Angry

Well, it's Democrats that don't want elections to be secure.

This is news to me. I thought that the use of electronic voting with
secret and proprietary software, no paper trail, and no way to verify
after the fact that votes were counted the way voters think they ought
to be counted came from Republicans presently in office.

Jose
--
You can choose whom to befriend, but you cannot choose whom to love.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

In article ,
Jose wrote:

Well, it's Democrats that don't want elections to be secure.

This is news to me. I thought that the use of electronic voting with
secret and proprietary software, no paper trail, and no way to verify
after the fact that votes were counted the way voters think they ought
to be counted came from Republicans presently in office.

You both would be wrong.

The inability of people to understand the problems with electronic
voting is found way too often in Democrats, Republicans, and every
other party.

--
Bob Noel
New NHL? what a joke

The only difference between the lever voting machine and the electronic
voting machine is the technology. In both the voter does something on
the front and the magic machine internals increments a counter.

Both parties have fingerprints all over the evolution from lever
machines to punch cards to electronic machines.

"Jose" wrote in message
news
Well, it's Democrats that don't want elections to be secure.

This is news to me. I thought that the use of electronic voting with
secret and proprietary software, no paper trail, and no way to verify
after the fact that votes were counted the way voters think they ought
to be counted came from Republicans presently in office.

Jose
--
You can choose whom to befriend, but you cannot choose whom to love.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

The only difference between the lever voting machine and the electronic
voting machine is the technology. In both the voter does something on
the front and the magic machine internals increments a counter.

You mean both are voting machines?

The difference in the technology is 100% the issue. A manual lever
voting machine is mechanical, can be examined by anybody with even a
little bit of mechanical aptitude, and watched in progress to ensure
that the machine does what it says it will do. It is a fairly open
device. It would be hard to "rig" it undetectably. Whether these
machines are in fact examined before voting is not a function of the
machine, it is a function of the law.

An electronic voting machine works by software. There is nothing to
"examine" except the code, and if the code is secret and proprietary,
then there is no way to ensure that the machine actually does what it
says it does. No public official, indeed virtually nobody except the
programmer (and sometimes not even the programmer) really knows what
goes on inside the box. If the software were set up to move every
fiftieth vote into a different slot, but only on November 2, and only if
a few other conditions are met, nobody would ever find out. The machine
is inherently impenetrable.

An electronic voting machine whose software OTOH is open, public, and
whose compiling and loading into standard interchangable chips and media
is properly supervised is much more difficult to rig. I would have more
confidence in such a machine.

Now... what kind of voting machine is being foisted on us?

Jose
--
You can choose whom to befriend, but you cannot choose whom to love.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

"Jose" wrote in message
. ..
[...]
An electronic voting machine whose software OTOH is open, public, and
whose compiling and loading into standard interchangable chips and media
is properly supervised is much more difficult to rig. I would have more
confidence in such a machine.

I would not. One of the most widely used open source programs (Firefox)
still regularly is found to have defects in it. Open source software is
still software, and it takes a huge effort to inspect the code and detect
flaws.

I do agree that an open source software voting machine is preferable. But
IMHO, the more important aspects are for the voting machine to provide a
paper record of the vote, and for the voting results to be audited.

Specifically, electronic voting machines ought to spit out a paper ballot
very similar to what is used today. The voter should inspect the ballot to
verify it has recorded their vote accurately. Then, some small percentage
of voting machines should be selected (randomly, of course) for their output
votes to be compared to manually counted paper ballots from those machines.

This would not, of course, guarantee 100% accurate results. But it would
come pretty close. It would be FAR more reliable than what is being
proposed these days by companies like Diebold.

Pete

One of the most widely used open source programs (Firefox)
still regularly is found to have defects in it.

Firefox is consumer grade. If it sort of works, that's good enough. I
would expect a higher level of vetting of voting software. And I did
not say it would be flawless, just that it would be significantly easier
to detect flaws with open source than with secret software, such as
proposed by Diebold.

Specifically, electronic voting machines ought to spit out a paper ballot
very similar to what is used today. The voter should inspect the ballot to
verify it has recorded their vote accurately. Then, some small percentage
of voting machines should be selected (randomly, of course) for their output
votes to be compared to manually counted paper ballots from those machines.

