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To: Diva Betsy Ross

Simple to solve. An encoded electronic voting card. Vote anywhere but only vote once. Lose the card -- tough until after the election is over. Have none of the genuises we elected in either party been able to figure this out?


26 posted on 10/22/2004 8:18:29 PM PDT by Arizona Carolyn
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To: Arizona Carolyn

Simple to solve?

In less than a day, the cards would be hacked, and in two days conterfeits would be available. In 2 more days, machines would be produced to re-energize the card for another go round...

Worse yet, the card could be made to crash the reader. What then? What if the readers crashed in an entire precinct? How secure is the network that will maintain the database?


27 posted on 10/22/2004 8:29:40 PM PDT by antaresequity
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To: Arizona Carolyn

I am afraid that will never happen even though it should. Too many on the left would scream that it creates a "barrier" to voters by (insert trumped up reason here) and too many on the right would scream about privacy...I am personally not opposed to the idea as I have nothing to hide, yet.... But I feel certain that there HAS to be a way to maintain the secrecy of the ballot AND the integrety of the balloting...I mean we can send people to the moon for crying out loud - surely the technology exists to do something about this that would maintain privacy and restrict fraud....


29 posted on 10/22/2004 8:34:52 PM PDT by Kylie_04
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To: Arizona Carolyn
I can see how, given a sufficient number of bits, these cards could be made to be cryptographically secure. Say, 4,096 random bits of data, each card unique to some unfathomable number. Unhackable.

But they wouldn't be physically secure. Just a couple months ago we had a rash of mailbox robberies in the neighborhood. If the cards were sent through the mail (most likely), a thief could easily steal them for fraud and profit. I can imagine the election office would provide an option to reissue an unused card if theft was suspected, but how many people--pressured in front of Food Mart to register--would bother to seek reissue, if they even realize the card was stolen.

Alternatively, we could have some type of national I.D. Oh, big brother! But we already have one: your tax payer id (or tax prayer LOL!) Just cast your ballot along with your taxes (assuming all other voter conditions are met.)

60 posted on 10/23/2004 2:06:13 AM PDT by John Robinson
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