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So, trying to keep this technical and not political (this is HN after all)... Assuming these machines that were handled are decommissioned, is there a risk to

So, trying to keep this technical and not political (this is HN after all)... Assuming these machines that were handled are decommissioned, is there a risk to future elections that use the same model of machine? I imagine there's significant security through obscurity. Do all models of this machine need to be decommissioned? We're taught that physical access to a machine should deem it compromised. But voters handle machines behind curtains every election. Does 4 hours unfettered access make things worse for the whole model?

airza 4y ago
Based on the ~2 days i spent hacking on them at defcon a few years ago, all of the current models should be taken out back and shot.
bogwog 4y ago
At my voting location in the last presidential election, we were given paper ballots to fill out (at tables with privacy dividers), and then we handed those to a poll worker who immediately fed it into the machine right in front of you (and everyone else). I think that's a good low-tech way to have security, since random people never directly interact with the machine. The only outside input is the paper ballot, and it shouldn't be hard to write scanning software that's perfectly secure from malicious ballots. The only remaining issue then is making sure the machine isn't tampered with before/after the events. You don't even need to trust the poll worker that feeds the ballot into the machine, since they're standing in plain view of everyone at all times, and under surveillance (I assume).
- tarakat 4y ago
  At my (non-US) voting location, we put marked ballots into big plastic boxes. After the polls closed, the ballots were counted by volunteers, and the counting was supervised by other people to make sure it was done correctly. Nobody had to worry about the boxes being tampered with, or about "unauthorized" people gaining access to them before or after the election, because they're just boxes. If your election can be trusted only if only "authorized" people interact with voting equipment, then it can't be trusted at all. Obscurity has no place in elections.
  - spoils19 4y ago
    The US is the largest (and greatest) democracy in the world - doing in-person counts won't work at all.
    - 29083011397778 4y ago
      Is there an actual reason you assume that? You have similar voter turnout to Canada, with a corresponding increase in both votes to count, and people available to count them. Are your districts dramatically bigger? And is the delay in getting an answer worth a large swath of the population not trusting the results?
    - 93po 4y ago
      > and greatest Let's get some basic universal healthcare in place like virtually every other first world country on the planet and then revisit this "greatest" descriptor.

airza 4y ago

Based on the ~2 days i spent hacking on them at defcon a few years ago, all of the current models should be taken out back and shot.

bogwog 4y ago

At my voting location in the last presidential election, we were given paper ballots to fill out (at tables with privacy dividers), and then we handed those to a poll worker who immediately fed it into the machine right in front of you (and everyone else). I think that's a good low-tech way to have security, since random people never directly interact with the machine. The only outside input is the paper ballot, and it shouldn't be hard to write scanning software that's perfectly secure from malicious ballots. The only remaining issue then is making sure the machine isn't tampered with before/after the events. You don't even need to trust the poll worker that feeds the ballot into the machine, since they're standing in plain view of everyone at all times, and under surveillance (I assume).

tarakat 4y ago
At my (non-US) voting location, we put marked ballots into big plastic boxes. After the polls closed, the ballots were counted by volunteers, and the counting was supervised by other people to make sure it was done correctly. Nobody had to worry about the boxes being tampered with, or about "unauthorized" people gaining access to them before or after the election, because they're just boxes. If your election can be trusted only if only "authorized" people interact with voting equipment, then it can't be trusted at all. Obscurity has no place in elections.
- spoils19 4y ago
  The US is the largest (and greatest) democracy in the world - doing in-person counts won't work at all.
  - 29083011397778 4y ago
    Is there an actual reason you assume that? You have similar voter turnout to Canada, with a corresponding increase in both votes to count, and people available to count them. Are your districts dramatically bigger? And is the delay in getting an answer worth a large swath of the population not trusting the results?
  - 93po 4y ago
    > and greatest Let's get some basic universal healthcare in place like virtually every other first world country on the planet and then revisit this "greatest" descriptor.