Some of the nation’s top election technology companies explained to state lawmakers Thursday how they might replace Georgia’s 15-year-old electronic voting machines, which have been phased out in many states around the country. … Georgia is one of five states where voting machines currently have no paper trail, and cybersecurity experts agree that exposes the system to potential doubt, hacks and glitches. “The bottom line is you want to have that fail-safe, so that the system can be checked with an audit and, if necessary, be recounted with a physical record, and that’s provided with a paper ballot,” said Susan Greenhalgh with Verified Voting, a nonprofit, nonpartisan organization that advocates for accuracy, transparency and verifiability of elections. She presented to the committee Thursday.
The Georgia Secretary of State’s office recently initiated a trial run of an Election Systems and Software voting machine system in a small municipal election in Conyers. It replaced the state’s current electronic voting machines with monitors that print out a ballot for voters to review and then drop in a secure box.
But using a pencil to fill in bubbles on a regular piece of paper makes for the most secure, efficient and affordable voting system, Greenhalgh said. In that setup, an optical scanner reads and counts the ballots.
“Optical scan, by far, is the most popular voting system in the country,” Greenhalgh said.
Full Article: Election Tech Companies Show Potential Replacements For Ga. Voting Machines | 90.1 FM WABE.