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Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

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Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#251

Post by EvilTerran »

tomp wrote: post #213
yesbabyyes wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If OP comes from a democracy, I highly doubt they do things like: - Voter ID to discourage minorities, students, elderly [1] - "True the Vote", invoking a problem that doesn't exist [2] - Another article on "True the Vote" [3] - Blocking voting on the weekend before election [4] - You don't see lines like this in other developed countries. It's not that they're not reported on because "no one cares", they're not repo…

> Voter ID to discourage minorities, students, elderly Why would that discourage anyone? In slovenia, you are required by law to carry an ID when you turn 18/get voting rights. So there's really no excuse for anyone to not have an id (or driver's licence).

In a lot of countries, ID is not mandatory, and government-endorsed photo IDs are expensive and time-consuming to acquire. As such, people with a high income will be more likely to have them.

That applies doubly so for a passport or driving license -- people with more money are more likely to have a car or travel overseas, so more likely to have those types of ID.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#252

Post by Firehed »

LandoCalrissian wrote: post #181
goostavos wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was not the best civics student.. What is the significance of it being secret ? Being able to verify your vote seems like a pretty simple, good thing ( I would think ).

The short answer is you can buy votes then. If you can prove to me who you voted for, I'll give you $5 or whatever.

Which is trivially easy with the availability of camera-phones (just include your ID in the shot).

I know it's not foolproof as you could request a new ballot, but I'm guessing those buying votes aren't the smartest folk. Plus you'd be crazy to not accept the money upfront, as there's no way they're actually going to pay out after the fact and it's not like you can take someone to court for not upholding their end of an illegal bargain.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#253

Post by evandena »

danielweber wrote: post #241
wbrendel wrote: post #65

What's wrong with paper ballots again? Serious question. In my area (northern MA), voters are given a ballot with a bubble next to each of the candidates' names. You use a marker to fill in the bubble next to the candidate you want to vote for, like 6-year-olds manage to do all the time on multiple choice tests in school. Then it gets read in by a machine, leaving a paper trail just in case. How are these electronic…

How do you count a smudge instead of a complete filling-in of the oval? You have humans go over them, and people hate that. Just because you never see this issue doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It's just that the ambiguous ballots don't matter in the vast majority of elections so no one cares. I'm not saying computers are better than paper. They each have trade-offs.

Bubbles seem stupid to me. It's a lot easier and less subjective on review to fill in an arrow than it is to fill in a bubble. Here's an example ballot of what I'm talking about: http://www.town.oregon.wi.us/uploads/ckfiles/images/nov_06_s...

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#254

Post by btilly »

danielweber wrote: post #179
jivatmanx wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The CEO's of the companies making these voting machines are all die hard Republican supporters, especially Diebold. Being that none of these machines are open-source, that's really the important factor, the political persuasion of the companies manufacturing the machines. The essence of democracy is an essential distrust of power, so yes, I'm concerned.

The machine in the video was made by iVotronic, not Diebold. none of these machines are open-source, that's really the important factor This is the least important factor.

iVotronic has had problems like this for a long time. For instance see http://www.brennancenter.org/content/resource/letter_to_secr....

If they made the machine, it is probably incompetence. iVontronic looks like it is owned by Printelect, which is owned by Owen Andrews, who seems to be affiliated with the Democrats.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#255

Post by danielweber »

pavel_lishin wrote: post #206
danielweber wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As others have said, this is exactly how you can start buying votes. Pull any book about cryptographic voting off the shelf and this is treated as a design flaw.

I think I missed the discussions in the thread; how is verifiability (is that a word?) a design flaw?

Because if you can prove to a third-party how you voted, you can sell your vote, or coerce someone else to vote a certain way.

It's one of the biggest challenges in crypto-voting systems. And there are some solutions. But we need to hammer down on the "silly people, why not just print a receipt" idea really hard.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#256

Post by hnriot »

AmVess wrote: post #184
hnriot wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's so funny to see that hardly anyone actually did anything more than just watch the video. The same "oh it must have been miscalibrated" is repeated up and down the comment page. Let's hope whomever gets elected spends money on education so that people start reading again and not just consuming the 5 second Reader's Digest version.

Uh, it's pretty clear that you didn't watch the video and didn't read the article. Don't troll. You are bad at it.

Actually AmVess, that was my point, that most people didn't read the article, they just jumped right to the miscalibration explanation that was already eliminated by the guy making the video.

It's pretty clear that you didn't read (or understand) my comment. Don't comment, you're bad at it. Dumbass!

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#257

Post by danielweber »

evandena wrote: post #253
danielweber wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you count a smudge instead of a complete filling-in of the oval? You have humans go over them, and people hate that. Just because you never see this issue doesn't mean it doesn't exist. It's just that the ambiguous ballots don't matter in the vast majority of elections so no one cares. I'm not saying computers are better than paper. They each have trade-offs.

Bubbles seem stupid to me. It's a lot easier and less subjective on review to fill in an arrow than it is to fill in a bubble. Here's an example ballot of what I'm talking about: http://www.town.oregon.wi.us/uploads/ckfiles/images/nov_06_s...

The arrow-thing is also confusing to people. I guarantee you that election officials have had to make a judgment call about them.

EDIT: Out of 1000 people, how many will get confused by this design? http://www.umsl.edu/~kimballd/polk.pdf

SECOND EDIT: misaligned arrows were also a problem in Florida in the 2000 election

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#258

Post by sebastianavina »

kevinalexbrown wrote: post #140

If there were one aspect of electronic voting I could change it would be the following: allow electronic votes to be reviewed by each individual at a later date, from two independent organizations. Each vote gets sent to two independent electronic counting organizations, and each let you verify your vote after the election, with an (anonymous) confirmation number issued at voting time. If enough people cry foul to ru…

I think all the electronic machines should print a recepit, deposit the receipt on a box, and at the end of the day, count all physical votes. If they don't match the electronic machine, then audit them.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#259

Post by amalag »

tokenadult wrote: post #189

The system here in Minnesota works much better. All ballots are paper ballots that are indelibly marked by voters. My wife and I voted this morning in our busy precinct in Minnesota, where there are some tight statewide contests about constitutional amendments and perhaps the most contested race for our state's House of Representatives of any electoral district in our state. As usual, we voted by marking bubble-shape…

Virginia does this as well. I think it's a great system. No need for costly machines, just optical scanners which can be spot checked by pulling a percentage to verify. Plus you can scale it very easily, just add more people for ID checking and more spaces to sit and fill in the boxes.

Virginia has both right now and a lot of people prefer to wait for the machine. I would love for them to switch completely to the paper marked ballots.

Re: Reddit user captures video of 2012 voting machines altering votes

#260

Post by blindhippo »

ry0ohki wrote: post #176
goostavos wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was not the best civics student.. What is the significance of it being secret ? Being able to verify your vote seems like a pretty simple, good thing ( I would think ).

So say if some party were to gain power and start harassing people that voted for the other party...

If this is the reason, there is a bigger problem in America then simple voter fraud...
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