Florida Elections Division: Audit Plan for Sarasota County

[eomer]

From the website for the Florida Department of State - Division of Elections:

Audit Plan
Sarasota County Florida
November 13 - TBD, 2006

Note: This audit plan may change in response to the in-process audit findings.
Activities that require access to the deployed equipment will be performed upon completion of the recount process.

Opening meeting
Purpose and scope
Team introduction
Available resources
Audit transparency
Audit overview
Examination of the precinct count equipment
Examination of the central count equipment
Verification of the election management system (ES&S Unity Voting System) software
Examination of the Sarasota County’s elections security procedures and activities
Parallel tests (simulations of election day voting)
Closeout meeting

Precinct Count Examination
Obtain the following:
Precinct list
List of voting devices at each precinct
Equipment tracking logs for election media / equipment
Zero and results tapes for all the voting devices (original and recount)
Number of spoiled ballots that occurred at each precinct, if any
Number of provisional ballots issued at each precinct, if any
Examine precinct voter rolls
Manually count number of voter signatures
Examine precinct zero tapes
Verify counters are zero
Note the time/date stamp & signatures
Examine precinct results tapes
Verify the public count from the protective counts using the zero and results tapes
Note the time/date stamp & signatures on the results tape
Examine precinct results and precinct voting equipment
Select at least 45 DREs used during election day and obtain their ballot image reports
(This selection TBD based on precinct demographics and magnitude of 13th Congressional District undervote)
Manually count the number of votes for the 13th Congressional District race from the ballot image report
Determine the number of undervotes for this race
Compare the observed 13th Congressional District undervote total to the results tape
Manually count the number of votes for additional randomly selected contest/candidates
Manually count the number of ballots cast
Obtain the event logs for the selected DREs and manually count the number of ballots cast
Verify the ballot count from the event logs, the ballot images, and the results tapes match each other
Sum the total ballots cast from the results tapes for each precinct
Compare the precinct ballot totals with the totals from the precinct voter rolls
Compare the precinct ballot totals with the reported totals from the Election Reporting Manager (ERM)
Repeat the above activities for early voting except sample size to be at least 2 DREs
Examine the precinct voting equipment
Download the EEPROM .bin files from each of the selected DREs
Examine the EEPROM files for any evidence of disagreement between the redundant memory chips
Extract the firmware .bin file from one of the selected DREs
(*The following activities to be performed at Division of Elections in Tallahassee, FL)
*Obtain the firmware EEPROM .bin file from the Division of Elections’ 12” DRE
*Hash the .bin file segment that contains the firmware for both voting devices
*Compare the hash results to verify the installed firmware
Perform an independent source code review of the firmware
(The independent review will be performed by TBD)

Central Count Examination by precinct, if time permits
Manually count the number of acceptable absentee ballot signatures
Manually count the number of acceptable absentee ballots
Compare the signature count to the absentee ballot count
Manually count the votes for the 13th Congressional District from at least one precinct.

ES&S Unity Examination
Obtain a directory listing of the Unity server and workstations
Obtain a copy of the registry
Obtain a copy of the operating system logs and the Unity log files
Obtain screen shots of each Unity module’s settings
Examine the ERM precinct results reports and compare with the manual counts
Compare the precinct election day totals, provisional totals, and absentee totals
Perform a SHA-1 hash of the installed static files on the server and workstation
(*The following activities to be performed at DOE/Tallahassee)
*Compare the hash message with the hash message of the installed State certified software
*Examine the registries and system logs

Security Procedures and Work Instructions
Examine the security procedures
Examine the work instructions and relevant objective evidence (e.g., logs, inventory, seals, etc.)
Examine the conduct of elections report
Compare the conduct of elections with the documented procedures/work instructions
Examine the reported issues concerning the precinct devices
Examine the security camera video tapes and access logs

