed it using a DVD-R camcorder (they'r around $400) that you could announce the SHA-1 hash of the DVD right after the ballots are displayed. That way you can prove the video was not altered after the fact. If you later contest the election with a video, it would have to have the correct SHA-1 hash value before being admissible. Don't how much of an assurance this would be.
hi8 camcorders seem to be quickly going out of fashion. However they're still available now from a few vendors and are quite cheap(around $200). They record an analog signal directly onto a magnetic tape. I don't know how hard it would be to fake such a tape.
I am still not sure which would be best for filming ballots.
I am wondering if anybody knows anyone or knows someone who might know someone who is forensic video expert or computer video expert that would be willing to possibly offer advice. It would be nice to get advice on how to set up the filming so that it's hard to fake. Of course being a grad student I'm trying to find someone like that myself through my university connections...but any pointers would be appreciated.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 14, 2006) |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1748
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - 2:03 am: |
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There is always a risk that if the videorecorder is an essential part of the election system, malfunction or sabotage could be or become a problem. |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 22
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - 8:08 am: |
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Right, Catherine... I'd much prefer the ballots were visually presented to public observers for filming by multiple people. Run them in front of a viewing window, I think all aspects of procedure should be viewable from a public oversight window. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 386
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - 11:05 am: |
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How will you keep voters out of the picture, then? If you do (keep voters out of the picture) what stops your poll worker who submits the ballot from submitting a ringer for a valid ballot? If you film voters coming up and have someone else filming the ballots, time stamps between the 2 cameras now told you who-voted-how. Aren't you guys trying to avoid this? |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1755
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 15, 2006 - 12:02 pm: |
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Good questions. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 73
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 16, 2006 - 2:32 am: |
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First it seems to be that ideally you would want a public viewing of the ballots being taken out of the ballot box and that anyone should be allowed to video tape it. Personally I think the ballots should not leave the polling station until there is a consensus as to what the count is. Thanks to scanning software you could do this quickly. You could even, concievably do the disambiguation without having to do a complete hand count...just see where the counts differ and ask the poll worker to show the ballots in dispute. But I'm still working on figuring out the details on this.
Second, I don't understand what is meant by this by Mr. Lamb:
Brant Lamb:
"If you film voters coming up and have someone else filming the ballots, time stamps between the 2 cameras now told you who-voted-how. Aren't you guys trying to avoid this?"
I don't see how you can find who voted how if you just film the ballots being taken out of the ballot box.
Lastly, I ran into this:
Johns Hopkins APL Creates System to Detect Digital Video Tampering
http://www.jhuapl.edu/newscenter/pressreleases/2003/030926.htm
From the article:
When finished, the Digital Video Authenticator is expected to be within the size and cost range of consumer-grade digital camcorders. It will be attached to, rather than embedded in, a video camera, which allows it to be transferred to different cameras when current ones become obsolete. Comparison of signatures with recorded video and analysis of the results will be accomplished in separate software that will run on a desktop PC.
Prototype development will include peer review by other researchers and potential users and is expected to be completed by 2005. In addition to Postal Inspection Service use, the system could serve state and local law enforcement needs and possibly corporate and other business venues.
If it's good enough for business and law enforcement, it could be good enough for voting documentation. I have not heard anything further about this, though.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 16, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 74
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 16, 2006 - 3:10 am: |
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Robert Sawdey:
Anwar... I understand the idea of imaging all ballots for public view, and think it's a great idea... but I'm a bit skeptical of the method Brandt suggested of imaging ballots as they enter the box - it would be technically simple to associate the ballot & voter then.
I agree (Sorry Mr. Lamb). We have a tradition(since 1888) in the United States of keeping votes anonymous, so I think that might be hard to change.
But without that safeguard, though, there is a possiblity of old-school ballot stuffing as Mr Lamb pointed out...but only at the polling station and only while the ballot and ballot box is in everyone's view.
I think, historically, ballot stuffing and tampering has happened more between the polling station and the precinct. So even given this vulnerability it's better than everything, I think, which is in use now.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 16, 2006) |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 388
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 16, 2006 - 4:57 am: |
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Ballot stuffing may have happened more that way only because in the past, that's been easier. If you remove that avenue (and still have the avenue of recounts), then the other will come into play.
As far as anonymous, the ballots in my scheme are still anonymous, just voter traceable. Anonymity hasn't been lost.
Yes, this is better than what anybody currently has. You have a couple of tradeoffs to keep in mind, though. If you put this on digital recording, it's very changeable and so very challengable, if you put it on videotape, it's less challengeable but very time-consuming to work with in auditing a count. |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 26
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 16, 2006 - 9:22 am: |
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I think the ballots will be somewhat randomized if allowed to freely fall into the box & are not stacked in order... and they should be stirred in the box before they're removed for presentation & counting... |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 77
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 5:03 am: |
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I have been throwing around some ideas for making it difficult to fake the video of ballots. Here is one idea that seems to have promise:
In computer graphics, as far as I know(and I did take a class in computer animation techniques), it's pretty difficult to simulate natural phenomena like fire, and water.
So I was thinking -- and this is just throwing ideas around -- if you simply filmed the ballot to get a clear picture and then filmed it through an agitated tray of water (like a pyrex tray) and then after filming all ballots released the SHA-1 hash of this video (to prove it was not modified after the release of the SHA-1 hash) then your ballot film would probably hold up well under scrutiny, no?
I think computing the complex interactions light would have with the water and ballot would be hard to simulate...especially on the fly...no matter what kind of supercomputer you have hidden in your camcorder(). If you tried to edit your video on the fly to duplicate a ballot you would have a hard time since the water interaction cannot be idential each time...so you can't just copy and paste ballot footage.
water is pretty cheap and glass is pretty cheap too so I assume this would not be hard or expensive to add to the current procedure.
but I'm gonna go check with a computer animation expert to see if this idea is any good.
It's kind of a wierd idea I guess but I'm curious what people think.
...also, with hi8 video cameras costing $139 now on ebay, it's hopefully not hard to add hi8 footage as well.
Oh and yes, Mr. Sawdey, I agree. That ballot box needs to be shaken and stirred!
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 17, 2006) |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 393
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 5:40 am: |
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The vulnerability of this system is now in whether or not:
the original ballot is actually put in the box, whether another ballot is substituted for the original ballot,
whether extras can be introduced,
and whether you can get several good films of the event.
The time stamped film is only as good as its inability to be tampered with makes it. Both for the way the film looks and the anti-tamperability of the time/date stamp. If it's digital take the film of the whole process, splice out large sections and substitute for them, remember this has to be good proof for the recount process, as well.
If you have this filming by the public and some are malicious, they go modify their films (preferably in concert) and now who's right? Unless you have more than 2 from people that aren't logically related, they're going to say you modified your film. Maybe a malicious group conspires (or are paid) to crowd the near vicinity of the ballot box so that you can only get the nosebleed seats to film from, what do you do then?
What happens when someone "finds" some votes? This is happening a lot lately. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 78
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 6:47 am: |
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Brant Lamb:
If you have this filming by the public and some are malicious, they go modify their films (preferably in concert) and now who's right?
Dear Mr. Lamb,
by the above do you mean to say that you think my water trick mentioned above is beatable?
Also, if you require a filmer to release their SHA-1 hash of the digital video while still at the polling place then how can they "go modify their films". They can't do anything with the film after releasing the hash. They would have to modify it *while filming*
You can require certain criteria be met before being allowed to film...like that you only use a camcorder placed in plain sight w/o anything hooked up to it.
As far as crowding goes. I think you should be required to reserve a spot for your camera so that the poll workers know what to expect. If a lot want spots you can put the ballots on a long conveyor belt. Each party with a candidate on the ballot should at least be allowed to have a spot.
As far as original ballots and extras being introduced I though we already had accounting-style precautions for that? Do you mean that a poll worker might introduce/switch ballots while taking the ballots out of the box? I think we can require that they always be on camera.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 394
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 10:11 am: |
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Yes, I think it's beatable, I think that they can go and film their own water ballots and splice them into the tape. Put a wireless tranceiver into the camera and the transposition can happen in real time. This has to live through a recount, as well.
I also think that you can switch the ballots going into the box.
How does the videotaper communicate his SHA-1 hash in a way that actually (guaranteed) gives you the hash that (guaranteed) results from his video without your having a chance to change his video?
If they've counted a lot of 'found' ballots in elections recently (and they have) they're getting around the poll book problem somehow, aren't they? Either by ignoring that they have a mismatch/undercount of real ballots in the first place, or a mismatch/overcount of real ballots in the last place.
And you can't require that people always be on camera, everybody gets to go the bathroom. And you're going to need a fisheye lens to watch the people and another camera to watch the ballots.
The long conveyor belt is going to cost you a lot of money.
And you can't just have it be party observers, they may have joined the party only to screw them up.
To really beat all the hacks that could accomplish this stuff, you have to think like a paranoid.
You need some kind of feedback that is instantly verifiable, that can be guaranteed to be useful in making sure that no one's vote is switched, removed, badly counted or not counted. And it has to be useful in a timely manner. It must also have the legal right of challenge. |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 31
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 1:39 pm: |
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On further reflection, Anwar, not only does the ballot box need 'shaken & stirred', but the serialized ballots need shuffled before given to the voter & the receipts also 'shaken & stirred'. Otherwise, the third voter found to be eligible gets the third ballot in the series - and Saddam knows you voted against him.
Your 'moving water distortion' shows good creative thinking, but I'm afraid it's beatable... it's a combination of a variable distortion and a constant ballot form... so by knowing the ballot image one can extract the distortion - and use it on the faked ballot. It's similar math to that used by astronomers when correcting for imperfections in the lense of a telescope... nice try, but no cigar. Experts are working on the issue of untamperable video, but it's a lot trickier than one might think. If you can think of some measurement to test for a value, then you have the data needed to fake that measurement. Perhaps making the ballot presentation even MORE public would help... a LIVE broadcast on the local TV stations or public access cable of the ballot presentation, combined with something like the moving water idea that is impossible to duplicate in real time.
Brant, you don't have to watch the pollworkers at lunch (or in the bathroom)... only when they are performing their pollworker function. We don't care if they're cheating on their diet at lunch. I'm worried about the issue of substitute ballots, too... which is why I want to see TRANSPARENT ballot boxes... did one go in the slot & two fall down?
I don't think it's really necessary to totally film every detail... just for all to know that any detail MAY be filmed AT ANY TIME... it would take a really stupid shoplifter to steal something right in front of the security camera - even though there might not be anyone watching that particular camera at this instant.
I'm worried about the trend toward centralized poll books, too. Look how that was abused in Florida to disenfranchise everyone with a last name similar to any felon's. Whatever the procedure for denying someone their right to vote (I think ALL should be eligible) then it must be correctable & challengable... look how poorly the DHS 'no fly list' is working - because there is no mechanism for correcting or challenging any entry - so we get 4 year olds not permitted to fly and strip searched grandmothers and even congressmen suspected of being terrorists! The cost & difficulty of managing an efficient & correct system is totally eliminated with a Canadian style system of 'every citizen gets one vote'... maybe that makes fiscal sense as well as being supportive of personal liberty. Somehow the idea the government is spending my tax dollars to prevent people from voting makes me sick to my stomach... |
Ron Crane
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ron_crane
Post Number: 112
Registered: 08-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 3:24 pm: |
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Anwar: "Voter verification" (and any system based upon it) has at least two major shortcomings.
First, VV requires every voter effectively to vote twice: once to cast her ballot and once to verify it. Many voters will skip the second step, particularly as they become more familiar with their voting system and (mistakenly) begin to trust it more, and particularly when the polls are busy or the format and presentation of the verification record are inconvenient.
Second, VV does not deter or catch presentation frauds. Such frauds, which modify the presentation of choices or the acceptance of selections, can influence the sizeable proportion of voters who decide how to vote in the booth. For example, a machine might make it more difficult to select a disfavored candidate. This won't deter a determined voter, but it will influence some undecided voters -- enough to flip some close elections.
-R |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 79
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 3:51 pm: |
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Ron Crane:
Anwar: "Voter verification" (and any system based upon it) has at least two major shortcomings.
First, VV requires every voter effectively to vote twice: once to cast her ballot and once to verify it.
Second, VV does not deter or catch presentation frauds.
Hello Mr. Crane
So far, this system does not require a machine-marked ballot. From the looks of it, it would be preferable if it wasn't. See Bev's post above for a full description.
Bascially the idea is to videotape the paper ballots after all of them have been cast and then use a computer on the video to do a quick count...thus allowing many people to quickly do independent counts.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 17, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 80
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 4:09 pm: |
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it's a combination of a variable distortion and a constant ballot form... so by knowing the ballot image one can extract the distortion - and use it on the faked ballot. It's similar math to that used by astronomers when correcting for imperfections in the lense of a telescope... nice try, but no cigar
I think distortion due to water and a distortion due to a telescope lens are quite different. I'm a little hazy on my chemisty, but water is made up of trillions(?) of atoms, producing at least thousands(?) of angles. A telescope lens seems much simpler (one angle?). Again, you're having to simulate this on-the-fly. I saw a presentation(I'll try to dig it up) where pouring water into a glass of water was simulated...it was enough of a feat that they published a paper on it..and even then the water looked too viscus to really be water. And I think you can do other things like put certain things into the water to make it even harder to simulate.
