Diebold comes clean, admits voting machines are faulty

The unreliability of implementation obscures the fundamental design flaws of current voting system 'security'.

There is credible indication that the operating system these voting machines use allows covert access by executive branch agencies. [1] [2] [3] [4]

Doesn't anyone see this as a potential conflict of interest?

Just posting some Headlines from your links for those too lazy to use them:

US secret agents work at Microsoft:
French intelligence

Microsoft Discloses Government Backdoor on Windows Operating Systems

How NSA access was built into Windows

No, no conflict of interest at all


Looks like some people are really desperate to make sure everything stays under control. As if a brainwashed populace wont suffice.

Its too late now, 'Liebolt'. George War Bush was elected into office, and millions are either dead or have had their lives ruined.

Hopefully the higher-ups at liebold will be dragged to court in full Hannibal Lecter gear and sentenced for unfailingly lying to or misleading the American public.

Now that GWB and the NWO has basically failed in their quest for successful world dominance, they at Diebolt are scared and are attempting to absolve themselves of their criminal stupidity.

'Oh, it was just a mistake' No way, I don't buy it at all. They knew what they were doing. Hell no to them being off the hook.

Originally posted by MemoryShock
Is there any real reason to vote, then?

What the hell is the point in voting if it is just an empty action?

I completely agree.. And even if our votes are tallied properly, the voting system in this country is so ridiculous that our votes don't count anyway. The only place my vote can make a difference is, perhaps, in local and state elections. And that's only if the votes are tallied properly (are they?). Presidential elections are still decided by the electoral college. IMO, Votes don't put presidents in office.. Votes get people nominated so they can be put in office by the electoral college. What ever happened to gettysburg address:

that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion
that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain
that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom
and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.

-ChriS

[edit on 24-8-2008 by BlasteR]

now ask yourself who was really suppose to be president.

and better yet...who was suppose to be on the ticket for president this year?

exactly.. all bs..

i say redo so we know who the real candidate's are suppose to be.

reply to post by star in a jar


The controversy that surrounded Bush originally being put into office is a testament to the ability of any machine to turn an election when, if all the votes were actually counted, Bush might have lost the election.. Manipulation of the voting system by the government is what put him into office from the very beginning..

We might not have to worry about hanging chads anymore, but the problems are even more complex and manipulative these days because the manipulation can be done much more covertly than ever before.

But we can't forget that President Bush was put into office without all the "hanging chad" ballots even counted. History might be quite different if they really were..

-ChriS

[edit on 24-8-2008 by BlasteR]

Reply to post by BlasteR

The voting process is only a survey...follow the money.


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

Did anyone else notice the utter irony that their spokesman's name is Chris Riggall, or, Chris "Rigg-all"? It's not really a Freudian slip, per se; I guess maybe you could call it "Freudian hiring"?

As a programmer it is ridiculous that a simply voting program could have problems in this area. I don't buy it at all. There is no way in the world such a bug could happen with the amount of resources they put into those things, and the error checking etc. I could easily write such a program in hours and not only give you an accurate count but I could even give you a run down of how the votes went and what the count was at any specific time etc.

We are talking about incredibly easy programs here. There is nothing at all complicated about them.

I'm sorry, but such bugs don't happen accidentally on this type of a program. They have the machines and they are all basically alike and therefore even less likely to have a legitimate bug.

It is inexcusable and the name change is just to get away from the bad rap they have gotten.

Originally posted by Maxmars
But that was the whole reason for all the long drawn-out fighting about mandating that the code be open source. By forcing the code to be available to public scrutiny, it makes it impossible to conceal it's functionality.

It is unbelievable that something as important as this, software for the election congress (lawmakers) and president, is not open to some type of public review.

Lets hope this revelation will force changes to this unacceptable situation. How could anyone in Congress accept this as the best interest for the people.

Wouldn't it be great if there was one person for every voting station in the nation standing outside with paper ballots, and those were legally allowed instead of the electronic versions?

I agree with the other programmers, vote-counting is one of the simplest programs you could write, and there's really no way that you should be losing only some votes, not "all" or "none"

And let us not forget that Diebold's primary business, prior to Bush and Co. landing in office and immediately putting in place e-voting machines, was ATM MANUFACTURING. In 20-plus years I have never, not once, had an issue with an ATM misstating my transaction. And I'm willing to wager no one else on this thread has either.

