2012 Voting Machine Altering Votes: Pennsylvania

reply to post by Blackmarketeer


again - i ask - why let the victim know his vote has been changed ???? it could be done invisibly

Originally posted by SkepticOverlord
An interesting video, originating by a Reddit user, is circulating the Internet and even now getting interest from CNN. Apparently the person taking the video attempted to vote for Obama on a voting machine in central Pennsylvania, but could not select the President's name -- Romney was selected instead. As a software engineer, he assumed the calibration of the touch screen was off, only to discern that he in fact could not select Obama no matter how hard he tried.

From his Reddit explanation:

I'm the guy who shot the video, hopefully this doesn't get burried. You guys have questions, I have answers.
My wife and I went to the voting booths this morning before work. There were 4 older ladies running the show and 3 voting booths that are similar to a science fair project in how they fold up. They had an oval VOTE logo on top center and a cartridge slot on the left that the volunteers used to start your ballot.

I initially selected Obama but Romney was highlighted. I assumed it was being picky so I deselected Romney and tried Obama again, this time more carefully, and still got Romney. Being a software developer, I immediately went into troubleshoot mode. I first thought the calibration was off and tried selecting Jill Stein to actually highlight Obama. Nope. Jill Stein was selected just fine. Next I deselected her and started at the top of Romney's name and started tapping very closely together to find the 'active areas'. From the top of Romney's button down to the bottom of the black checkbox beside Obama's name was all active for Romney. From the bottom of that same checkbox to the bottom of the Obama button (basically a small white sliver) is what let me choose Obama. Stein's button was fine. All other buttons worked fine.

I asked the voters on either side of me if they had any problems and they reported they did not. I then called over a volunteer to have a look at it. She him hawed for a bit then calmly said "It's nothing to worry about, everything will be OK." and went back to what she was doing. I then recorded this video.

EDIT: There is a lot of speculation that the footage is edited. I'm not a video guy, but if it's possible to prove whether a video has been altered or not, I will GLADLY provide the raw footage to anyone who is willing to do so. The jumping frames are a result of the #ty camera app on my Android phone, nothing more.

Reddit Thread



Seems appropriate for a shameless plug of how I feel about all this:
The Quadrennial Exploitation Of The Moronic Masses

Probably a faulty touch screen.The buttons are probably not lined up correctly underneath or something.

Problems at polls cropping up in PA, OH, other spots around US, rights groups say

www.startribune.com...

Problems have been plaguing North Texas polling places this election day from Dallas to Fort Worth. Voter complaints are coming into NBC 5 and to local election workers

.

www.nbcdfw.com...

Polling Place Problems Plague Early Part of Election Day November 6th, 2012 REGION (WGGB) — Voters have discovered several issues while voting Tuesday morning. In Springfield, the Greenleaf Community Center and Duggan School both ran out of ballots. Specifically in the case of the Greenleaf Community Center, they ran out of the second page of the ballot, which had question #3 on it. More ballots were brought to each location by members of the Springfield Election Office, with about 1,200 heading to Duggan.

www.wggb.com...

Maybe it really could be the machine. And if so, that Takes away the element of choice.
The rest of the country should vote like Oregon, With mail in ballots. If you vote in the comfort of your own home, its unbiased and more personal.

Technology is not perfect and will have glitches.

Originally posted by otie1
Maybe it really could be the machine. And if so, that Takes away the element of choice.
The rest of the country should vote like Oregon, With mail in ballots. If you vote in the comfort of your own home, its unbiased and more personal.

Technology is not perfect and will have glitches.

Problem with that is, in some homes, there is no privacy.
For instance..my father does mail in ballots..he does his own, then he does my mothers (she has no choice), then anyone else in the house at any given time. My brother lives with them. yep..he had to give him the ballot also for him to vote straight rep.

the secret ballot should be preserved. I do understand the convenience of absentee ballots mind you, and should be done, but polling stations offer relief to those ultimately surpressed at their home...and a good excuse is that you don't trust absentee ballots, think they will be "lost", etc.

reply to post by SaturnFX


Your family should have your father thrown in jail.

It is a felony to do what your father did. Despicable.

More than one comment in the Reddit thread reflects this finding in Pennsylvania also:

echolog
I just voted in PA, and luckily my machine didn't do this, but I have heard some people saying that if they press 'Straight Democratic', it will leave the Presidential field blank.

Some similar stories on The Brad Blog also.

It's a fake. The guy edited his video. You can see his finger heading towards Romney, the video skips and it shows a Romney vote but his finger over Obama. He would not identify where this was (others identified it as a PA poll). He does not say what official he notified of the issue. On top of that, recording devices are illegal in polling places. If the observers are doing their job, he would have been removed and denied his vote.

I just got back from walking the .8 hilly mile to my polling place. It was pretty busy, btw, at 11am....
we had a choice,
Computer or paper.

I chose paper.
I urge everyone who has the option to choose paper as well. The scanning machines might not be accurate either, but the paper ballot is indelibly marked with my vote.