I'm not sure it's that easy to fake this on-the-fly. I would be curious to see how you think this can be done in more detail.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 17, 2006) |
Ron Crane
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ron_crane
Post Number: 113
Registered: 08-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 4:09 pm: |
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quote:Ron Crane:
Anwar: "Voter verification" (and any system based upon it) has at least two major shortcomings.
First, VV requires every voter effectively to vote twice: once to cast her ballot and once to verify it.
Second, VV does not deter or catch presentation frauds.
Hello Mr. Crane
So far, this system does not require a machine-marked ballot....Bascially the idea is to videotape the paper ballots after all of them have been cast and then use a computer on the video to do a quick count...thus allowing many people to quickly do independent counts.
I was responding mainly to this post of yours:
quote:Sorry I think I used the wrong word. When I said OCR I meant something like mark sense where you just recognize filled in bubbles. But I don't mean filled in bubbles made by human hands. Just standarized, voter-readable marks produced by another machine.
I think that videotaping ballots and conducting independent counts are a great idea, as long as (1) they don't become an excuse to use machines to generate the ballots and (2) they preserve voter privacy.
-R |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 81
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 4:32 pm: |
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I was responding mainly to this post of yours:
quote:
Sorry I think I used the wrong word. When I said OCR I meant something like mark sense where you just recognize filled in bubbles. But I don't mean filled in bubbles made by human hands. Just standarized, voter-readable marks produced by another machine.
ah, yes, sorry that was the original idea which changed. Yes in reading the posts in these forums I have become quite weary of machine-marked ballots so I don't know if they should be required or even desired. Fortunately I think this method does not rely on machine-marked ballots.
But now that I think about it I remember some of the history where hand-marked ballots have given party scrutinizers an excuse to invalidate otherwise good-looking ballots simply because the law that described a valid mark could be misconstrued. But maybe that's just the law.
in either case the machine-marked ballots seem to introduce even more problems than hand-marked ballots so I, for one, don't have a problem avoiding them.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 82
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, February 17, 2006 - 6:26 pm: |
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Dear Mr. Lamb:
You pointed out some other possible weaknesses that neither I nor anybody else seems to have addressed yet. Please know that I appreciate your feedback and I'm thinking about the issues you raised. I hope to respond more soon. Some of them seem quite challenging.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1758
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 18, 2006 - 2:25 am: |
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Anwar,
The process that Ron described that's used in astronomy is called Adaptive Optics. It is used to make micro-adjustments for the trillions of air molecules inbetween the telescope lens and the celestial object that's being observed.
It's high tech.
That said, there are scientists at work to make the technology available for smaller applications. You are both right. Fire/water would make it almost impossible to duplicate using current technology; and technology to get around it does exist but hsn't yet been adapted for this kind of purpose but over time it undoubtedly could be.
I really like your way of thinking outside the box. Neither fire nor water seems particularly practical at this stage. Both present interesting opportunities for "accidents".
Maybe one could make at least one visual record using actual film rather than a digital media. |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 34
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 18, 2006 - 2:56 pm: |
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I think distortion due to water and a distortion due to a telescope lens are quite different. I'm a little hazy on my chemisty, but water is made up of trillions(?) of atoms, producing at least thousands(?) of angles. A telescope lens seems much simpler (one angle?). Again, you're having to simulate this on-the-fly. I saw a presentation(I'll try to dig it up) where pouring water into a glass of water was simulated...it was enough of a feat that they published a paper on it..and even then the water looked too viscus to really be water. And I think you can do other things like put certain things into the water to make it even harder to simulate.
I'm not sure it's that easy to fake this on-the-fly. I would be curious to see how you think this can be done in more detail.
Actually, they're not that different... it's a question of the physics of light, rather than a chemical issue... the light is bent because it is refracted when passing the interface between two media of different refractive indices... air & glass or air & water. Amount of bend depends on the angle between the light ray & surface, and the difference in refractive index between the media.
I don't think this could be done (faked) in real time, but it could be done off-line after the fact... it looks simpler when you consider it's done one frame at a time... |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 83
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 18, 2006 - 3:48 pm: |
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Mr. Sawdey and Ms. Ansbro,
I'm sorry I think I misunderstood Mr. Sawdey's earlier comment. I agree with the possibility of being able to fake it. I was only trying to produce something that's impossible(or very very hard) to fake in real-time or, say, within an hour.
Also from what I gather of your comments it seems like the telescope technique is for reproducing one image from a series of distorted images(?). I think water-ballot fakers would have to produce something like 30 (30 frames per second) distorted images from one fake image.
peace 2u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 18, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 84
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 18, 2006 - 4:38 pm: |
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Brant Lamb:
I think that they can go and film their own water ballots and splice them into the tape. Put a wireless tranceiver into the camera and the transposition can happen in real time. This has to live through a recount, as well.
I was thinking if the water is filmed continuously (and if it is continuously in an agitated state) then they would have a hard time splicing their manufactured water-ballot film in. They would have to manufacture the whole thing, I think.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 39
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, February 19, 2006 - 3:26 pm: |
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I think a spliced in section would stand out & be easily detectable since the distortion within each frame is related to the distortion of it's adjacent frames, since surface waves travel at a steady rate.
The telescope analogy I was talking about is used to find & map distortions caused by imperfections in the lense... this is done by imaging a highly accurate grid & comparing the image that has passed through the lense to the original. This is then used to correct images of other things imaged by that lense. Used extensively in chip lithography systems...
http://www.ing.iac.es/Astronomy/observing/manuals/html_manuals/wht_instr/ldss/su bsubsection1.2.0.6.1.2.html |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 396
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 20, 2006 - 6:03 am: |
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What I was talking about (wireless device in the digital camcorder gets the original streaming output to an editor in seconds and someone starts editting the streamed output immediately and streaming it back, they use your original water effect and don't have to make their own. |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 57
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 20, 2006 - 9:43 pm: |
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If I'm correct about the algorythm used, it's an interative error minimization technique that's going to take a while... it can be automated, but it's not going to be real-time.
Just might work, short term. Tonight's broadcast couldn't be faked. Tomorrow's could. I wouldn't want to bet the farm on my opinion though... I'm not an image analysis expert. Dedicated specialized processors might be more capable than I know. Better ask the NSA. (like they'd tell you if they knew!) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 85
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - 12:11 am: |
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Okay thank you everyone for all the valuable feedback and help in developing these ideas.
I think there is enough here for me to write up and code up a project. I am running out of time and need to work on the film scanner code and formalizing all this in a paper. Please feel free to continue to think about and post more ideas here. I plan to switch to paper-writing and coding mode so I probably won't have many new ideas. In academia I don't think things have to work perfectly...especially for a masters *project* (it's not even a master's *thesis*!). I plan to reference this thread in my paper and if anyone is curious I also hope to post the paper itself and source code when it's hopefully done soon, too.
After the master's project is hopefully(2 to 3 weeks) over I hope to go back to the drawing board and to this thread to try to contribute to developing this idea more. Maybe I will have learned a few things after putting all this into practice too.
You guys have been so very helpful. If you don't mind I plan to mention you all by name in my paper. I think you guys all contributed so much!
Don't forget to send those California senators emails/faxes and to call them up. The 2-17 news on Diebold certification in my mind is like the SoS saying, "We want a dictatorship!" Nothing less!
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 21, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 86
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - 5:27 am: |
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Catherine Ansbro:
I really like your way of thinking outside the box. Neither fire nor water seems particularly practical at this stage. Both present interesting opportunities for "accidents".
Maybe one could make at least one visual record using actual film rather than a digital media.
Well I see fire as pretty bad but I don't now if water is so bad. Given decent paper and marking instruments(a sharpie) I think it would take quite an accident to permanently damage the votes with water.
I'm wondering about your film idea more and more. Maybe film takes some pretty high-resolution pictures which would be hard to synthesize. I'm just not familiar with it. How practical is it to get a film camera? How much does a camera cost? Since you may just need it for one day, can you rent one? How long does it take to develop? It would be interesting to know more. It could prove to have very convienient tamper-proofing properties.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 64
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 21, 2006 - 3:54 pm: |
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We could use a sealed container for the water, kinda like a flattened 'wave in a bottle' toy, know the ones I mean? Square bottle, blue dyed water, slow motor to tip it side to side.
Camera wise, High Definition video cameras are now down to about $1500 and still falling... both HD video & film cameras can be rented. Rates depend on how fancy the camera is. Resolution depends on the size of the film & the grain size, which is related to it's ISO speed. A widescreen HD camera (all HD is widescreen) turned on it's side might work very well even for long ballots. HD comes in 1280 x 720 progressive, or 1920 x 1080 interlaced (usually).
Looking forward to seeing your paper, Anwar... thanks for contributing to these discussions. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 401
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - 4:56 am: |
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Have a mixer box that gates the water with an asymetric gate (or several of them) in it that changes the turbulence of the water into a fanout into the box. Probably the most difficult to sync with. |
Kerry Kimes
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Kerrykimes
Post Number: 9
Registered: 02-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - 8:52 am: |
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"redundant counting design with voter verified paper ballot"
That is the title on this thread. I think it's time new threads were started.
How about "Videotaping ballots placed in clear plastic boxes through a water screen with an HD camera."
And definitely another thread, "How writing a custom interpreter could easily foil any attempt to trace foul play." I'd like to join in on that one and it sounds pretty timely given the scrutiny ABasic is being given in California.
I'm not interested discussing either in this thread, it's gotten way too long and twisted as is. I don't know whether to talk about the Reynolds number at which water goes turbulent (i.e. nonlinear in flow pattern) or how the use of nondocumented microprocessor operands easily confuse a disassembler but, are still quite useful if one is seeking subterfuge or obfuscation.
Specifics, focus and practicality seem important to me if this forum is to be taken seriously.
Sawde's remarks are usually technically adept. Others have made good remarks, too.
My two cents. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 88
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - 9:21 am: |
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I think you have a good suggestion Mr. Kimes,
Since I'm working on writing this up for my project anyway I think I can summarize the main ideas in this thread and put them at the start of a new thread. Sorry about the convolution but I think sometimes that's how ideas get generated..at least seems to have been the case here.
I will hopefully make a new thread soon with a reference to this one.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 89
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - 9:29 am: |
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Mr. Sawdey,
Thank you for your last post which contains a nice idea, i think, and interesting extra info about flim cameras...I was googling for a while on film cameras and didn't find this info, especially not that well summarized.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 90
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - 9:34 am: |
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Mr. Lamb,
Your "gates" idea seems to add some needed extra control/complexity to the wave generator idea. It might be quite handy I think.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 69
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, February 22, 2006 - 11:26 pm: |
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Good idea Kerry, we've stumbled into an interesting idea from a tangent... let's concentrate on it's refinement in a discrete thread.
Non-laminar flow is not helpful... anything with a high Reynolds would just splatter noise over the whole image, rather than an isolable regular distortion. You'd lose the relation with adjacent frames...
Yes, I'm extremely skeptical of any technical solution... if I can think of a way to subvert the process, then those with equal or greater skills could subvert it... and unfortuneately such people exist, and have the political connections to accomplish these immoral acts. To my mind, the best solution is KISS & Sunshine! A process so simple that ANY idiot can see it's subversion when ALLOWED to watch the procedure. Basically my entire philosophy here depends on the opinion that MOST people (including election officials) will do the honest thing while being publically observed... just don't lead them into temptation to fraud by trusting them! |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 91
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 23, 2006 - 7:51 am: |
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Hello,
Here is an early version of what I'm thinking of posting in a new thread.
Not sure about the title yet:
Basic Idea
First, the voter marks their vote on a paper ballot and puts it into a ballot box using paper-ballot-based voting procedures. Voters with disabilities can use alternative means (VotePad) to also produce a paper ballot.
However after the ballots are cast and before the the ballot box is removed from the polling station, the ballots are taken out of the ballot box by a poll worker (in public) and briefly(1 second) placed in a hopper for video-recording. After sitting briefly in the hopper each ballot is placed into another sealed ballot box.
Using OMR on the ballots in the video, a count can quickly be done. For reliability and redundancy it can be done by multiple entities...at least all official parties with something on the ballot.
Paraphrasing some issues
There are many issues that were discussed. Here are some:
Making the video hard to fake:
Adding hard-to-compute distortions:
1) Anwar: Some kind of agitated water distortion since water is hard to simulate
2) Mr. Sawdey: Use something akin to a 'wave in a bottle' toy
3) Mr. Lamb: Add assymetric "gates" to 'wave in a bottle' to make for more complex waves
4) Mr. Kimes, Mr Sawdey: Reynolds Number?
Release video ASAP to avoid time given for tampering:
1) Live feeds
2) Calculate SHA-1 hash of digital video and release within a few minutes before even the video is released
Ballot Box Integrity
Mr. Lamb: Ballot stuffing is still a possible problem.
1) Mr. Lamb: Use in conjuction with fingerprinting and tracing techniques as discussed in the thread "A proposed hack- and vote- fraud- - resistant voting method"
2) Mr Sawdey: Use transparent well-shaken ballot box. Trust poll workers and voters will not misbehave while in public view.
Propose a ballot standard
It may be good to propose and establish a paper-ballot standard to ease the production of accurate, independently-produced, ballot video OMR software. Kind of like an RFC
----------------------
There were many other issues that were discussed and I am not finished going through all of them yet. This thread is 17 pages printed in a tiny font! But just to show people that I have actually been working on this (and to possibly get people's reaction so far) I'm posting this.
I plan to more accurately mention all the people that were involved in each idea too -- to give thanks where it's due.
This is a rough draft.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 23, 2006) |
Mike Myhre
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Mike_myhre
Post Number: 1
Registered: 02-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 23, 2006 - 10:19 am: |
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I think the water idea has "gone off the deep end". It is important to make the video hard to fake, but there are easier ways to do that (two camera angles by independant observers and a live feed for example).
Mike |
Jo Anne Karasek
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Jo_anne_karasek
Post Number: 101
Registered: 08-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 23, 2006 - 11:06 am: |
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Brant Lamb wrote,
"Currently access to a precinct's votes can be very difficult to get, something that assures people of the right to do this would have to be passed and then you're back into."
Two weeks ago we finished copying 5,000 ballots in Lucas County (Toledo, Ohio). We were able to copy them through a public records request filed after the time for the contest to the election had passed.
It depends on the state--in Californa, as I understand it, you have to get a court order to see the ballots. |
Jo Anne Karasek
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Jo_anne_karasek
Post Number: 102
Registered: 08-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 23, 2006 - 11:10 am: |
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Mike Myhre wrote,
"It is important to make the video hard to fake, but there are easier ways to do that (two camera angles by independant observers and a live feed for example)."
Every time I read the concept of live feed, I think of the movie that had the live feed altered/substituted for the duration of the crime. I don't know how practical such faking would be, but it is possible |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1785
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 23, 2006 - 2:13 pm: |
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Re: Ballox Box Integrity
One could have a setup in which no polling workers are allowed to get anywhere near the (transparent) ballot box once the election has begun. Only voters carrying their single ballot would be allowed to approach the ballot box. |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 72
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, February 23, 2006 - 9:41 pm: |
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'Reynolds number' is a term from fluid dynamics that describes how the fluid is flowing, from smooth stream to rushing rapids.
I don't think it's got to be quite that restrictive on the workers... just so they don't come between the box & the observation window... should be the same for voters. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 94
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 5:33 am: |
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Hello,
I'm working on the summary of this thread and hopefully it's almost done. However I think I've come upon a treasuretrove of research in digital image forensics that I would like to share now as well as include in the summary later.
Combine the availability of these techniques with something like a "water ballot" and early release of video and we may have just foiled most fraudulent-video attacks!
I stumbled upon Dr. Hani Farid's interesting phd dissertation while doing yet another google search for detecting fake video. Since he was at dartmouth I decided to google:
"dartmouth study on video forensics"
and found some interesting links:
in particular Dr. Farid states in:
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/farid/research/cgorphoto.html
Computer graphics rendering software is capable of generating highly photorealistic images that are often very difficult to differentiate from photographic images. We have, however, developed a method for differentiating between photographic and computer generated (photorealistic) images.
more references in:
http://wwwiti.cs.uni-magdeburg.de/iti_amsl/lehre/05_SoSem/mf-lm_ps/scripte/ps_th emen-ss05.pdf
especially slides 8 and 9:
http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~farid/publications/
and also of interest seems to be:
http://www.ee.columbia.edu/dvmm/trustfoto/
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 25, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 95
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 7:39 am: |
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Mike Myhre:
I think the water idea has "gone off the deep end". It is important to make the video hard to fake, but there are easier ways to do that (two camera angles by independant observers and a live feed for example).
Dear Mr. Myhre,
Thanks, first of all, for the feedback Can you explain how multiple angles by independent observers would make the video hard to fake? I think we are trying to avoid having to rely on trusting "independent" observers because maybe they're hard/expensive to find. Even if they existed someone could accuse them of faking their video. But maybe we're being too paranoid.
Thank you for endorsing the idea of a live feed. I agree, it could easily add authenticity to the video. I think the biggest problem with that idea is that it may not always be possible for every observer to do this. And I get a sick feeling about relying on media-conlogmerates to do it.
I know the "water ballot" sounds silly but the attractive aspect of a ballot distorted through water is that it could become very close to an absolute reference. It could put a lot of power in the hands of anyone with simply a camcorder and a cheap computer for calculating its SHA-1 or MD5 hash.
I have talked to a well-respected computer graphics professor about it and he thinks it has a lot of potential.
But I, for one, would welcome any simpler solutions.
So, would you care to elaborate some more? And do you have any other ideas of simpler ways to establish authenticity? I think it could be refreshing to hear your perspective.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 25, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 96
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 7:56 am: |
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Jo Anne Karasek:
Every time I read the concept of live feed, I think of the movie that had the live feed altered/substituted for the duration of the crime. I don't know how practical such faking would be, but it is possible
Something about a live feed makes me nervous.
I can't exactly put my finger on it. Maybe it's just that it seems few can really afford to have a live feed so that the result is that it would be put in the hands of centralized single-point-of-failure media conglomerates instead of decentralized joe/jane citizen watchdogs.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 25, 2006) |
Mike Myhre
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Mike_myhre
Post Number: 3
Registered: 02-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 10:07 am: |
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Anwar,
I start to question when things get to complicated. I believe that there is always a simple solution, though I may not always be smart enough (or patient enough) to find it. My biggest concern in voting is that we find a solution that everyone believes is honest. The more technology we throw at it, the more it goes over peoples heads and if they don't understand the complex technology that is making it honest (even if it is) the less likely they are to trust it. As things get more complicated, there are usually more ways to compromise them.
I think the keys to finding fraud attempts is redundancy. Two cameras are better than one (however complicated), two or more independant sources that agree is better. Sending these sources out live on the internet includes many more redundant eyes.
My comment on different angles was that each would include much of the same image, but from a slightly different angle to make it unique. You would need to alter both, slightly differently to get a realistic image. If each was from a different source (maybe one live feed and the other private) that would make it even harder to duplicate.
I guess my main point here is that your idea would take the current voting system and make it more secure, but when do you reach the point of marginal returns? By throwing the extra technology at it, did you have a significant improvement in security for the extra work involved? |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1801
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 12:31 pm: |
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It probably wouldn't be legal to air a live video feed if that meant people would be able to see what was on the ballots. I think that information is not supposed to be made available to anyone until after voting is finished.
In fact, with any kind of video or film one would have to ensure that noone was able to access this info during the election, because otherwise it could enable potential tamperers to know what changes might be necessary to achieve a desired result. (E.g., it could enable them to know that they just need to ensure a small number of absentee ballots from certain precincts with certain votes on them.) |
Robert Sawdey
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 94
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 9:00 pm: |
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If we're talking about presentation when the ballot box is opened, that would be after close of polls... although in national elections, there's the multiple time zones so the East coast would be revealed before West coast polls had closed. |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 97
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 11:04 pm: |
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Catherine Ansbro:
...(E.g., it could enable them to know that they just need to ensure a small number of absentee ballots from certain precincts with certain votes on them.)
Dear Ms. Ansbro,
From what i can tell it seems that no matter what absentee ballots are quite a mess.
Among the many problems is that I think you pretty much lose anonymity when you vote absentee right? Plus you can't be sure the mailman didn't just lose your ballot or DHS didn't just check it for anthrax or whatever and discard it when your vote was "a threat to national security".
Plus I think you can do vote buying with it, no?
So why can't we have absentee ballots be tracable ala something akin to Mr. Lamb's tracing method, or some internet-based cryptographic method?
Anyway I guess I don't know too much about absentee voting but I think it may be best to address absentee voting separately since it seems to be such a different animal. I think it would be quite useful to secure everything around absentee voting.
What do you think?
I will try to put a section for this issue in the summary I'm writing -- to be released hopefully tonight.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 25, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 98
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 11:07 pm: |
|
Catherine Ansbro: It probably wouldn't be legal to air a live video feed if that meant people would be able to see what was on the ballots. I think that information is not supposed to be made available to anyone until after voting is finished.
I thought the idea is to do the video count *after* the voting is finished anyway? Am I missing something?
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 25, 2006) |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 99
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 11:20 pm: |
|
Mike Myhre:
I start to question when things get to complicated. I believe that there is always a simple solution, though I may not always be smart enough (or patient enough) to find it....As things get more complicated, there are usually more ways to compromise them.
The problem with computer based voting is that essentially a lot of complexity was introduced without adding regulations concerning that complexity. Possibly just because there are so many ways to compromise them, as you said. So I agree there. Also I certainly hope there is a simple solution.
Mike Myhre: I think the keys to finding fraud attempts is redundancy.
Yes I wholeheartedly agree. That's why this thread is called "redundant counting..." and why public displays seem to have such potential..they would allow for very high levels of redundancy.
But I thought adding some measure of authentication can't hurt...as long as it's not too complex. The "water ballot" is still not a complete idea and I think it needs work. Thanks for mentioning the concern that it may go over the heads of too many people. I will try to keep that in mind.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 100
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, February 25, 2006 - 11:39 pm: |
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Last thing, I think, and then I'll get back to summary writing. Summary writing is hard because I can't help thinking about what I'm writing....
How about using a magnetic stirrer?
http://www.onlinesciencemall.com/Shop/Control/Product/fp/SFV/30852/vpid/1786555/ vpcsid/0/rid/119435
RPM is up to 1600 ... that's up to 26 revolutions per second. Add a few interesting substances in a sealed jar and let it spin?
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 101
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, February 26, 2006 - 1:43 am: |
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Jo Anne Karasek:
Two weeks ago we finished copying 5,000 ballots in Lucas County (Toledo, Ohio). We were able to copy them through a public records request filed after the time for the contest to the election had passed.
It depends on the state--in Californa, as I understand it, you have to get a court order to see the ballots.
I think the difference between displaying and lending out needs to be kept in mind for legal hurdles. But I'm not a lawyer.
But showing a $10,000,000 car by displaying it in public is not the same as showing it to the public by letting each person take it for a spin. Same as the distinction between displaying and lending out a bunch of diamonds.
It's much harder to tamper/switch ballots that are just displayed to you. Using a camcorder and Bev's techique above you can quickly copy the ballots without even touching them.
Thanks for your comment, I just finished adding it to the summary. It also allowed me to add this distinction which might be useful to keep in mind, possibly, in legal matters?
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on February 26, 2006) |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1803
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, February 26, 2006 - 3:38 am: |
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Hi Anwar,
Yes, I forgot that you were only referring to displaying the ballots after polling was finished. In that case there wouldn't be a problem with the timing.
Re: absentees, in theory anonymity is protected. The ballots are mailing in inside security envelopes. The signature and any other information is on the outside of the envelope for verification. Once that is given the ok, then the vote, still concealed in its inner envelope and now anonymous, goes into the hopper with the other absentee ballots.
That said, someone in the postal system could systematically waylay a percentage of envelopes that showed a certain address area on the outer envelope (e.g., implying a likelihood to be of one party rather than another). While this wouldn't have anything to do with linking the voter to their vote, it's a way that absentees could be tampered with.
Protecting and documenting the chain of custody of absentee ballots is probably more challenging than most people realize. That's why postal voting is not necessarily the ideal solution to addressing voter participation issues, tempting as it is. (At the minimum, postal voting and absentee ballots should only be used where there are extremely good procedures in place, and where there is a track record of excellent documentation in all aspects of ballot chain of custody.) |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 102
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, February 26, 2006 - 2:39 pm: |
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Catherine Ansbro:
Yes, I forgot that you were only referring to displaying the ballots after polling was finished. In that case there wouldn't be a problem with the timing.
Oh good. (No emoticons are available for feeling relief) Thank you for your vigilance.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 103
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 27, 2006 - 3:20 am: |
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okay so I think I have a decent draft for a summary. But I think I would like to post it for comments before creating a new thread with it.
For optimal printing download the pdf:
for most-compatible editing there's a word95 version
or simply the html version:
http://www.cs.ucr.edu/~aadi/masters/threadsummary/summary.html
I think I quoted or paraphrased ideas of each person that posted here. Please let me know if I misquote or mis-paraphrase you. Or if you made a point that I missed, or if a missed a subtlety in your point.
Also I refer to most people by Mr. or Ms. LASTNAME. So if you're looking for where you are quoted just look for you last name. Also if you prefer not to be addressed as Mr. or Ms. please let me know what you prefer.
Also in general I'm open to suggestions for additions, deletions, modifications, style, whatever. I think I can use all the help I can get ;)
Please either post a suggestion or email me a suggestion at
aMY_LAST_NAME AT cs.ucr.edu
In other words the letter "a" followed by my last name and then the at sign and cs.ucr.edu
I'm curious to know what you think.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 410
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 27, 2006 - 6:31 am: |
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Jo Anne Karasek said: "Two weeks ago we finished copying 5,000 ballots in Lucas County (Toledo, Ohio). We were able to copy them through a public records request filed after the time for the contest to the election had passed." You're making my point for me, Jo Anne, what good does this do you if you think the election was rigged? You just know you've been stiffed, nothing more. This kind of feedback isn't timely enough to make a difference. |
Mike Myhre
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Mike_myhre
Post Number: 4
Registered: 02-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 27, 2006 - 10:18 am: |
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Showing the ballots to everyone allows people to discover more about each voter (even though the voters identity is not linked to a ballot). I personally believe that everyone should have a right to this information. I don't see any reason why it would make voting fraud more prevalent, but there are plenty of reasons why it would make it easier to detect.
Once the voters identity has been separated from the ballot, everyone should be able to witness the process so long as they can't affect it.
