Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds • Hacker News Board

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#141

Post by AlwaysRock » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 8:53 PM UTC

bluGill wrote: post #40

briffle wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The state of Oregon has vote by mail. Its awesome. My ballot gets mailed to me a few weeks before the election. I fill it out, and can either mail it back (I have to pay for a postage stamp) or drop it off at a ballot drop box all over town. there are all sorts of safeguards for things like not getting your ballot in the mail, etc. I was also automatically register to vote as an independent when I got my drivers lice…

This actually a bad idea: The reason for in person voting is poll monitors there are watching to make sure nobody knows how you voted. There are have been cases of "vote for me or I'll break your legs". When you vote from home someone can come by and watch you mail your vote the "correct" way in.

I'm confused. Are you talking about family members forcing others to vote a certain way? Wouldnt that family member be just as coercive at a polling station? I guess in theory one could lie to the family member if they vote in person but is this a sizable and real concern about at home voting?

Genuinely curious because I've never heard of anyone expressing this concern before.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#142

Post by zdragnar » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 8:59 PM UTC

return-value wrote: post #6

I work for the municipality of Skanderborg, Denmark. We have what we call digital elections, but what’s digitized is the registration process. Basically every adult gets a voting card with their information + a barcode, we scan those barcodes when they turn up to receive their ballot(is that the right word for voting list?), and then they are registered. The actual voting takes place on paper, and while it takes time…

Registration for voting varies by the state you live in. In MN, you basically just need to walk in, have someone else who is already registered vouch for you, and you can register + vote on the spot.

Every attempt to firm up voter registration roles (such as proving identity, eligibility, etc) is met with cries of racism.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#143

Post by return-value » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:04 PM UTC

sgeisenh wrote: post #48

return-value wrote: post #6

I work for the municipality of Skanderborg, Denmark. We have what we call digital elections, but what’s digitized is the registration process. Basically every adult gets a voting card with their information + a barcode, we scan those barcodes when they turn up to receive their ballot(is that the right word for voting list?), and then they are registered. The actual voting takes place on paper, and while it takes time…

I trust good digital voting systems more than a paper ballot. Specifically, the system should be auditable in a way that makes it difficult to trace individual votes back to voters, but allows individual voters to verify that their votes are counted correctly. There must be a good way to accomplish this while also addressing potential voter fraud. Does anybody know of any research in this area? With paper ballots, I…

We count votes several times, using different people. All counting is done under observation. Everyone on the ballot can demand a recount under their supervision, within reason (you can’t demand infinite recounts).

The people who count votes are either trusted employees of the muniplacity, members of a politician party or NGOs. I guess in a two party system it’s hard to understand why politician party members are impartial, but when you have several parties they govern each other + they don’t get to count their own votes, and there is at least one recount of only officials.

I’m not sure what system would be safer.

Without a paper trail you have no evidence. I guess you could use blockchain, but realistically, it would never be decentralized and 99% of the voters wouldn’t understand it well enough to know whether or not the software actually did what they intended, making it much unsafer.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#144

Post by kaycebasques » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:07 PM UTC

Loughla wrote: post #50

kaycebasques wrote: post #41

The HN consensus seems to be that digital voting is very difficult to do right. I trust the consensus opinion, but this also makes me sad. The bigger picture that I think we’re missing here is the opportunity for huge-scale direct democracy. I know the usual debates against DD, but I think there’s ways to safeguard against those problems. E.g. you can’t vote on an issue without hearing both sides of it and passing a…

>I’m a firm believer that most people act more responsibly when you give them more responsibility. Honestly, I believe the literal opposite. People act irrationally if they believe it's in their own self-interest. What leads to to think that way? I'm genuinely curious.

Some random thoughts, starting with personal experience:

* When my team gives me ownership over a project, I take pride in that project and produce higher-quality work. This is loosely related to "people act more responsibly when you give them more responsibility" in the sense that direct democracy will make people feel like they have more ownership over issues.

* Homeowners tend to take better care of their place of living than renters.

* When people have kids, most tend to mature and act more responsibly in general. Not all, but most. In this case "having a child" is a proxy for "having more responsibility" in general.

In terms of studies, I'm intrigued by experiments [1] where people are assigned leadership roles randomly. They seem to suggest that people tend to make better decisions when given more responsibility. An even more radical idea that is more closely related to this study would be to assign random citizens to be in charge of a certain political issue, say for 6 to 12 months.

[1] http://bobsutton.typepad.com/my_weblog/2011/10/is-it-sometim...

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#145

Post by bdamm » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:11 PM UTC

zdragnar wrote: post #142

return-value wrote: post #6

I work for the municipality of Skanderborg, Denmark. We have what we call digital elections, but what’s digitized is the registration process. Basically every adult gets a voting card with their information + a barcode, we scan those barcodes when they turn up to receive their ballot(is that the right word for voting list?), and then they are registered. The actual voting takes place on paper, and while it takes time…

Registration for voting varies by the state you live in. In MN, you basically just need to walk in, have someone else who is already registered vouch for you, and you can register + vote on the spot. Every attempt to firm up voter registration roles (such as proving identity, eligibility, etc) is met with cries of racism.

