[Gordongekko909]

Felten said he and his colleagues felt it necessary to publish the paper as quickly as possible because of the possible implications for the November midterm elections.

This is both factually accurate and intentionally misleading.

[antiRepublicrat]

claims that electronic voting machines used across much of the country are vulnerable to hacking

Claims? It's pretty much proven.

[antiRepublicrat]

Radke also question why Felten hadn't submitted his paper for peer review, as is commonly done before publishing scientific research.

Felten does have a problem in that he's been threatened with lawsuits from companies over the presentation of previous research that he's done.

[weegee]

The machine Felten tested, obtained in May from an undisclosed source,

Potential Democrat source FOR such machines to tamper with?

[kingu]

Does this mean we can go back to punch cards?

And can elections boards across the nation sue the DNC for a refund?

Seriously, electronic voting, paper receipt, put into a locked box after being verified by the voter. Not a very hard concept - a basic voting system.

[weegee]

Felten and graduate students Ariel Feldman and Alex Halderman found that malicious programs could be placed on the Diebold by accessing the memory card slot and power button, both behind a locked door on the side of the machine. One member of the group was able to pick the lock in 10 seconds, and software could be installed in less than a minute, according to the report.

BUT could it be done while unobserved and could it be done without trigger any internal reset codes?

I know that some PCs have a "tamper" setting to note when the last time the lid was removed.

[ozoneliar]

If somebody could simply upload a program with a memory card that will reprogram the machine, we are in a lot of trouble.

[Paperdoll]

It really doesn't take a rocket scientist. I've been saying the computer count can be programmed for 25+ years. Now they've got us voting by mail in Washington State, and many ballots will not be counted at all because so many people don't read the new special instructions before marking them!

[ozoneliar]

Link to paper's site:
http://itpolicy.princeton.edu/voting/

[coconutt2000]

Electronic voting machines should just be electronic card punchers.

Input your vote, the machine punches your card, you verify it, and feed it into a machine built by a second manufacturer, which electronically counts and securely stores the card in tamperproof cases.

[BadAndy]

Put the operating system into rom that requires 256 based encryption to reprogram. Eack box gets it's own individual code and the rom chips are embedded such that thay are inacessable without dismantaling the machine.

[Ticonderoga34]

Libs are setting up the "election fraud by Diebold" talking point in case they don't take control of Congress in November.

Now if the Rats win in November, you won't hear a thing about "election fraud by Diebold".

[hosepipe]

Forget the voteing machines.. a large portion of more than 30 million legal and illegal aliens voting will change the voting demographics in America for ever... Well.... at least for a long time..

Clue: Aliens are much much more crafty than dead people voting.. Like dead people... aliens will never vote republican... Wonder if some college professor has studied this strange FACT.. A needed study.. Seems the RNC could care less about all this.. Another strange FACT..

[RobRoy]

"Radke also question why Felten hadn't submitted his paper for peer review, as is commonly done before publishing scientific research. "

Hmmm. Must be one of those pesky creationists as well...

[pabianice]

Liberals. Can't win elections so they try to ban elections. Typical.

[M. Dodge Thomas]

The list of things I don't think should be done by private enterprise is is pretty short.

Writing proprietary software to count my vote is one of them - I want this done ONLY by open-source software that can examined for potential security problems by anyone who wishes to do so.

[CharlesWayneCT]

Is anybody scared that all over the country, we have electronic voting machines.

And all over the country, those machines are being given to left-wing professors and organizations?

And all over the country, those organizations and college leftists are learning how to hack the systems and change the vote totals, all in the name of "securing our votes?"

Does anybody else smell a rat here? Does it seem the leftists are preparing an all-out assault on voting machines to fraudulently steal elections?

[osideplanner]

I'm confused about this. A few years ago I worked the polls in Riverside Co. CA. The machines were not networked to any ourside lines or each other. Each machine had a disc and the discs were collected and entered into the central machine at the registrar's office. The collection of the discs into a locked box was witnessed by all the poll workers. Each lockbox was turned in by a certain time after the poll closed. Two people took the lockboxes from each polling place to the registrar's office. I don't know how they can be hacked.

Someone please explain the problem to me.

[WhiteGuy]

IF it is "possible" to hack a voting machine......

it will be hacked, every single time that it matters.

[sgtbono2002]

Personally I think this whole story is BS.

I worked as an election judge this year and there isnt a keyboard or anything like one on these computers. They are programmed before they come to the voting station. They are not hooked together by any wires other than the plug which supplies electricity to the machine.How can you spread a virus when the machines are all separated and not connected? No one could change these machines at the voting precinct without being noticed, the guts of the machine are locked with a key given to the chief Judge.
At the end of the day a paper is scrolled with the figures on it and they are sent to the electoral office.

I am no computer expert , but I feel the only way one of these machines could be tampered with is at the electoral office before their introduction to the precinct.