Consider how much more sheer computing/networking/software programming goes into ATM functionality than an e-votiing machine, which is the simplest kind of counting and walled-garden networking. All to say they have zero credibility in stating that there is any complexity to this that they cannot handle.

Reply to post by TheWayISeeIt

You are brilliant...funny that a simple program, such as an atm, never fails. There is no excuse for diebold...


Posted Via ATS Mobile: m.abovetopsecret.com

reply to post by MemoryShock


When you look at the ONLY two viable choices we have, the answer is NO.

Let them rig the voting machines, in the end will it really make a difference?

Which is YOUR favorite puppet?

I just scanned through (good thread, BTW!)

Did anyone see an HBO documentary called "Hacking Elections"? (or something close to that.

Ties right in to this OP.....

The meat of the show had about eight people use one of those machines, selected at random....and they all agreed on how they would vote ahead of time.

There is a computer expert who predicted how the software, and the result of the 'votes' could be easily manipulated, yet the paper print-outs would not reveal the deception.....been a while since I've seen it, but it was thought-provoking.

Of course, there is also the story about a Texas company (surprise) that was hired in Florida (year 2000) to 'purge' voters' records of all convicted felons.....but it was riddled with mistakes....even had dates of the 'convictions' of people in the future!!

Shameful power-grab back then.....and look where it got us?

reply to post by TheWayISeeIt

Take a look at the wiki entry
en.wikipedia.org...

Jeff Dean, Senior Vice-President and Senior Programmer at Global Election Systems (GES), the company purchased by Diebold in 2002 which became Diebold Election Systems, was convicted of 23 counts of felony theft for planting back doors in software he created for ATMs using, according to court documents, a "high degree of sophistication" to evade detection over a period of two years[7]. In addition to Dean, GES employed a number of other convicted felons in senior positions, including a fraudulent securities trader and a drug trafficker[8].

The case of characters are convicted felons according to this article. Aren't you glad that people of this ethical quality control the highest office in the USA?

Every time I see a "electronic voting machine" thread cross my view, I always have to pop in with the same notice:

If you have reservations with the machines, request an Absentee Ballot! Everyone in every State has this option, you never have to give a reason why you vote this way & your vote is always on paper.

Of course, this is still no guarantee that Absentee Votes will be counted...


[edit on 24-8-2008 by MidnightDStroyer]

reply to post by MidnightDStroyer


Yes indeed. Some poor schmuck sits in a cubicle, entering your absentee ballots into an electronic voting machine.

Diebold diebold diebold.. tsk tsk tsk.

Diebold: Because your vote counts

Ya really..?

Clicky clicky:

www.democracyfornewmexico.com...

15 minute video: What's Wrong With Diebold.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

... our electoral system is broken for three reasons, in three large respects: The first is our campaign finance system, which is a system of legalized bribery, and which has allowed corporations and the very rich to control the results of our electoral process. Number two is the failure of the American press and that is also a function and result of corporate control, as I showed in my book. Number three is the election system itself, which is broken. We've privatized it and allowed four large corporations to count our votes on machines that don't work.

From source inside a source above [bradsblog: www.bradblog.com... (went down temporarily should go now..).


164. choicepoint + Diebold + CIA + SAIC Connections...

www.democraticunderground.com...


Diebold tries to evade North Carolina election law
www.homelandstupidity.us...

Another link to OPs story from bradsblog.com
www.bradblog.com...


If it looks like S#$% and smells like S%$% it probably is S#$*!
Diebold - just like 9/11... another lie bought to you by your oh so friendly U.S. government.

I can't believe this crap. Their company name was Diebold. Die Bold sounds like something the marines would say going into a battle they might not make out alive. Yet this company is embarrassed of the allegations against them for fraud'n the American public so they change their names. What difference does it make!? You "had an error" in your programming for 10 years? I don't think so. That error was your poor judgment of messing with our country's elections.
The programming code in these machines HAS to be open source. Many people have deemed easy to write and debug a program that could handle all of this. Yet this company has most likely made the code so grotesquely congested with filler code to make it much more difficult to see the faults. This is the only reason they are screaming the code is "proprietary."

They sell the machines... they make money on that... let the code be open source. Ya' dang frauds.