July 09, 2004
More e-voting problems in Miami
Miami-Dade County elections officials have been working on a small problem with their voting machines: a serial number that is essential for identifying the source of votes is being lost somewhere in the transfer of data from voting machines to the big computers that do the final tabulations.
No worries, though. The manufacturer that sold the county these flawed machines is in town to fix them, and they just might be able to get them working right.
Unfortunately, no one has yet figured out just how to fix a whole new crop of serious flaws that has just come to light thanks to a public records request by the Miami Herald.
ES&S, the manufacturer of these machines, is now engaged in a shouting match with the state and county. Meanwhile, an independent audit has shown that the entire Miami-Dade system put in place by ES&S is fatally overburdened, having never been designed to handle an area as populous as Miami-Dade.
There seems to be plenty of blame to spread around here. The state says that ES&S filed an incomplete application for certification for these iVotronic machines, but the state certified the machines, which would seem to be an implicit approval of the incomplete application.
• The central database machines used to tabulate votes are incapable of holding all the audit data at once, requiring a ''labor intensive and costly'' solution that could complicate a recount in a close race. Audit data is used to back up the system.• The optical scanners used to read absentee ballots have problems when information is merged from the three machines the county uses.
• And the county could potentially mix up votes if it were to try to use phone lines to transmit data from the polling places to the election center, which it doesn't plan to do.
ES&S RESPONSE
ES&S Senior Vice President Ken Carbullido responded to Kaplan on June 14, noting that each of the problems could be resolved if the county alters its procedures, reconfigures its software or, if it wants to transmit data from the polling places, redo the programming code in the machines or retrain its staff.
He acknowledged on Thursday, however, that the problems are ''separate issues'' from the so-called ''audit anomaly'' that brought a team from his company to Miami-Dade this week. The team tested a program intended to repair a problem in which the computers garbled serial numbers in the machine's audit trail. In a close election requiring a recount, that problem might make it difficult to tell what votes were cast on a particular touch-screen machine.
MAKE CHANGES
All of the problems can be addressed by the November election if Miami-Dade officials make a few changes in the way they use the equipment, said Doug Jones, a University of Iowa computer expert the county hired to independently review its electronic voting system and make recommendations.
But, Jones said, the extent of the flaws expose a major failing of the system: ``The fundamental problem is the data formats used were never designed to handle a county as big as Miami-Dade.''
......Jones said the problem rests with the software, known as Unity, and added that it is up to ES&S to decide how far it wants to go to make it better able to perform in large counties.
The lesson, Jones said, is ``the belief that a software program is correct is almost always wrong.''
''All we have are a choice between imperfect systems,'' he said.
Luckily, Florida voters can legally vote absentee and leave a paper trail, at least for themselves.
And there’s something you can do! (From a TrueMajority email):
The national "Computer Ate My Vote" day of action is really taking off - in
just the three days since we invited you to next Tuesday's big event, more
than 20,000 TrueMajority members have added their names to the call for
voter-verified paper ballots. Along with others who signed on earlier, and
signatures from MoveOn, Democracy For America and VerifiedVoting.org, it
adds up to a list of more than a quarter-million names. Come on down
Tuesday, July 13th to join the crowd of Florida citizens who will deliver
those petitions and call on your election officials to support voter-
verified paper ballots.
The rally and press conference is at on Tuesday, July 13th.
There are 8 different rallies in Florida;
Find the one near you.
These events are happening in 17 more states besides Florida, and there's
also a national telephone press conference that same day where Gov. Howard
Dean will join our own Ben in promoting what you're doing. This will be the
biggest day of grassroots action for secure elections yet - come be a part
of it!
About this campaign:
The paperless computerized voting terminals being adopted by many states are
vulnerable to software flaws, hardware failures, and security holes. The
machines have already lost votes in a number of elections around the
country, and without a paper printout there is no way to do a meaningful
audit or recount. Every voter should be able to see a paper version of their
ballot to verify their choices are recorded correctly, before leaving it
with pollworkers as a permanent record. For more on the issue, see
computeratemyvote.org
Tuesday, July 13
Rally & Press Conference
outside Hillsborough County Supervisor of Elections Office
(Buddy Johnson, Supervisor)
601 East Kennedy Blvd
Tampa, FL 33602
11:00am
Contact: Rob McKenna (rob@dukies.com)