Originally posted by ignorant_ape
reply to post by Blackmarketeer

 

again - i ask - why let the victim know his vote has been changed ???? it could be done invisibly

A question best suited for an Engineer, which I am not, but for starters the choice mechanism and which physical amount of space is attributed to each choice...the portion of the screen representing a romney choice growing to overlapping the Obama choice....That is simple code and would be the most simple hack and implement rather than creating a false graphic of one choice and changing recorded result to another while circumventing security software.

SO how many more lies and more BS do you have to push to get that tool re elected ..You should be proud your all good Americans

"SPECIAL REPORT: Forensic Analysis Finds Venango County, PA, E-Voting System 'Remotely Accessed' on 'Multiple Occasions' by Unknown Computer"

Another eye-opening report - sadly the site reporting it is under an intense DDOS attack.

I just have to say LMAO.

I mean really, This will be the Obama supporters excuse after the election if they lose, Rigged voting machines.

So what happened in 2008? How did McCain lose if the machines where rigged?

Since where in the business to Deny Ignorance, When I go to vote later today, I will Test my machine and see if it lets me select Obama, But Im personally placing my vote for Romney. If my machine fights me on this, then I will submit to the notion that something is afoot, until then, I am a Skeptic.

I'll report back.

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


We've been hearing dozens & dozens of reports about this for years, from BOTH sides. The fraud isn't going to happen in plain sight. It'll happen on the back end, away from easy view.

As several other posters said, this is almost certainly a faulty machine, like it usually is. The real fraud will be in the programming & tabulation of votes where we will not be able to document it without someone on the inside blowing the whistle.

Not saying we should not be keeping an eye on stuff like this, but this is not the smoking gun of voter fraud. Whoever TPTB want in office will be *placed* in office while we run around pointing fingers at symptoms of the disease, not the cause of the disease.

Originally posted by mal1970
As several other posters said, this is almost certainly a faulty machine

Which is fraud of a different type -- government contractor being paid incredibly high prices for horrible hardware/software that in all reality appears to be bad on purpose.

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


I agree. In my opinion it should all be voted on with Paper. There is to many issues that can go wrong with the software and I think the old fashion paper route would have been the best way to cast a vote.

Today, I exercised my rights as an American and did NOT vote. I'm sorry but I really don't support either candidates. Yes, I would rather have Obama over Romney but to me that isn't a reason enough to vote. My vote, like many others, was for Ron Paul. I have a feeling Obama will win this election.

Does anyone know what time they will announce the winner? In EST.


Edit: Off-Topic- Could anyone point me to the right forum where I could share my story/pictures of a flood we had in our little community in Florida? I just don't want to make a thread in the wrong section.

Thanks in advance.

I'm in Ohio. I voted this morning, had no issue with the touch screen, it marked my selection. When the paper ballot printed, it also had the correct candidate selected. No one where I voted seemed to be having any issues while I was there, and this is a small town, so if there was a problem, everyone will hear about it

reply to post by SkepticOverlord


I saw that. I am disgusted.

I didn't watch the video but if that was me, as soon as that happened I would of called a judge over right away. I hope the OP did.

Are we seeing Retaliation from the Chinese?? Obama only recently started to play hardball with them...

he report was issued as the U.S.-China economic relationship remains an issue in the presidential election campaign. President Barack Obama last month barred a Chinese- owned company from building wind farms near a U.S. Navy base in Oregon, the first time in 22 years a president has blocked a transaction as a national security risk. The ruling came amid campaign charges by Republican challenger Mitt Romney that Obama has been too soft on China.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers, a Michigan Republican, and C.A. “Dutch” Ruppersberger of Maryland, the panel’s ranking Democrat, announced the probe of Huawei and ZTE last November, citing concerns about Chinese hacking into U.S. systems and theft of intellectual property.

U.S. counterintelligence officials called China the world’s biggest perpetrator of economic espionage in a report last year, saying cyber espionage is jeopardizing an estimated $398 billion in U.S. research spending.

www.businessweek.com...

Chinese hackers are moving into “increasingly advanced types of operations or operations against specialized targets,” such as sensors and apertures on deployed U.S. military platforms, according to the report.

While the Chinese military’s ability to manage sophisticated computer systems is limited, according to the report, its leaders “recognize this weakness and intend to develop a pool of soldiers” who can manage cyber technology as well as advanced weapons systems.

China employs a “cyber warfare militia,” PLA civilian units “usually comprised of workers with high-tech day jobs” that focus on military communications, electronic warfare and computer network operations, the draft said.

The militia members are among the nation’s 538 million Internet users with access to 677 million devices that can be used to enter the Internet, according to the International Data Corp

www.bloomberg.com...

If they can disrupt our Military system, why not our electoral systems as well... "From the inside" so they say

Remember when Pac-Man was covertly installed on a voting machine in 2010
ebiquity.umbc.edu...

Who knows....The vulnerability is glaring