Whether vote hacking actually occurred last Tuesday or not really isn't the point. The fact that it can be accomplished easily - with no telltale evidence - is indictment enough of electronic "black box" systems in their current state.

So, just how easy is it? According to these examples: Too. Damned. Easy.

Bev Harris, of BlackBoxVoting, explained to Howard Dean on the CNBC TV show "Topic A With Tina Brown" just how easy it was to hack into the main vote tabulating computer and switch the votes. The main tabulator is just a regular PC, like in any home or office. It's hackable. And it's not hard at all. From the Free Press article:

[H]arris had Dean close the Diebold GEMS software, go back to the normal Windows PC desktop, click on the "My Computer" icon, choose "Local Disk C:," open the folder titled GEMS, and open the sub-folder "LocalDB" which, Harris noted, "stands for local database, that's where they keep the votes." Harris then had Dean double-click on a file in that folder titled "Central Tabulator Votes," which caused the PC to open the vote count in a database program like Excel.

In the "Sum of the Candidates" row of numbers, she found that in one precinct Dean had received 800 votes and Lex Luthor had gotten 400.

"Let's just flip those," Harris said, as Dean cut and pasted the numbers from one cell into the other. "And," she added magnanimously, "let's give 100 votes to Tiger."

They closed the database, went back into the official GEMS software "the legitimate way, you're the county supervisor and you're checking on the progress of your election."

As the screen displayed the official voter tabulation, Harris said, "And you can see now that Howard Dean has only 500 votes, Lex Luthor has 900, and Tiger Woods has 100." Dean, the winner, was now the loser.

Harris sat up a bit straighter, smiled, and said, "We just edited an election, and it took us 90 seconds."

Quoting Sheelzebub at Pinko Feminist Hellcat

Here's a similar situation. Would you feel comfortable using a banking system that allowed any ATM service worker to alter your account balance by 'cooking' a spreadsheet stored in the machine? Of course not. At least computerized banking systems provide you with a transaction statement that can tip you off something is amiss; whether you can reclaim the disputed funds is another matter.

One major problem with electronic ballots is that voters have no access to any type of verifiable "statement," since a valid record would require accounting of all votes within the machine up to that point. Even if we addressed privacy issues, and the fact that a running tally of voting results would undoubtedly cause problems with undue influence on future votes on that particular machine, only the very last voter would have an accurate total - and if hacking is easily accomplished, any semblance of accurately reflecting voter's choices is gone. The paper receipts given to electronic voters only verify each individual's voting choices - not the machine tally - and are analogous to ATM statements that verify your transaction deposit amount without telling your what your total account balance is.

What about verification or recounts? Unless every voter at a polling place shows up with their individual ballot receipts to compare against a specific machine's results - a highly unlikely occurrence - the public must take electronic voting results on faith alone.

We shouldn't make the mistake of minimizing this issue as simple partisan bickering, or dismissing it as Democrats' "sour grapes" paranoia. In my opinion, making the U.S. elections process this fluid and impermanent devalues it immensely for any political party.

A transcript (with screenshots) of the Howard Dean/Bev Harris voting machine demonstration is available here - just scroll about three-quarters of the way down this page:

Dean: There are two problems [with electronic voting]. One, there's no paper trail which means you can't verify your vote, and it can't be recounted. The other potentially serious problem: tampering and rigging of elections. We asked Diebold, one of the companies that makes these machines, and Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood to appear on this program. They both turned us down.

But Bev Harris is here. She's a crusader who thinks this is a disaster waiting to happen. Bev, you've made a potentially blockbuster statement. In under 2 minutes, you can hack into an electronic voting system, and change the results of an election with almost no chance of being caught. Bev Harris, how did you discover this?

Bev Harris, Executive Director of 'Black Box Voting': Well, I found the software that they were keeping secret, as a proprietary trade secret, and I found it on the Web quite by accident, and I worked with several different computer scientists who were very helpful in terms of analyzing the weaknesses. One of them had designed accounting software before. And of course, counting votes is just a form of bookkeeping. And right away he could see the weaknesses in it, and he kind of walked me through it like an AOL tech might walk you through something on the phone, he showed me how to rig an election.

Dean: If this is so easy to do, what in the world are we doing relying on this technology all over the country?

[NOTE: The Black Box Voting.COM site states they are no longer affiliated with Bev Harris, whose domain is Black Box Voting.ORG]

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