EFF: North Carolina "Illegally" Certifies Diebold E-voting System and 2 others

[Neal <neal@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

A new North Carolina law requires escrow of the source code for all
voting systems to be certified in the state and identification of
programmers.

Last Monday a judge ruled that Diebold must follow the new North
Carolina disclosure law, or face liability, if it wanted to continue
in its certification bid,

But the Board of Elections just certified Diebold's bid.

Here is the relevant part of the latest EFF newsletter.

-Neal

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Subject: EFFector 18.42: North Carolina Illegally Certifies Diebold E-voting System

A Publication of the Electronic Frontier Foundation

* North Carolina Illegally Certifies Diebold E-voting System

Board of Elections Ignores Rules to Escrow Code, Identify
Programmers

Raleigh, North Carolina - The North Carolina Board of
Elections certified Diebold Election Systems to sell 
electronic voting equipment in the state Thursday, despite
Diebold's repeated admission that it could not comply with 
North Carolina's tough election law. The Electronic
Frontier Foundation (EFF) believes that this raises important 
questions about the Board of Elections'procedures as well as 
the integrity of Diebold's bid for certification.

In all, three companies were certified for e-voting in
North Carolina: Diebold, Sequoia Voting Systems, and Election 
Systems & Software. However, Keith Long, an advisor to the 
Board of Elections who was formerly employed by both Diebold 
and Sequoia, has said that "none of them" could meet the 
statutory requirement to place their system code in escrow.  
Instead of rejecting all applications and issuing a new call 
for bids as required by law, the Board chose to approve all 
of the applicants.

"The Board of Elections has simply flouted the law," said
EFF Staff Attorney Matt Zimmerman. "In August, the state 
passed tough new rules designed to ensure transparency in the 
election process, and the Board simply decided to take it 
upon itself to overrule the legislature. The Board's job is 
to protect voters, not corporations who want to obtain multi-
million dollar contracts with the state."

Last month, Diebold obtained a broad temporary restraining 
order that allowed it to evade key transparency requirements 
without criminal or civil liability. The law requires escrow 
of the source code for all voting systems to be certified in 
the state and identification of programmers. Diebold claimed 
that it could not comply because of its reliance on third-
party software.

Monday, responding to EFF's arguments, a judge dismissed 
Diebold's request for broad exemptions to the law and told
Diebold that if it wanted to continue in its certification 
bid, it must follow the law or face liability. Diebold had 
told the court that it would likely withdraw from the bidding 
process if it was not granted liability protection. But 
instead, Diebold went forward with the certification bid.

Diebold's certification now means it is permitted to sell e-
voting equipment in North Carolina. But Zimmerman says that 
any county that buys from Diebold is taking a risk.

"If Diebold's certification is revoked, counties using its 
equipment could be left holding a very expensive bag," 
Zimmerman said.

Despite Long's assertion, at least one Diebold competitor--
Nebraska-based Election Systems & Software--has publicly 
stated that it is capable of meeting the escrow requirement 
for the code used it its system.

For more on the judge's decision Monday:
<http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2005_11.php#004203>

For this release:
<http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2005_12.php#004227>

---------------

Elsewhere...  In the 358th Issue of EFFector:

 * North Carolina Illegally Certifies Diebold E-voting System
 * DMCA Triennial Rulemaking: Failing Consumers Completely
 * Smart Card Research Threatened in DirecTV Case
 * Location Privacy: 3, Warrantless Cell Phone Tracking: 0
 * Blogging WIPO: The New Internet Treaty
 * Help Us Bust the Test.com Patent
 * Blog of the Month - Ed Foster's GripeLog
 * miniLinks (8): Sony BMG's Costly Silence
 * Staff Calendar - Kevin Bankston at LISA in San Diego
 * Administrivia

[ See the rest at http://www.eff.org/effector/ ]

...

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