http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/metro/0703/25voting.html
GA Backs Computer Voting Plan Despite Critical Study By DUANE D. STANFORD The Atlanta Journal-Constitution A state election official said Thursday he is "very confident" in the security of Georgia's new touch-screen voting system, despite a study that concluded it is highly vulnerable to fraud. "My confidence in this system is the same as it was... before I read the report," said Michael Barnes, assistant elections director in the secretary of state's office. Barnes was in charge of Georgia's statewide rollout in November. The study was released by computer experts Thursday. It found "significant security flaws" with the system designed by Diebold Election Systems and used in several states. The study was the first review of the software by independent researchers. The system was vulnerable to unscrupulous voters as well as "insiders such as poll workers, software developers and even janitors," who could cast multiple votes without a trace, the study said. Avi Rubin of Johns Hopkins University, a lead researcher on the study, said there is no quick fix for the software. "You would have to start over," Rubin said. Georgia's Barnes, however, said that the review ignored election protocol and pre-election testing. It also ignored hardware features and other measures designed to protect the system, he said. "If you look at a Picasso, you might look at one corner and think the whole thing is ugly, but when you look at the whole picture as it's meant to be presented, you realize it's beautiful," he said. Mike Jacobsen, a spokesman for Diebold, based in North Canton, Ohio, declined to comment in detail until company officials had more time to review the study. But he said the company's systems "pass rigorous certification tests at the federal and state governmental levels." Jacobsen also said that the software analyzed in the study was about a year old and that problems with it might have been fixed. Barnes added that the version studied was not the one approved for use in Georgia. Georgia Secretary of State Cathy Cox championed touch-screen voting after learning that the state had had more uncounted votes during the 2000 presidential election than even Florida. Cox persuaded Georgia officials to install the $54 million system statewide for the November 2002 election, in which Gov. Sonny Perdue upset incumbent Roy Barnes. The system is used in several states, including Maryland, California and Kansas. The researchers were critical of an ATM-like card given to each voter to make sure the voter casts only one ballot. A voter easily could bring a specially programmed counterfeit card to the polls and use it to cast multiple votes, they said. The researchers concluded that the system was vulnerable to anyone from a group of poll workers to a foreign government wanting to influence an election. The findings were based on a July study of the computer code used in the voting system. The code was posted anonymously on the Internet earlier this year. -The Associated Press contributed to this article. � 2003 The Atlanta Journal-Constitution _______________________________________________ http://www.mccmedia.com/mailman/listinfo/brin-l
