Many of you have heard of
Avi Rubin, the highly respected Johns Hopkins computer scientist who is a leader in the fight to educate government officials and the public about the vulnerability of election computer systems. Rubin has a blog post up at
the Huffington Post about the conflict of interests that make a joke of the
"Independent Testing Authorities" which certify the security and reliability of election systems.
Excerpts below the flip.
When pressed [at a California summit on testing of voting systems] about whether or not the ITAs would fail a system if a serious flaw was found, the reply was that a memo would be written, but that the system would still pass. I couldn't believe it. The company that was tasked with certifying machines for elections in the United States would still pass them, even if a serious flaw was found, as long as the machine did not violate any aspects of the standard. Unbelievable.
[snip]
The ITAs are hired by and paid by -- the vendors. That is, when a vendor has a voting machine that they want certified, they find an ITA who is willing to certify the voting machine. Any memos about flaws that are discovered remain confidential. There is no requirement to disclose any problems that are found with the machines. In fact, the entire ITA report is considered proprietary information of the voting machine vendor. After all, they paid for it. This provides an incentive for ITAs to certify machines, to satisfy their clients.
What to do with this information: every time you hear a local or state government official make reassuring comments to your local media about the ITA certification assuring the security and reliability of the voting equipment in your state, you call bullshit and contact local media. See examples of such unfounded reassurances here, here, and here.
Please don't wait for bromide-spiked media reports either. Get in touch with your county election officials, your state senators and representatives, and your state's executive election officials. Put them on the spot and ask them if they knew that the certifiers are in no way independent. Demand a real certification process for your state.
Google for election reform groups in your state, and try to get them involved as well. The only thing the vendors have going for them is public ignorance.