Here’s yet another reason not to feel safe about electronic voting:
On Wednesday, former Maryland state legislator Cheryl C. Kagan was anonymously given disks containing source code to Diebold’s BallotStation and GEMS (Global Election Management System) tabulation software used in the 2004 elections. Kagan, a well-known critic of electronic voting, is Executive Director of the Carl M. Freeman Foundation, a philanthropic organization based in Olney, Maryland.
The disks were created and distributed by two federal voting machine testing labs run by Ciber Inc. and Wyle Laboratories Inc. They had been testing systems on behalf of the state of Maryland, Diebold said in a statement.
This is not the first time that Diebold source code has been leaked. In early 2003, Diebold critic Bev Harris uncovered similar source code while conducting research using Google Inc.’s search engine.
So, with about 2 weeks left until elections, somebody has gained access to the code that runs the voting machines that millions will vote into this November 7. These machines, with no means of independent validation and verification, have been compromised (for the second time) and we are supposed to trust them?
As Americans, we need to demand more and preserving the sanctity of our vote is as good a place as any to start.
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