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http://www.blackboxvoting.org/

 

Black Box Voting - Bev Harris - one of the leading groups doing voting

machine investigations. A nonpartisan, nonprofit, cons..

 

Voting without auditing. (Are we insane?)

SEATTLE, WASHINGTON Nov 3 2004 -- Did the voting machines trump exit polls?

There’s a way to find out.

Black Box Voting (.ORG) is conducting the largest Freedom of Information

action in history. At 8:30 p.m. Election Night, Black Box Voting blanketed the

U.S. with the first in a series of public records requests, to obtain internal

computer logs and other documents from 3,000 individual counties and townships.

Networks called the election before anyone bothered to perform even the most

rudimentary audit.

America: We have permission to say No to unaudited voting. It is our right.

Among the first requests sent to counties (with all kinds of voting systems

-- optical scan, touch-screen, and punch card) is a formal records request for

internal audit logs, polling place results slips, modem transmission logs, and

computer trouble slips.

An earlier FOIA is more sensitive, and has not been disclosed here. We will

notify you as soon as we can go public with it.

Such a request filed in King County, Washington on Sept. 15, following the

primary election six weeks ago, uncovered an internal audit log containing a

three-hour deletion on election night; “trouble slips†revealing suspicious

modem activity; and profound problems with security, including accidental

disclosure of critically sensitive remote access information to poll workers,

office

personnel, and even, in a shocking blunder, to Black Box Voting activists.

Black Box Voting is a nonpartisan, nonprofit consumer protection group for

elections. You may view the first volley of public records requests here:

Freedom of Information requests here

Responses from public officials will be posted in the forum, is organized by

state and county, so that any news organization or citizens group has access

to the information. Black Box Voting will assist in analysis, by providing

expertise in evaluating the records. Watch for the records online; Black Box

Voting will be posting the results as they come in. And by the way, these are

not

free. The more donations we get, the more FOIAs we are empowered to do. Time's

a'wasting.

We look forward to seeing you participate in this process. Join us in

evaluating the previously undisclosed inside information about how our voting

system

works.

Play a part in reclaiming transparency. It’s the only way.

# # # # #

Public Records Request - November 2, 2004

Black Box Voting

Elections division

Pursuant to public records law and the spirit of fair, trustworthy,

transparent elections, we request the following documents.

We are requesting these as a nonprofit, noncommercial group acting in the

capacity of a news and consumer interest organization, and ask that if possible,

the fees be waived for this request. If this is not possible, please let us

know which records will be provided and the cost. Please provide records in

electronic form, by e-mail, if possible - crew.

We realize you are very, very busy with the elections canvass. To the extent

possible, we do ask that you expedite this request, since we are conducting

consumer audits and time is of the essence.

We request the following records.

Item 1. All notes, emails, memos, and other communications pertaining to any

and all problems experienced with the voting system, ballots, voter

registration, or any component of your elections process, beginning October 12,

through

November 3, 2004.

Item 2. Copies of the results slips from all polling places for the Nov. 2,

2004 election. If you have more than one copy, we would like the copy that is

signed by your poll workers and/or election judges.

Item 3: The internal audit log for each of your Unity, GEMS, WinEds, Hart

Intercivic or other central tabulating machine. Because different manufacturers

call this program by different names, for purposes of clarification we mean the

programs that tally the composite of votes from all locations.

Item 4: If you are in the special category of having Diebold equipment, or

the VTS or GEMS tabulator, we request the following additional audit logs:

a. The transmission logs for all votes, whether sent by modem or uploaded

directly. You will find these logs in the GEMS menu under “Accuvote OS

Serverâ€

and/or “Accuvote TS Serverâ€

b. The “audit log†referred to in Item 3 for Diebold is found in the GEMS

menu and is called “Audit Logâ€

c. All “Poster logsâ€. These can be found in the GEMS menu under “posterâ€

and also in the GEMS directory under Program Files, GEMS, Data, as a text file.

Simply print this out and provide it.

d. Also in the Data file directory under Program Files, GEMS, Data, please

provide any and all logs titled “CCLog,†“PosterLogâ€, and Pserver Log,

and any

logs found within the “Download,†“Log,†“Poster†or “Resultsâ€

directories.

e. We are also requesting the Election Night Statement of Votes Cast, as of

the time you stopped uploading polling place memory cards for Nov. 2, 2004

election.

Item 5: We are requesting every iteration of every interim results report,

from the time the polls close until 5 p.m. November 3.

Item 6: If you are in the special category of counties who have modems

attached, whether or not they were used and whether or not they were turned on,

we

are requesting the following:

a. internal logs showing transmission times from each voting machine used in

a polling place

b. The Windows Event Viewer log. You will find this in administrative tools,

Event Viewer, and within that, print a copy of each log beginning October 12,

2004 through Nov. 3, 2004.

Item 7: All e-mails, letters, notes, and other correspondence between any

employee of your elections division and any other person, pertaining to your

voting system, any anomalies or problems with any component of the voting

system,

any written communications with vendors for any component of your voting

system, and any records pertaining to upgrades, improvements, performance

enhancement or any other changes to your voting system, between Oct. 12, 2004

and Nov.

3, 2004.

Item 8: So that we may efficiently clarify any questions pertaining to your

specific county, please provide letterhead for the most recent non-confidential

correspondence between your office and your county counsel, or, in lieu of

this, just e-mail us the contact information for your county counsel.

Because time is of the essence, if you cannot provide all items, please

provide them in increments as soon as you have them, and please notify us by

telephone (206-335-7747) or email (Bevharrismail) as soon as you have

any

portion of the above public records request available for review.

Thank you very much, and here’s hoping for a smooth and simple canvass which

works out perfectly for you. We very, very much appreciate your help with

this, and we do realize how stressful this election has been.

If you need a local address, please let me know, and we will provide a local

member for this public records request. In the interest of keeping your life

simple, we thought it best to coordinate all records through one entity so that

you don’t get multiple local requests.

# # # # #

We now have evidence that certainly looks like altering a computerized voting

system during a real election, and it happened just six weeks ago.

MONDAY Nov 1 2004: New information indicates that hackers may be targeting

the central computers counting our votes tomorrow. All county elections

officials who use modems to transfer votes from polling places to the central

vote-counting server should disconnect the modems now.

There is no down side to removing the modems. Simply drive the vote

cartridges from each polling place in to the central vote-counting location by

car,

instead of transmitting by modem. “Turning off†the modems may not be

sufficient. Disconnect the central vote counting server from all modems,

INCLUDING PHONE

LINES, not just Internet.

In a very large county, this will add at most one hour to the vote-counting

time, while offering significant protection from outside intrusion.

It appears that such an attack may already have taken place, in a primary

election 6 weeks ago in King County, Washington -- a large jurisdiction with

over

one million registered voters. Documents, including internal audit logs for

the central vote-counting computer, along with modem “trouble slipsâ€

consistent with hacker activity, show that the system may have been hacked on

Sept. 14,

2004. Three hours is now missing from the vote-counting computer's " audit

log, " an automatically generated record, similar to the black box in an

airplane,

which registers certain kinds of events.

* * * * * * * * lots more at the site

 

 

 

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