In my mind, the perfect voting system is one that has many redundant checks built in along the way. If the end result doesn't match what you expect, you can inspect all the mile markers along the way and see where it went wrong. The voter would be able to verify his ballot at the final destination and only he could find his own ballot. If the voter chose to verify his ballot and it didn't match, he should be able to prove in court that he actually voted differently than it was recorded. If one or two people complained, it wouldn't go to court, but if 10,000 people all complained about the same vote swing, then you would know there was fraud and could pin it down to which link in the chain caused the problem. I think the absentee ballots should be able to be taken to your precinct or mailed back to the county. This would allow them to be tallied earlier and get a precinct total. Precincts would then post their own totals independant of the county totals so voters could verify that the subtotals match the totals. |
Robert Sawdey
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 101
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 27, 2006 - 9:25 pm: |
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Looking pretty good to me, Anwar... I still think I'd prefer a rocker to the stirrer... They can be gotten 'off the shelf' as well, and don't require a magnetic stir bar. |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 104
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, February 27, 2006 - 10:12 pm: |
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Robert Sawdey: Looking pretty good to me, Anwar... I still think I'd prefer a rocker to the stirrer... They can be gotten 'off the shelf' as well, and don't require a magnetic stir bar.
Thanks. And it's good to hear that rockers are "off the shelf" too. I'll see if I can get my hands on one.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 412
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, February 28, 2006 - 5:08 am: |
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Keep in mind that whatever you institute, there is always the chance that the elections officials may be oppositional to your access, and that it need not be legal to interfere with you in order for them to interfere with you at any point. This is from the example of Ohio, '04 and Florida '00.
So, if the proof is within their physical ability to take or is legally theirs, you may never get it. You need to (as much as possible) make the proof widely available as soon as possible in the process to avoid the possibility of its suppression. This is a vitally important issue. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 413
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 1, 2006 - 1:26 pm: |
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If you think that people aren't going to do things to the ballot box while voting, just because they haven't done it before, think again. |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 107
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, March 1, 2006 - 2:16 pm: |
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Mr. Lamb,
You make a good point I think.
I'm in paper-writing mode so i think I can't think too creatively now. All I can think to say is what Mr. Sawdey said; I think sunshine is the cure. And technology should be used to bring in the sunshine instead of blocking it out.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 414
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, March 2, 2006 - 7:20 am: |
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Yes, but I think that you must apply it at the correct points or it won't work. Or perhaps, won't work for long. I sent you an e-mail regarding this, let me know what you think. |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 108
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, March 2, 2006 - 9:42 am: |
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Mr. Lamb,
I got your email. Thanks for the feedback. I need some time to think about your many points, especially, since I'm having to meet school deadlines too. But I really like your feedback.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Robert Sawdey
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 104
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, March 2, 2006 - 11:26 am: |
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Anwar: Thanks. And it's good to hear that rockers are "off the shelf" too. I'll see if I can get my hands on one.
Ask around biology or biochemistry labs, they're used to slosh liquid culture media. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 432
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, March 9, 2006 - 4:32 am: |
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If you're going to 'mix' the ballots, you're going to need an awfully big box, you'd probably be better off with a drum. |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 109
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, March 9, 2006 - 2:24 pm: |
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For those who are still paying attention to this thread I'm in hopefully the last stages of the writeup.
I think giving this idea a short, but descriptive name would be nice.
What about "Open Counting"?
Since y'all were involved in generating the idea I'm wondering what you think. Got any other names?
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on March 09, 2006) |
Robert Sawdey
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Rsawdey
Post Number: 117
Registered: 01-2006
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, March 9, 2006 - 3:27 pm: |
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Good title... most of the labels I like are metaphorical, like 'SunshineKathy's moniker. 
A broader term might be 'Transparent Elections Process', or 'Citizen Verifiable Democracy'. |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 437
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 4:48 am: |
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'Videotaping Ballots' |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1868
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Friday, March 10, 2006 - 5:12 am: |
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Transparent Vote Counting |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 110
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, March 12, 2006 - 1:37 pm: |
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Thanks for the ideas.
Hmm...I wonder if it would work as a title and subtitle....kind of like the title:
Black Box Voting: Ballot tampering in the 21st century
some catchy phrase followed a simple explanation
A Turbocharged Australian Ballot: Transparent, Quick and Publically-Verified Vote Counting through the videotaping cast paper ballots
Nothing seems to really settle for me now. The title might just come last and I guess it's not that important. Gotta get back to writing.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1888
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, March 12, 2006 - 3:23 pm: |
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Actually the title's incredibly important, if it's something that will potentially be shared with others. And it makes sense that the title will clarify after the writing is completed. But don't underestimate it's importance. |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 111
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, March 12, 2006 - 4:17 pm: |
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Okay, I will try not to underestimate the importance of a title. You're right. Now that I remember, some professors have told me that even academic papers need good titles.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1889
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, March 12, 2006 - 4:32 pm: |
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(OT) For a little inspiration, see the titles of the Ig-Nobel award recipients ("The winners have all done things that first make people LAUGH, then make them THINK.") http://www.improb.com/ig/ig-pastwinners.html
While at first many of the titles seem ridiculous, when you look at the actual papers they are fascinating and good science. E.g., "The Significance of Mr. Richard Buckley's Exploding Trousers."
Fact beats fiction all the time!
I guarantee you some good laughs when you see the titles. The link above lets you look at the winners for each year going back to 1991.
(Message edited by catherine_a on March 12, 2006) |
ed hill
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ed_hill
Post Number: 8
Registered: 03-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, March 12, 2006 - 5:46 pm: |
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Hi folks
Re; the use of cycles per frame as a lock against CGI simulations. That's a short term fix. I worked for years in CG and VR. Moore's law renders this a very temporary fix. (sorry Punintended)I had to replace boxes every few months.
Just quick thought. Hack a small sandblast head into an old broadcast video camera. Tape whatever you need to with the carefully regulated sand or peening stream hitting the tape hard enough to cause low intensity "noise" in playback. All copies are to lower width with tape like 1 1/2, 3/4, or DVD. This would work for film camera too. Don't use digital. Film and video record at molecular granularity. Using digital, orders of magnitude less info is actually stored. Resulting in correspondingly easier forgery.
The master is reserved for evidentury use only.
All of the algorythmic splendor you can find won't change information theory. That which has come down can't be brought back up.
Those lower content distributions can never provide enough data to clone the original.
Hope that's what you were after.
Caherine I see my previous suggestion lost your interest. salright. I'll move ahead with it. This solution required about 3 mins for me to come up with and I know it to be workable. The other. 2 whole hours at findlaw.
Kid stuff.
I'll be happy to help. It just gets tired wasting time showing things to those who won't see.