Yes, of course. In addition to the software being not secret.

Jose
--
You can choose whom to befriend, but you cannot choose whom to love.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

"Jose" wrote in message
t...
Firefox is consumer grade. If it sort of works, that's good enough. I
would expect a higher level of vetting of voting software.

Why?

A voting machine with software that's not open source can still be vetted.
It's just that the people with specific authority to inspect it need some
sort of NDA. All that open source does is remove the minimal requirement of
non-disclosure.

People act like if something is open source, there are millions of
programmers out there poring over the code looking for flaws. That's just
not the case, even for desktop applications never mind something like a
voting machine. It would be trivial enough to simply require the code for a
voting machine to be provided to any inspector willing to sign the
appropriate agreements for non-disclosure. There aren't going to be that
many people actually looking at it.

And I did not say it would be flawless, just that it would be
significantly easier to detect flaws with open source than with secret
software, such as proposed by Diebold.

The primary difficulty is not providing the code to the inspectors. It's
the inspectors being able to validate the code. The hard part is actually
looking at the code, not getting access to it.

Open source does make access even easier, but it's by no means required for
the purpose of providing sufficient inspection. I definitely disagree with
the claim of "significantly easier to detect flaws". Open source isn't more
readable, it's not less obfuscated, it's not easier to validate. It's just
publicly available. That's all.

Open source doesn't really help with the technical aspect of inspection.
What it does help with is public trust. That's at least as important, IMHO,
but it's not relevant to the question of actually detecting flaws.

Pete

I would expect a higher level of vetting of voting software.

Why?

Because too much depends on it. If word processing software fails, you
have to retype your Christmas letter. If voting machine software fails,
we end up going to war in Iraq. It's like the difference between myself
and a friend in the navy. When I launch a rocket, it comes back to
earth on a colorful plastic parachute, ready for re-use. When my friend
launches a rocket, it blows up Moscow.

It would be trivial enough to simply require the code for a
voting machine to be provided to any inspector willing to sign the
appropriate agreements for non-disclosure.

There's no point in that - it just keeps the secret if there is one.
Democracy should not be based on secrets. It is important, for freedom
and democracy, that the workings of the machinery that protects our
freedoms be public.

People act like if something is open source, there are millions of
programmers out there poring over the code looking for flaws.

It doesn't take "millions of programmers". It just takes one, and
you'll usually find that one in the opponent's camp.

Open source isn't more readable, it's not less obfuscated,
it's not easier to validate. It's just publicly available.

.... which makes it possible to validate to outsiders. I don't care if
it's validated to insiders; that's the fox and the henhouse.

Shrodinger's cat knows whether it's dead or alive, even if we don't. If
you put us in a box and we open the cat box, we will find out. But
nobody outside =our= box will know. It's the people outside the box
that matter.

Jose
--
You can choose whom to befriend, but you cannot choose whom to love.
for Email, make the obvious change in the address.

Peter Duniho wrote:
Open source does make access even easier, but it's by no means required for
the purpose of providing sufficient inspection. I definitely disagree with
the claim of "significantly easier to detect flaws". Open source isn't more
readable, it's not less obfuscated, it's not easier to validate. It's just
publicly available. That's all.

you haven't been looking at much code, proprietary or open source if
you believe so; when you write code that you know is potentially going
to be scrutinized by the best mind out there -- whether it is going
to be the case or not, but you can be it will, by your next potential
employer -- if said potential employer is not a moron -- next time you
apply for a job and by people who matter in the field, the average
programmer tends to do things differently it seems than what is
done for code which is known to remain proprietary (who's going to look
at it? Pointy Haired Bosses?) and where being readable and unobfuscated
is a known bad carreer move (do you really want your code to be easily
taken over by the nice folks of the newly opened field office in
Bangalore?); I have seen good and bad code in either proprietary
or open sources, you bet, but by far, the worst piece of junk I
ever had to look at were proprietary, no contest.

--Sylvain

now this is of course completely off the topic, isn't it? :-)