Open Source Voting Software First Public Review Available

Terry Olaes

Terry Olaes

I Used to be the [H] News Guy
Joined
Nov 27, 2006
Messages
4,646
Want an open and transparent voting system free of proprietary hardware and software? So does the Open Source Digital Voting Foundation (OSDVF) and they just released the first public review of their code. Cool.

The OSDV, co-founded by Gregory Miller and John Sebes, launched its Trust the Vote Project in 2006 and has an eight-year roadmap to produce a comprehensive, publicly owned, open source electronic election system. The system would be available for licensing to manufacturers or election districts, and would include a voter registration component; firmware for casting ballots on voting devices (either touch-screen systems with a paper trail, optical-scan machines or ballot-marking devices); and an election management system for creating ballots, administering elections and counting votes.
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Honestly think nothing will ever beat old fashion honest pieces of paper. Hard actual proof.
 
Something tells me voting software of all things should not be open-source.
 
HOCP4ME said:
Something tells me voting software of all things should not be open-source.
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Isn't there something to be said for thousands of people combing through it that can detect programming mistakes versus just a handful with closed source?
 
I don't understand how there a bugs in voting machines, the code is so simple!


void main(void){

int mrx = 0;
int mry = 0;

if(voteinput() == 1){
mrx ++;
}
if(voteinput() == 2){
mry ++;
}
}


tell me, unless someone really try to fake results.... how can any coder "bug" a voting software!
 
 
but it allows everyone else to also, you count on the higher numbers of good guys finding the bugs first
 
Shockey said:
Honestly think nothing will ever beat old fashion honest pieces of paper. Hard actual proof.
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Indeed. Nothing beats the old fashioned way. Our current president won in one district by around 10,000 votes...the district's population was less than 5,000.
 
This is a rather specious argument. Millions of safe, secure and acurate transactions are done DAILY around the world with proprietary software, via cards, paypal and ATM's, That's not the problem. In fact I've propsed that voting be done via ATMs. The problem is that not everyone has a bank account that would vote. But that's another issue.

The main issue is proper voter identification and vetting. The voting process is a mess because its run state by state, county by county and no overall network like ATMs for instance.

Not slamming open source, just saying the act of a safe and secure voting transaction isn't really the issue as that problem has been solved LONG ago and needing open source software isn't the problem.
 
HOCP4ME said:
Open-source would allow hackers to inspect the code for security holes, wouldn't it? :confused:
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Jakalwarrior said:
but it allows everyone else to also, you count on the higher numbers of good guys finding the bugs first
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That's true...it just seems to me that Apple's "security through obscurity" technique would be more effective here.

I do understand the argument about transparency in the voting process, though.
 
HOCP4ME said:
Open-source would allow hackers to inspect the code for security holes, wouldn't it? :confused:
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BTW, that video was made in 2006 - anyone know if the issues presented have been corrected yet?

It alarms me that voting machines will automatically install updated (or malicious) software from a memory card. There should be no way to alter the software of a voting machine other than physically swapping the ROM chip.
 
heatlesssun said:
Not slamming open source, just saying the act of a safe and secure voting transaction isn't really the issue as that problem has been solved LONG ago and needing open source software isn't the problem.
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IMO this isn't about open vs. closed source, it's about trusting the corporation making the software and the government using it.
 
keenan said:
IMO this isn't about open vs. closed source, it's about trusting the corporation making the software and the government using it.
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I can agree with this. Indeed one reason that the transactions I mentioned work so well is because EVERYONE wants an honest outcome. It does the no one any good if these card, paypal and ATM transactions get screwed up on a massive scale.
 
eeyrjmr said:
Because the present closed-source approach is soo much better

http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6995
http://www.usenix.org/events/evtwote09/tech/full_papers/checkoway.pdf
http://www.salina.com/news/story/vote-machine-4-9-2009
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/226/story/64711.html
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=7001
http://media.kentucky.com/smedia/2009/03/19/17clayindict.source.prod_affiliate.79.pdf
http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6995
http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/voting_systems/sos-humboldt-report-to-eac-03-02-09.pdf


plus some eVoting already uses OSS (they just don't honour the GPL...)
http://www.informationweek.com/news/management/legal/showArticle.jhtml?articleID=212000374
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Exactly our current manufactures of voting machines are sleeping with the politicians & bankers...we are no longer a democracy...We are the United Fascist States of America.

Hacking Democracy
http://video.google.com/videoplay?d...595GEBg&q=Hacking+Democracy&client=firefox-a#
 
Shockey said:
Honestly think nothing will ever beat old fashion honest pieces of paper. Hard actual proof.
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not to hijack this thread but your argument implies logic on the part of the election officials, they are like lawyers, they don't require logic to look at it differently. they will still argue about what any even slightly misaligned hole, mark or other possible "error".
 
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