4 ms·
Ok, so here are my assumptions for a good chain of custody... Ballots, whether sealed or unsealed, blank or marked, must have at least two people present (from
by beat 7y ago
Ok, so here are my assumptions for a good chain of custody...
Ballots, whether sealed or unsealed, blank or marked, must have at least two people present (from different parties) for all handling. At the end of the process, it should be possible to account for every ballot, marked or blank, and know who handled it (except for the individual voter), from the moment it was received from the printer to the moment it is eventually destroyed. Counts should match at every level, from the printer to the distribution to the voters to the number of ballots in each locked box. Every box can also be traced to an individual machine.
Assuming this is done, where do you fit fraud in? I see three paths for fraud - adding ballots, removing ballots, and substituting/altering ballots. How do you add or remove ballots without upsetting the counts? How do you substitute/alter ballots without breaking seals? And mind you, the techniques have to be able to a: survive a recount, and b: work at a sufficient scale to meaningfully alter the election results.
The way to break this isn't the weakness of paper security. It's to undermine the chain of custody itself, do have the kinds of sloppy processes endemic to Florida, Ohio, etc.