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Date: Tue, 6 Dec 2005 21:41:23 -0500
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Subject: [Clips] Diebold insider alleges company plagued by technical woes
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http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Diebold_insider__alleges_company_plagued_1206.html
The Raw Story
Originally published on Tuesday December 6, 2005
Last Updated: 12/6/2005
Diebold insider alleges company plagued by technical woes, Diebold defends
'sterling' record
Miriam Raftery
In an exclusive interview with RAW STORY, a whistleblower from electronic
voting heavyweight Diebold Election Systems Inc. raised grave concerns
about the company's electronic voting technology and of electronic voting
in general, bemoaning an electoral system the insider feels has been
compromised by corporate privatization.
The Diebold insider, who took on the appellation Dieb-Throat in an
interview with voting rights advocate Brad Friedman (BradBlog.com), was
once a staunch supporter of electronic voting's potential to produce more
accurate results than punch cards.
But the company insider became disillusioned after witnessing repeated
efforts by Diebold to evade meeting legal requirements or implementing
appropriate security measures, putting corporate interests ahead of the
interests of voters.
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I've absolutely had it with the dishonesty, the insider told RAW STORY.
Blasting Wally O'Dell, the current president of Diebold, the whistleblower
went on to explain behind-the-scenes tactics of the company and its
officers.
There's a lot of pressure in the corporation to make the numbers: `We
don't tell you how to do it, but do it.' [O'Dell is] probably the number
one culprit putting pressure on people, the source said.
Diebold spokesman David Bear rebuts the charges. Diebold has a sterling
reputation in the industry, Bear said. It's a 144-year-old company and is
considered one of the best companies in the industry.
Previous revelations from the whistleblower have included evidence that
Diebold's upper management and top government officials knew of backdoor
software in Diebold's central tabulator before the 2004 election, but
ignored urgent warnings-such as a Homeland Security alert posted on the
Internet.
This is a very dangerous precedent that needs to be stopped-that's the
corporate takeover of elections, the source warned. The majority of
election directors don't understand the gravity of what they're dealing
with. The bottom line is who is going to tamper with an election? A lot of
people could, but they assume that no one will.
Concerns about Georgia, Ohio elections
The insider harbors suspicions that Diebold may be involved in tampering
with elections through its army of employees and independent contractors.
The 2002 gubernatorial election in Georgia raised serious red flags, the
source said.
Shortly before the election, ten days to two weeks, we were told that the
date in the machine was malfunctioning, the source recalled. So we were
told 'Apply this patch in a big rush.' Later, the Diebold insider learned
that the patches were never certified by the state of Georgia, as required
by law.
Also, the clock inside the system was not fixed, said the insider. It's
legendary how strange the outcome was; they ended up having the first
Republican governor in who knows when and also strange outcomes in other
races. I can say that the counties I worked in were heavily Democratic and
elected a Republican.
In Georgia's 2002 Senate race, for example, nearly 60 percent of the
state's electorate by county switched party allegiances between the
primaries and the general election.
The insider's account corroborates a similar story told by Diebold
contractor Rob Behler in an interview with Bev Harris of Black Box Voting.
Harris revealed that a program patch titled rob-georgia.zip was left on
an unsecured server and downloaded over the Internet by Diebold technicians
before loading the unauthorized software onto Georgia voting machines.
They didn't even TEST the fixes before they told us to install them,
Behler stated, adding that machines still malfunctioned after patches were
installed.
California decertified Diebold TSX touch screen machines after state
officials learned that the vendor had broken state election law.
In California, they got in trouble and tried to doubletalk. They used a
patch that was not certified, the Diebold insider said. They've done this
many times. They just got caught in Georgia and California.
The whistleblower is also skeptical of results from the November 2005 Ohio
election, in which 88 percent of voters used touch screens and the outcome
on some propositions changed as much as 40 percent from pre-election exit
polls.
Amazing, the Diebold insider said.
Diebold is headquartered in Ohio. Its