Perform the first of two parallel tests by performing the following:
(Note: This first parallel test will be performed as soon as possible. However, the actual DREs that were deployed on election day will not be available until after the recount process is complete. A second parallel test will be performed utilizing the DREs that were deployed on election day once these devices become available.)
Identify four DREs that were deployed on election day
(This selection TBD based on precinct demographics and magnitude of 13th Congressional District undervote)
Select four DREs that were not deployed on election day
Program PEBs and election media to reflect the election definition/parameters of the deployed DREs
Obtain the event log and ballot image report for each of the deployed DREs
Prepare the test scripts based on the ballot images
Prepare a time-line for casting ballots based on the event log for each deployed DRE
Obtain four video cameras / recorders
Organize four two-person teams with each team assigned to a DRE
(One person to enter votes and one person to verify vote selection and verify the review page)
Determine optimal setup of the video cameras / recorder for each DRE and team
(Video image should clearly display the entire touchscreen surface without obstruction during the voting process)
Clear the PEBs, election media, and DREs
Perform the following at the start of the designated test day:
Start video recording
Set the date to November 7, 2006
Set the DREs for election mode
Open the polls at the indicated time and obtain the zero tapes
Select candidates/positions per the test script
For the undervoted 13th Congressional District race perform the following:
Randomly select one or the other candidate or neither
Compare this selection with the review screen and document
Change the selection to match the test script
Examine the review screens to verify its contents match the script based on the ballot image
Cast ballot at the designated time
Document any discrepancy and/or deviation from the test script
Repeat for each ballot cast on election day
Close the polls at the indicated time and obtain the results tapes
Terminate video recording
Resolve discrepancies (if any)
Summarize finding(s) and observations

Perform the second parallel test once the deployed DREs become available by performing the following:
Select four DREs that were deployed on election day
(This selection TBD based on precinct demographics and magnitude of 13th Congressional District undervote)
Obtain the same PEBs and election media that were used with these DREs
Obtain the event log and ballot image report for each of the deployed DREs
Prepare the test scripts based on the ballot images
Prepare a time-line for casting ballots based on the event log for each DRE
Obtain four video cameras / recorders
Organize four two-person teams with each team assigned to a DRE
(One person to enter votes and one person to verify vote selection and verify the review page)
Determine optimal setup of the video cameras / recorder for each DRE and team
(Video image should clearly display the entire touchscreen surface without obstruction during the voting process)
Clear the PEBs, election media, and DREs
Perform the following at the start of the designated test day:
Start video recording
Set the date to November 7, 2006
Set the DREs for election mode
Open the polls at the indicated time and obtain the zero tapes
Select candidates/positions per the test script
For the undervoted 13th Congressional District race perform the following:
Randomly select one or the other candidate or neither
Compare this selection with the review screen and document
Change the selection to match the test script
Examine the review screens to verify its contents match the script based on the ballot image
Cast ballot at the designated time
Document any discrepancy and/or deviation from the test script
Repeat for each ballot cast on election day
Close the polls at the indicated time and obtain the results tapes
Terminate video recording
Resolve discrepancies (if any)
Summarize finding(s) and observations

Closeout Meeting

Issue the audit report

http://election.dos.state.fl.us/pdf/AuditPlan11-10.pdf

[philb]

1. If full audit is carried out in independent manner, major problems likely will be found based on the

widespread reports of voters and poll workers.
The question is to what extent a non-partisan technically knowledgable audit will be carried out with the intent to really find the underlying problems.
The fact that the audit is being carried out by partisan officials in a situation where there is a good chance of finding partisan colusion in the causes of the manipulations is problematic, under our current system.
It would be better it seems to me to make voting official non-partisan to the degree possible, and in the event of the need for such audits to have a process that is as non-partisan as possible.

A Step in the audit that is very important is determining how many machines contained a ballot design that was clearly biased against one of the parties- Jennings in virtually all cases it appears.
And a process to determine how and why this biased ballot design was selected and approved by the SOE and SOS.
This is a major part of the problems seen, apparently, so should be investigated. But will it in a partisan audit?

Does the following task get at this issue to some degree?
"Obtain screen shots of each Unity module’s settings"

and what will they do if and when they likely find partisan bias on many machines?

[eomer]

2. Yes, my main concern just at a quick glance

is along the same lines.

The plan anticipates testing only 4 of the machines that were used on election day. If everything checks out fine on those 4 machines then do they just wrap it up and write a report saying it was probably voter error? What they should do, if that is the initial finding, is test more machines and keep testing until they find some machines that exhibit the reported behavior.