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Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

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Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#281

Post by donarb »

jellicle wrote: post #66
thatcat wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What is the publically available source to view voting history ? I thought that was protected information.

How one votes is secret. Whether one votes is typically compiled by the government and made available to political parties and often the general public.

Note that this is used by campaigns prior to the election to be able to target voters that have not yet voted. Here in Washington state, you receive your mail-in ballot 3-4 weeks before Election Day. I usually return mine as soon as I get it. Campaigns can query this data repeatedly up to Election Day. Knowing that I have already sent in my ballot spares me from needless phone and mailed campaign literature and saves campaigns the cost of sending out useless material.

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#282

Post by crooked-v »

unityByFreedom wrote: post #231
jack_kc wrote: post #194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The site you linked to is not affiliated with any state DMV. It links to a sketchy background check service that appears to be a scam. Edit: spelling

That, and, I've never consented to release my birthday publicly. I consider it to be private, therefore it is private. It's mine! I expect the government would not release it since they use it as part of an identifier all the time. There's no perfect identifier. That's why we need security. This is a major lapse. Pretty sneaky of the comment above yours to try to pass dmv.org as a government website.

> I've never consented to release my birthday publicly.

Too bad. The government doesn't care about you consenting to things. In fact, making you do things without your consent is literally the entire point of organized government, even if we usually overlook that because it's for a good purpose (for example, taxation to pay for health care or national defense).

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#283

Post by ethan_g »

bb88 wrote: post #146
maxerickson wrote: post #107

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno about the jail part, but the being ultimately responsible for the actions of the people working for you sort of goes with the title. Like, why is the organization set up so that 1 programmer can make a catastrophic mistake? The CEO is responsible for that.

So if the system is set up so that one programmer can make a catastrophic mistake, then the system is broken. If the system is set up so that one general can launch a nuclear warhead, then the system is broken. If the system is set up so that one politician can kill people without a trial, then the system is broken. If the system is set up so that one nurse can release data on 1 million patients, then the system is b…

While I generally agree with your point, it's hard to make this into law. Do you think it should be illegal to have a company with only 1 programmer? If not, how do you prevent them from making catastrophic mistakes?

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#284

Post by dragonwriter »

ethan_g wrote: post #283
bb88 wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So if the system is set up so that one programmer can make a catastrophic mistake, then the system is broken. If the system is set up so that one general can launch a nuclear warhead, then the system is broken. If the system is set up so that one politician can kill people without a trial, then the system is broken. If the system is set up so that one nurse can release data on 1 million patients, then the system is b…

While I generally agree with your point, it's hard to make this into law. Do you think it should be illegal to have a company with only 1 programmer? If not, how do you prevent them from making catastrophic mistakes?

Law generally doesn't prevent catastrophic mistakes, it creates consequences for them which incentivizes those in a position to make them to find ways of preventing them.

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#285

Post by Phlarp »

mrpoptart wrote: post #90
vinhboy wrote: post #69

> It would ultimately take days, from June 12th to June 14th, for Vickery to download 1.1 TB of publicly accessible files Do security firms have special permission to do this? Because as a private citizen, I am pretty sure I would go to jail if I tried this.

IANAL, but I'm pretty sure if someone leaves a Top-Secret document on the ground, and you pick it up, you don't go to jail for that. The data is accessible to the public -- this isn't a hack, this is just downloading.

Didn't weev end up on the wrong side of this relatively blurry line?

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#286

Post by specialist »

anigbrowl wrote: post #199
Lagged2Death wrote: post #105

“‘Microtargeting is trying to unravel your political DNA,’ [Gage] said. ‘The more information I have about you, the better.’ The more information [Gage] has, the better he can group people into "target clusters" with names such as ‘Flag and Family Republicans’ or ‘Tax and Terrorism Moderates.’ Once a person is defined, finding the right message from the campaign becomes fairly simple.” Neal Stephenson wrote a book ca…

I agree, but citizen education should not imho be the only approach here. I'm for much more muscular privacy laws and a slightly narrower tolerance on what's acceptable political speech. Of course education is great, but look at the vast financial and operational asymmetries between even the most informed individual and well-resourced corporate actors like political parties. I have a super-strong political immune sys…

I revel in my filter bubble and labor to improve it.

For policy wonks and activists such as myself, discourse, persuassion, marketing, are distractions from the real work of getting things done.

Firstly, because people vote their identity. Period. Almost no one votes on the facts, the issues, the policy, the platforms, whatever. There are no undecideds, no independents. Cite "Democracy for Realists".

Secondly, victory is achieved by mobilizing your supporters. You bring the heat, whoever is sitting in the chair will see the light.

The only distinction is if a voter is willing or unwilling to bother casting a ballot.

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#287

Post by specialist »

rattray wrote: post #145

I don't typically don hats with this much tin foil, and I don't think this is likely , but... The real danger of data like this, in my opinion, illegal usage for voter fraud. Find people who are likely to vote against you and likely to have poor voter registration documents, and remove them from the polls so they can't vote. Find people who aren't likely to vote at all and vote on their behalf. In-person, the only ve…

Please learn how election administration is conducted before continuing to speculate, criticize.

An easy way is to see it first hand, by working as a poll judge or inspector.

Happy hunting.

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#289

Post by thatcat »

wildmusings wrote: post #263
thatcat wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

enzanki_ars and BoiledCabbage cite the publicly accessible preference/views data categories which included the party you vote for

Sorry to be pedantic, but precision matters here. You can't find out who someone voted for, only what party they are registered as.

No need to apologize, that is a crucial detail.

Re: Inside the Largest US Voter Data Leak

#290

Post by sdenton4 »

anigbrowl wrote: post #274
ryb73 wrote: post #255

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're blowing grovegames' original post out of proportion — he asked some pretty reasonable questions.

Of course they're reasonable. But problematic large scale data breaches are not a new problem. The last financial crisis was almost a decade ago, and yet we haven't developed a new culture of organizational responsibility since, despite the massive societal costs. Not to make overly sweeping generalizations, but 'hold on, let's think through all the ramifications here instead of being too hasty' is a great way to mai…

Indeed, lock up a couple CEOs and the others will feel a much stronger need to create better protections. Right?
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