That's because schemes such as bringing a driver's license are racist when you look at mobility and accessibility to government services. Back in my home country (Canada), voter eligibility was done by bringing evidence of residence in the district, which is roughly the same hurdle as getting a library card. I don't see why it ought to be any harder than that.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#146

Post by vec » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:21 PM UTC

thatfrenchguy wrote: post #114

vec wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I live in Colorado. A couple of weeks before the midterms I'm going to get a packet in the mail containing my ballot, instructions for filling it out, a pamphlet where every candidate on the ballot gets a paragraph or two to make their case, and a prepaid return envelope. I fill out my ballot at my leisure, stuff it in the envelope, sign the envelope underneath the flap, and drop it in a mailbox. There's a receipt wi…

How do you know your ballot has not been changed ?

There's a line for a signature that the flap of the envelope ends up glued over the top of. There is no identifying information visible on the outside of a properly sealed envelope.

The envelopes have to remain sealed until they're brought into the room with the election monitors to be counted. If the seal isn't intact or the envelope isn't signed underneath or the bar code under the flap doesn't match the one on the ballot then the ballot is considered spoiled. The actual ballots are wrapped in a "secrecy sleeve" so that the votes can't be seen without unfolding them, and the election monitors separate the envelopes with the signatures from the ballots before they begin counting, so the secret ballot is preserved.

From that point forward they're processed just like any other paper ballots.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#147

Post by kevin_thibedeau » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:21 PM UTC

sumeno wrote: post #119

jerf wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's better to worry about these things before they are problems. I don't know if it's happened in the US but it is absolutely a very common attack against voting systems, and any voting system not resistant to it should be considered suspect.

Voter suppression is an actual real world problem that happens today, not a hypothetical problem like the one you are worried about. Allowing voting by mail is an improvement to that real world problem as it reduces the barriers to voting for those that are employed in jobs that don't give time off for voting or who don't have transportation to their voting location. Voter intimidation is already illegal and there is…

Vote buying is also illegal and vote-by-mail makes it easy to document your ballot to get the promised kickback. This is logistically difficult for national elections but for local office it is much more likely to succeed.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#148

Post by slg » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:25 PM UTC

avar wrote: post #128

QuercusMax wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If we're going to have a national ID card, then it needs to be: 1) Free. Period. Otherwise you're going to disenfranchise poor people who can't afford even $50 to get an ID. 2) Universally accessible. If we're going to require it, then we need to make sure everyone has one, from a little old lady living 100 miles from civilization in Montana, to the homeless living in camps near San Jose.

There's plenty of countries where neither of those is true, but the voting system requires a national ID and has better outcomes by any reasonable metric than the US. So you don't really need those things, but they may be proxy issues for other hard-to-solve issues.

I am not very familiar with the systems other countries use so I am genuinely curious which ones you are referring to here and whether they are comparable to the US. The US has a centuries long history of laws designed to make it harder for "undesirables" to vote. The US's racial and socioeconomic makeup and its history of oppression of those groups makes this a much more contentious issue than some other countries that historically have been very homogeneous.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#149

Post by soundwave106 » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:33 PM UTC

return-value wrote: post #6

I work for the municipality of Skanderborg, Denmark. We have what we call digital elections, but what’s digitized is the registration process. Basically every adult gets a voting card with their information + a barcode, we scan those barcodes when they turn up to receive their ballot(is that the right word for voting list?), and then they are registered. The actual voting takes place on paper, and while it takes time…

For a little bit of context, from what I recall, the real push towards electronic voting in the United States came after the 2000 presidential election and the controversies that happened with paper ballots and the tight recount in Florida (eg "hanging chads"). (https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/10/22/electronic-voting-...)

Paper isn't perfect and I think the thought at the time was pushing elimination of all of paper's errors. That being said, digital voting of course has far worse problems if you don't do it right (and it's pretty clear it hasn't been done very well in the US). In hindsight, that was a poor push.

I imagine it's actually possible to design a digital voting system that is fairly secure (eg air-gapped voting machines, secure data storage and transmission, integrity verification, redundant security features, thoroughly tested, and -- most critical of all -- paper backups), but it would be very difficult compared to designing a better paper ballot system, and probably quite a bit more expensive.

Re: Voting Machine Used in Half of U.S. Is Vulnerable to Attack, Report Finds

#150

Post by kevin_thibedeau » Fri, Sep 28, 2018, 9:34 PM UTC

_a3nw wrote: post #39

BatFastard wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Elections are held on Tuesday as a way of restricting who can vote PERIOD. Poorer voters have a harder time getting off work, and getting transportation to voting site, which is usually close to their home, but not their work.

If this had an actual impact on the election you would see one side push for changing the day as a strategy if they are more popular in the poorer populations than their opponent. Republicans would definitely want this more now considering Donald Trump's voter base was mostly lower income people. Same could be said for Barack Obama during 2014.

The GOP is run by the 1% but they need a larger base to win elections. This is why they crafted a platform catering to the pet issues of low-income conservatives. They never actually deliver on their rhetoric because it's all just an act (Still waiting on the executive branch to institute H1B reform). They don't want policies that allow masses of poorer people to influence the results for the periods they are out of power.