The Big Gamble on Electronic Voting

[lsanderson]

Digital Domain
The Big Gamble on Electronic Voting
By RANDALL STROSS

HANGING chads made it difficult to read voter intentions in 2000. Hotel minibar keys may do the same for the elections in November.

The mechanics of voting have undergone a major change since the imbroglio that engulfed presidential balloting in 2000. Embarrassed by an election that had to be settled by the Supreme Court, Congress passed the Help America Vote Act of 2002, which provided funds to improve voting equipment.

From 2003 to 2005, some $3 billion flew out of the federal purse for equipment purchases. Nothing said “state of the art” like a paperless voting machine that electronically records and tallies votes with the tap of a touch screen. Election Data Services, a political consulting firm that specializes in redistricting, estimates that about 40 percent of registered voters will use an electronic machine in the coming elections.

One brand of machine leads in market share by a sizable margin: the AccuVote, made by Diebold Election Systems. Two weeks ago, however, Diebold suffered one of the worst kinds of public embarrassment for a company that began in 1859 by making safes and vaults. More

Comments

[bchbum-98.livejournal.com]

I like the machines we use; I don't understand why everyone doesn't use them. We fill in ovals with a black marker, then insert the paper into a reader. The reader determines whether I've invalidated my ballot by voting for too many people or crossing parties in a primary. If so, I get a chance to start over. The machine counts votes electronically, but saves al the ballots in case the machine is compromised.

What is the reason these machines aren't used everywhere? I don't get it.