Risks of DC Internet Voting Pilot

Risks of DC Internet Voting Pilot for military voters. Letter to Holder: ban DREs

Posted: 01 Jul 2010 10:02 PM PDT

DC's Internet Voting Pilot for overseas and military voters: "In essence, every attack people have proposed on DREs is suddenly an attack on this system as well. Some of these attacks may be detectable but in general one can't recover from them. And the available evidence suggests that users are pretty oblivious to even fairly blatant attacks..."~ Eric Rescorla, a recognized expert in Internet Security and Distributed Systems...Protect Our Elections attorney, Kevin Zeese, sent a letter to AG Holder To Ban DRE Voting Machines...

All this and more in today's voting news below...

AL: Legislator to appeal Democrats' decision to deny runoff in District 69 *
http://www.montgomeryadvertiser.com/article/20100702/NEWS02/7020323/1009
Thomas and his attorney ex pressed concerns about the number of absentee ballots and about one precinct in which voters were supposed to receive different ballots depending on their district, according to Sabel, but 302 people in one precinct did not receive the ballot that should have included District 69.

CA: Judge delays RivCo election results
http://www.pe.com/politics/miller/stories/PE_News_Local_D_webvote.495b4cc.html
"If voters are going to have faith in the system, their votes must be counted," said James Harrison, a San Leandro-based attorney representing the voters and county Democratic Party.

CA: Grand jury: Vote-by-mail would save San Joaquin County big bucks
http://www.news10.net/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=84722&catid=2

CA: Bill seeks to redefine vote-by-mail deadline
http://www.inlandnewstoday.com/story.php?s=14919
RIVERSIDE – Assemblyman Bruce Nestande wants to correct the ‘wrong’ over the 12,500 vote-by-mail ballots that were not counted in the June 8th election.

Nestande has submitted a bill that would require future ballots postmarked on Election Day to be tabulated before the final election results are certified.

CO: Voters will get primary election ballots in the mail
http://www.northfortynews.com/News/20100720_PrimaryElection_ballots.htm
Political parties across Colorado on Aug. 10 will pick their candidates for the fall general election. Voters must be affiliated with a party to vote in the primary election.
Voting will be by mail-in ballot in Larimer County

CT: Bysiewicz registers new citizens to vote
http://www.norwalkplus.com/nwk/information/nwsnwk/publish/News_1/Bysiewicz-registers-new-citizens-to-vote_np_9014.shtml Secretary of the State Susan Bysiewicz today marked America’s Independence Day by helping preside over a naturalization ceremony for 23 new United States citizens at Middletown’s City Hall

IL: Special Senate Election a Possibility
http://blog.champaigncountyclerk.com/2010/07/01/special-senate-election-a-possibility/
If Judge Grady, at the U.S. District Court, tries to take the authority for this process away from the legislature, the legislature should wrest it back and save taxpayers the money of the special election and not imperil the November election, especially the votes of those overseas.

MD: Justice Department probes election*
Crisfield voting procedures also under examination by ACLU, city attorney
http://www.delmarvanow.com/article/20100702/NEWS01/7020303/1002/Justice-Department-probes-election CRISFIELD -- The U.S. Justice Department is expected to begin its own investigation into the recent Crisfield election following allegations that improper and illegal voting procedures may have been used.
...
Jeon said city elections officials turned away a number of potential voters without giving them provisional ballots.

ME: City voters to decide: elected mayor and ranked-choice voting
http://www.pressherald.com/news/city-voters-to-decide-elected-mayor-and-ranked-choice-voting_2010-07-02.html The Charter Commission decides to send both proposals to Portland residents on the November ballot.

MI: Sec. of State candidate Ruth Johnson stirs fears of non-citizen voting
Elections officials say problem is non-existent
http://michiganmessenger.com/39119/sec-of-state-candidate-ruth-johnson-stirs-fears-of-non-citizen-voting
“Non-citizens do not want to commit a crime,” BenDor said. “They want to live honestly so they can qualify for citizenship, or return home freely after their tour of study.” Indeed, studies have shown that immigrants are less likely to commit crimes than the native population for that very reason.

NY: Recount Results: Environment Party Wins* (write ins examined for voter intent)
Results Now Official With the Village of Manorhaven
http://www.antonnews.com/portwashingtonnews/news/8887-recount-results-environment-party-wins.html Additional votes were calculated due to “voter intent.” For example, votes for just “Giunta” without a first name were not accepted by the village, while the Nassau County Board of Elections said that since Giovanna Giunta had been campaigning for several weeks, it was clear that the voter intended to vote for Giovanna Giunta; not another person in the community whose last name is Giunta.
...
The Revival Party said that there is still a discrepancy between the total number of votes that were counted and the public counter of the voting machines. They said that the mechanics of the machines’ slots were repeatedly jammed, making it impossible for voters to open the slot and do a write-in vote.

NV voter registration climbs since primary
http://www.ktvn.com/Global/story.asp?S=12747860
Secretary of State Ross Miller says the number of active registered voters in Nevada jumped by nearly 13,000 from mid-May to the end of June.

NV: Candidate wins NV primary with queen of clubs
http://www.bellinghamheraldcom/2010/07/01/1507965/candidate-wins-nv-primary-with.html CARSON CITY, Nev. -- The 10 of clubs wasn't quite good enough.
That's what Carl Moore Sr. drew Thursday in the tiebreaker between two rural Nevada county commission candidates who sought the Republican nomination in the June 8 primary.

Internet Voting Watch

DC's Internet Voting Pilot
http://www.educatedguesswork.org/2010/07/dcs_internet_voting_pilot.html
...Because voters are voting on their own computers, there is of course a risk from compromise of those machines. The average user's computer isn't very well maintained and though estimates for the fraction of machines which are malware infected vary, it's clear that the numbers are large. It wouldn't be particularly hard to develop a piece of malware whose payload changed people's votes. There are several potential attack vectors here:

National

Letter To AG Holder To Ban DREs Voting Machines
http://protectourelections.org/node/15
Today, our Protect Our Elections attorney, Kevin Zeese, sent a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder urging him, under the Voting Rights Act and the Constitution, to ban electronic DRE voting machines used in states across the country.

How VIP States Can Use FourSquare Cartography for Voter Education
http://www.votinginfoproject.org/blog/index.cfm/2010/7/1/How-VIP-States-Can-Use-FourSquare-Cartography-for-Voter-Education

Voting News by Joyce McCloy.Archives here at http://votingnews.blogspot.com/
Also on Facebook http://www.facebook.com/VotingNews and at Twitter http://twitter.com/VotingNews
Subscribe to Voting News at this link: http://tinyurl.com/votingnews To assist with Daily Voting News, please send links to news articles to us at votingnews@earthlink.net

"The Voting News is a free service made possible in part by support from Verified Voting Foundation. You can help support the Voting News by sending a check to Verified Voting Foundation, PO Box 4104, Carlsbad, CA 92018. Be sure to note "for Voting News" in the memo line of your check! Your contribution is tax deductible to the extent permitted by law."Donate online at this link: http://tinyurl.com/donate-vn

Disclaimer: Articles and commentary included in "Voting News" do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the editors of Voting News,or its allied organizations. Articles are selected for inclusion to inform subscribers'ability to draw their own conclusions based on noteworthy and credible news,research, legislation, and debate bearing on the integrity of elections.

© Scoop Media