A bipartisan group of former state election specialists, intelligence officials and voting experts have urged local state officials to ditch paperless voting machines as part of a $380m security overhaul. The funds were released by Congress to help states upgrade their election systems in the wake of Russian cyber-attacks ahead of the 2016 presidential election. The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) claimed last year that a total of 21 state systems were targeted by Kremlin hackers ahead of the election. Although actual compromises were confined to a small number of states, there are fears that the hackers will use the intelligence they gained to potentially cause greater disruption next time around.
Now a group of experts has signed an open letter to state election officers urging them to follow best practices in replacing paperless voting machines with systems that count a paper ballot. This would crucially preserve a record of the vote itself in case any suspicions are raised.
… The group comprises big hitters such as former DHS secretary, Michael Chertoff; former NSA and CIA boss Michael Hayden; former US ambassador to NATO, Douglas Lute; cryptography expert Bruce Schneier; former deputy US CTO, Nicole Wong; and many more.
Full Article: Experts: Switch Off Wi-Fi and Ditch Paperless Voting Machines – Infosecurity Magazine.