The security of Georgia’s touchscreen electronic voting machines will be under scrutiny in a federal courtroom Wednesday. A group of voters and election security advocates want a federal district court judge to order the state to not use the machines in this November’s election and replace them with paper ballots. “I will not cast my vote on those machines, as I have no confidence that those machines will accurately record, transmit, and county my vote,” said one of the plaintiffs, Donna Curling, in a court filing. Early voting in the state begins on Oct. 15 and election officials say a switch at this point would mean chaos, and potentially suppress turnout.
Georgia is one of 14 states that use electronic voting machines that do not leave a paper trail that can be audited after an election and is one of five states that exclusively use the machines. Cybersecurity experts along with the Senate Intelligence Committee say the machines can leave elections vulnerable to hacking. In a worst case scenario, hackers could manipulate vote totals without detection.
Voters “should not be forced to accept the electronic equivalent of a broken lockbox to exercise their right to vote,” lawyers for the plaintiffs said in written arguments.
Full Article: Federal Court Asked To Scrap Georgia’s 27,000 Electronic Voting Machines : NPR.