It's the "Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2005." Sure, that's what they all say!
If you want to send your own letter, please do so. His staffer's address is: michelle.mulder@mail.house.gov
Remember Holt is on our side. I wouldn't be any more belligerent than this, but please read the bill, and tell them what you think!
Just enter "HR550" in the first search field at:
<
http://thomas.loc.gov/home/c109query.html>And post your comments here!
Dear Ms. Mulder,
I, and a number of other Internet activists, have been raising questions
about the manual random auditing and security requirements in H.R. 550
and other verified voting bills.
First of all, from where did the 2% manual random audit number originate
and why should we have confidence that this is sufficient to detect
counting fraud?
The 2% audit required by H.R. 550 could still result in up to 98% of all
precincts being un-audited in any independent way, even if discrepancies
are found in the initial 2% hand count. There is no requirement in H.R.
550 for any additional auditing in the event a discrepancy is found
in the initial 2% sample. Sec. 5, Paragraph (d) "Additional Audits If
Cause Shown", leaves this entirely up to the EAC. Would it not be better
to legislate some mandatory minimum requirements for additional audits
in the event of any (i.e., 1 vote or more) discrepancy in the initial 2%
sample?
Furthermore, what assurance is there that the initial 2% sample can
actually detect counting fraud in the first place?
Such fraud can take either of two forms at the precinct level:
a) as little as one vote shifted on many machines or
b) a larger number of votes shifted on fewer machines.
While a random 2% audit might be somewhat of a deterrent to tampering,
given the stakes, the lack of a requirement for follow-up in the law and
the possibility of tampering that could elude the auditors are still
grave concerns.
Also, I can find no provisions in H.R. 550 to detect fraud perpetrated
on central vote tabulators. Precinct totals may be 100% correct, but how
will we know that the precincts are tallied correctly at the county and
state levels? I would suggest mandating public posting of all precinct
totals so that candidates and citizen volunteers can add them up and
compare them to official tabulated counts to ensure that no fraud or
mistakes are made beyond the precinct level. Believe me when I tell you
that in light of recent events, there will be enough of us interested in
doing this as a public service (using basic Internet technology such as
web sites to tally and publish the results) that given the data from the
precincts, it will happen.
The bill says that "No component of any voting device upon which votes
are cast shall be connected to the Internet." But no votes are actually
cast on the central tabulators -- they are only counted therein.
Presumably the tabulators can therefore be exposed to Internet hacking
under this law. Not a good idea. This is a glaring deficiency in the
bill as currently written and I'm sure it is merely an oversight, given
the bill's intention to separate vote-casting and vote-counting
functions. Please fix this.
All security and auditing provisions affecting voting machines in this
bill need to be applied to tabulators as well.
H.R. 550 prohibits connection of voting machines (but not tabulators) to
the Internet, but what about the public switched telephone network
(PSTN)? Phone lines are generally considered to be secure, but we have
seen evidence of tampering and jamming of phone lines in several states
in connection with elections. In the state of Hawaii, the Carlyle Group,
with well-known ties to the Bush family, will actually purchase the
local telephone company from Verizon. Such a purchase would make
confidential phone records, including the phone numbers used to connect
voting machines and central tabulators, readily available to those with
political agendas who happen to have ownership interests in
telecommunications providers such as in Hawaii. I leave it to you to
determine how to regulate or control this legislatively without
restraining free trade and property rights, but it would seem that
connecting voting machines and tabulators via privately owned telephone
networks is neither a secure nor an impartial way to facilitate vote
counting.
With respect to source code, public disclosure is fine, but in addition,
there should be digital signatures applied to all application software
on every machine with a requirement for election officials from both
parties to verify its authenticity immediately before, during and
immediately after each election, including early voting days, which are
yet another security risk in many states and have now been proposed at
the federal level. This type of real-time software authentication is
used for such mundane purposes as secure credit card transactions via
the Internet all the time, so why should it not be applied to something
as important as our national vote-counting software? Trust but verify!
Digital signatures can be used to verify both the code itself, and the
identity of its author (usually a company) beyond doubt, and detect any
changes to the code that may have occurred. Without this relatively
simple safeguard, the integrity of the vote tallying software is only as
good as the intentions and abilities of those charged with safeguarding
it. More protection is needed.
I hope you can answer these points and that Congressman Holt and the
other co-sponsors will consider strengthening this bill to reflect the
true nature of the threat to our democracy posed by secret privatized
electronic vote counting. If the experts you've been consulting on this
haven't raised or resolved these issues, may I respectfully suggest that
you seek advice from some additional experts.
The concealed nature of the counting processes in effect in the last
election have already become the subject of numerous legal actions, and
more are on the way. With increasing public awareness of computers and
computer related fraud, the electorate will have no confidence in and
will not tolerate an electoral process without adequate safeguards and
transparency.
Thank you for taking the lead on this issue and thank you for your time
and attention. I look forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely,