[EM] Why We Shouldn't Count Votes with Machines

[Dave Ketchum]

Federal certification?  The many horror stories tell us either:
     Equipment is failing that has never been "certified" or
     The certifiers are signing off without bothering to look 
seriously for the many defects in the offered systems,

Thus the certification process needs overhauling.

I said nothing of such as central tabulators.  Certainly quality needs 
attending to here, but voter anonymity should not be a problem here.

On Thu, 21 Aug 2008 22:22:41 -0600 Kathy Dopp wrote:
> On Thu, Aug 21, 2008 at 10:00 PM, Dave Ketchum <davek at clarityconnect.com> wrote:
> 
> 
>>    First, this is not intended to be used in a zillion precincts - just to
>>validate the programs.
> 
> 
> OK. Well if you don't care about validating the election outcome
> accuracy, and just want to verify the small amount of programs on
> voting machines that pertain to voting, then you could do parallel
> (Election Day) sampling of memory cards (memory cards unbelievably
> have      today interpreted code on them on most voting systems) like
> the University of CT engineering dept. has designed for checking the
> voting code on CT's voting systems.
> 
> My own focus is on ensuring that voters decide who governs them by
> checking the accuracy of the election outcomes instead.
> 
I assume properly certified systems, only demonstrating to voters that 
they truly behave as such.

I am not interested in memory cards, as such - if such are used, the 
certifiers should have considered proper installation and use.
> 
>>    But part of the requirement on the program installation is that it be
>>impractical to alter it undetectably.
> 
> 
> OK. So how many billions of dollars do you want to allocate to your
> new voting system and voting program design?
> 
> And you do understand that it will not ensure that the election
> outcomes are accurate right?

Certainly want correct outcomes.  Major requirement is developers with 
the right mindset, plus reasonable skill.

Do not see this costing billions - more than many present efforts, but 
usable by many precincts.
> 
> 
>>>1. potentially violates voter privacy
>>
>>    That is the reason for letting voters CHOOSE whether to volunteer for
>>this.
> 
> 
> Oh. I see, so you want voters to choose to give up their ballot
> privacy. Hmmm.  You do realize that could/would enable vote buying not
> just for mail-in voting like today, but also for precinct voting?
> 
Needs thought.  Look for needed use of the tapes while making vote 
buying as impractical as possible.
> 
>>>2. video can be digitally altered, segments deleted (is more volatile
>>>than paper ballots)
>>
>>    So there needs to be extra effort to avoid such.
> 
> 
> Extra effort and expense and complexity and you are going to first
> convince the public to double their budget for elections so that you
> can remove the voter from "voter-verification" so that we can have
> video verification?
> 
Not something to do at many precincts.  Do not see it as being as 
expensive as you imply.
> 
>>>3. another expensive toy (video cameras) that would have to be kept
>>>running during elections, & maintained between elections, tested,
>>>certified, etc.
>>
>>    Sounds like overkill.  What more is needed than cameras that can be
>>borrowed for use as needed?
> 
> 
> OK. So now you plan to change the election statutes in almost all
> states too, so that federal certification and testing are no longer
> required for voting systems?

As I say above, what has been called "federal certification" 
apparently needs to be replaced by testing whether the equipment 
offered can really do the job.
> 
> Gee, does anyone on this list ever consider practical real life
> situations when you devise your "solutions"?
> 
I do consider.  Do not know what proper equipment would cost, but 
believe we could get closer than where we are now.
> 
>>>4. auditing video tapes would be much slower (more administratively
>>>burdensome) than auditing paper ballots
>>
>>    "Auditing" is not clear to me - must read all the ballots off the tape -
>>part of deciding how many voting machines to do this on.
> 
> 
> I thought you already said that only some machines are selected prior
> to the election for videoing, so that all the unselected machine
> counts can be undetectably altered to match erroneous election
> results?

They are all supposed to be using the same programs - which are 
supposed to defend against what you suggest.
> 
> Since your aim is not to ensure accurate election outcomes and only to
> check some of the vote counting software on the individual machines,
> and not on the central tabulator and not check the accuracy of the
> election outcomes, I'm not sure how you plan to calculate the amount
> of voting machines to "do this on"?

There are supposed to be proper programs everywhere.  Topic here is 
enough verification to satisfy voters that we are saying goodby to the 
horror stories.
> 
> When calculating audit amounts with the goal of assuring correct
> election outcomes, the mathematics depend on the reported election
> results and the total number of reported auditable vote counts.
> 
I am not talking of auditing.
> 
>>>5. selecting the machines to be videotaped prior to the election tells
>>>any inside fraudsters which machines can be undetectably tampered with
>>>or have their votes altered during or after the election  (valid
>>>auditing requires only selecting the random audit units AFTER all the
>>>auditable vote counts have been publicly posted after the polls close
>>>(as in any field, the data must be committed prior to auditing it)
>>
>>    Then I am not proposing auditing as such.
> 
> 
> Yes. I understand that your goal is obviously not to ensure that the
> election outcomes are correct, but only to test the voting software on
> some machines selected at the beginning of the election.  Obviously
> there are a lot of ways to fraudulently manipulate election outcomes
> with using your costly administratively burdensome procedure of adding
> video machines that film voters' screens while voting.
> 
See below.
> 
>>    The programs used need to make fraud difficult, and undetectable fraud
>>VERY difficult, wherever used, whether or not a particular machine is taped.
>>
>>Again, my purpose is validating a program, rather than a particular
>>election.
> 
> 
> Yes. Thanks for explaining that.
> 
> I am more concerned about whether or not voters are the
> decision-makers in who governs them and really am not interested in
> spending gobs of money and complicating elections just to video some
> individual voting machines during the election.
> 
Assuming we get proper programming, how would you convince voters that 
the horror stories are from a regrettable past, and gone from the present?

> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Kathy
-- 
  davek at clarityconnect.com    people.clarityconnect.com/webpages3/davek
  Dave Ketchum   108 Halstead Ave, Owego, NY  13827-1708   607-687-5026
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