For this election, the Orange County electronic voting machines have been upgraded to print and store paper copies of the votes after making the voters check their accuracy. Gave me a warm fuzzy feeling about the security of my vote; not so much that I expect the receipts ever to be used, but it seems that this sort of measure should prevent anyone from attempting the more blatant kinds of ballot theft. Of course, no foul measures need be taken in my area for the vote to come out the way the Republican machine would want.

I do wonder about the secrecy of my vote against sound recording attacks. The machines give an audible click on each spin of the selection wheel and it would be easy to deduce the vote sequence from that. It's not a kind of attack I'm particularly worried about, though. There are easier ways of finding out how I voted...




Comments:

chouyu_31:
2006-06-07T05:05:31Z

The more likely attack would be to suppress the sound of voting so that (independent 3rd party verification) listeners would have their number of verification methods reduced. Assuming that someone would want to develop a sound-based verification method, and that someone would have both the access and the ability to replace any paper or electronic ballots.

1minusqsquared:
2006-06-07T16:14:03Z

You were voting in the Busby/other people race then?

11011110:
2006-06-07T16:45:56Z

No, Busby's district is just north of San Diego. I live in Irvine, about an hour north of there.

1minusqsquared:
2006-06-07T20:47:12Z

Then why are you votin' in June, outta curiosity? Special election or somethin?

11011110:
2006-06-07T21:10:32Z

It's the primary election, in which each party selects their candidates for the main election in the fall. Also there were two statewide ballot measures, one to raise money to build new libraries and another to tax high-earning people to pay for preschools; both lost.