Regretfully
ed
(Message edited by ed_hill on March 12, 2006)
(Message edited by ed_hill on March 12, 2006)
(Message edited by ed_hill on March 12, 2006) |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 112
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, March 13, 2006 - 5:36 am: |
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Hello Mr. Hill,
Thank you for the informative post. Actually I think the last possibly critical problem we are facing with this idea is trying to make it possible to produce, cheap yet hard-to-fake video. Are you saying that a Hi-8 video would be much harder to fake then a digital video? We were thinking of using HI-8 as a backup and your information seems to suggest that this would add much authenticity to the video (also I hope you're already seen the README above...looks like you have, I'm just trying to be sure)
I'm a little confused as to what you mean by the sandblasting idea. How could you prove that someone who presents such a video has not faked it? Or that a video *is* fake. Got any further references?
Again thank you for the contribution. I will keep thinking about it and try to pursue your tips...although I'm a little busy writing all this up formally and trying to produce a prototype program by the end of the week.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on March 13, 2006) |
ed hill
Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Ed_hill
Post Number: 9
Registered: 03-2006
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, March 13, 2006 - 11:03 am: |
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within this thought experiment, film then video in that order.
the "peening" to introduce random noise pattern onto the frame by frame recording or frame by frame film cels. the randomness generated by air turbulence at the nozzle is in the near future computationally prohibitive to accurately simulate digitally. big terraflop iron. this could be done to the film or tape prior to loading the camera.
even so it's costly at best.
i side with lynn's way smart KISS idea of drafting hand counters as we draft trial juries.
the more eyes counting, the safer the votes counted.
no references my old site might help re; my experience. way old menu popup. just click the images on the popup for a better look. it's a decade old. i was too busy back then to complete the site. little thing for pc mag cd at the bottom's nice.http://world.std.com/~ehill/r-frme-3.html
sorry that i don't play well with others. i'm tryin'
regards
ed
(Message edited by ed_hill on March 13, 2006) |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 1892
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, March 13, 2006 - 12:38 pm: |
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"sorry that i don't play well with others. i'm tryin'"
You're doing just fine!
(I'm not in any position to take on a major legal issue, and don't have any legal background myself. And I live in Ireland. That's why I didn't say more in response to your post about 14th amendment strategy, etc.) |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 113
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, March 13, 2006 - 7:25 pm: |
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Dear Mr. Hill,
I think my comment about references was misunderstood. When I asked about references I was wondering about any possible url's, papers or books you could point me to in order to learn more about what you were talking about...like something that would expand on your "peening" idea or the difficulty of the computation.
thanks for explaining your idea further in your last post and that "the randomness generated by air turbulence at the nozzle is in the near future computationally prohibitive" I can use that to do a google search...but I find that people's url tips can sometimes save lots of time.
Also I would not worry 100% about cost in the beginning. I heard Sergey Brin say that they started with a goal to produce the best search engine irreguardless of cost...then they figured out how to make it cheap later to produce what we now know as google.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 115
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Saturday, March 18, 2006 - 8:17 pm: |
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how about the term "democrasee"?
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 116
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, April 3, 2006 - 3:52 pm: |
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I just heard about the following conference:
http://www.usenix.org/events/evt06/cfp/
the submission deadline is tonight!
I have written something which I will try to submit. Since the idea presented in the paper was developed with extensive collaboration of the people on this message board I would like to add Ms. Cantherine Ansbro, Mr. Brant Lamb, Mr. Mike Myhre and Ms. Bev Harris as co-authors. The conference isn't until August so I think small adjustments can be made until then. However it would be nice to know if people are willing to be co-authors before I submit the article (6 pages). I decided to only focus on the simple idea of adding redundancy (as suggested by Mr. Mike Myhre)
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on April 03, 2006) |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 117
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, April 3, 2006 - 4:01 pm: |
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here is an early draft of the article
|
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 2027
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 2:39 am: |
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Hi Anwar,
I haven't read the paper yet, though I look forward to doing so.
Rather than being listed as a co-author, I prefer you to simply acknowledge my input at the end (and any others who feel the same). I assume that any direct quotes would be attributed as well.
Co-authoring implies a different kind of collaboration IMO. |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 118
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 6:58 am: |
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Hello Ms. Ansbro,
Yes, I have been told this too. I added peoples' names with comments in the acknowledgements. This was a very rushed paper. I submitted it last night in the last minute. I am already seeing things I wish I could remove and I have realized I forgot to add some points.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 119
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Tuesday, April 4, 2006 - 7:40 am: |
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Good news: It looks like one has the option of modifying one's paper until June 14th! So if it's accepted (notifications go out on may 12) then there is room for fixes.
Bad news: I am not sure weather I can post my submission on the web. I think I can but I don't want to get disqualified. Will try to confirm and then hopefully post. I think I can at least email it to people. So if you're curious send me an email at aMYLASTNAME AT cs.ucr.edu and I can send it.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Brant Lamb
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Brantl
Post Number: 488
Registered: 01-2005
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 1 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Wednesday, April 5, 2006 - 5:16 am: |
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Anwar, I agree with Catherine, we only commented, you are welcome to credit quotes, but giving co authorship to me is much more credit than is due. |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 120
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, April 6, 2006 - 12:31 am: |
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You guys are too modest. I was working on a master's degree with no real experts as advisors guiding me. The kind of collaboration here I believe was absolutely essential. Otherwise I would be working with little expert guidance. I have found the tips here to be quite expert and quite valuable in guiding my research.
btw: I just received word of my master's project going through. So it's official! I'm just a little hesitant to post my master's project write up just yet. It was a bit rushed and has some problems IMO...and it's huge (over 60 pages!)..so I'd like to fix it up a little before posting it.
As far as the conference submission(6 pages instead of 60!) I'm taking the safe route and just sending it to people via email for personal use. If anyone is interested I can also send them the current master's project write-up.
peace 2 u,
-anwar |
Catherine Ansbro
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Catherine_a
Post Number: 2033
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Thursday, April 6, 2006 - 12:54 pm: |
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Congratulations! |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 121
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box?
Votes: 2 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Sunday, April 9, 2006 - 3:27 am: |
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Thank you. Again much thanks goes out to you guys and Black Box Voting in general. I included lots of references to black box voting and mentioned everyone in this thread by name in the acknowledgements.
It may not have been much in the end(still don't have an implementation), but I guess I spent a lot of time dedicated to the masters project write-up and dedicated to doing background research. I am now trying to piece my life back together 
Thanks, again, everyone here.
peace 2 u,
-anwar
(Message edited by Anwar on April 09, 2006) |
anwar adi
Frequent Voting Rights Forum Participant
Username: Anwar
Post Number: 123
Registered: 12-2004
Best of Black Box? N/A
Votes: 0 (A keeper?) | | Posted on Monday, August 21, 2006 - 1:43 am: | |
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summary of thread (pdf)