Philippines: Comelec eyes new voting machines for 2016 polls | The Philippine Star

Following the Supreme Court ruling voiding its contract to repair the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) is now looking for alternative machines to be used in the May 2016 elections. Comelec spokesman James Jimenez said the poll body will ready an alternative plan and not wait for the ruling on the motion for reconsideration to be filed by Smartmatic-Total Information Management (TIM) Corp. “The possibility of the motion for reconsideration being granted in the future cannot be a basis for the Comelec not to take any action at this time. We need to start our preparations already,” Jimenez said.

Virginia: Board of Elections votes to decertify AVS WINVote | The Washington Post

The Virginia Board of Elections on Tuesday voted to scrap a type of voting machine used by dozens of local governments, including Fairfax City and Arlington County, after identifying security concerns. The move leaves 30 counties and cities scrambling to replace hundreds of voting machines. Ten of those local governments have primary elections scheduled for June 9. During a public meeting, the Board of Elections voted 2 to 0, with one member absent, to decertify WINVote touchscreen voting machines. Edgardo Cortés, commissioner of the state Department of Elections, said continuing to use the aging machines “creates an unacceptable risk to the integrity of the election process in the commonwealth.”

Editorials: Decertifying the worst voting machine in the US | Jeremy Epstein/Freedom to Tinker

On Apr 14 2015, the Virginia State Board of Elections immediately decertified use of the AVS WinVote touchscreen Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machine. This seems pretty minor, but it received a tremendous amount of pushback from some local election officials. In this post, I’ll explain how we got to that point, and what the problems were. As one of my colleagues taught me, BLUF – Bottom Line Up Front. If an election was held using the AVS WinVote, and it wasn’t hacked, it was only because no one tried. The vulnerabilities were so severe, and so trivial to exploit, that anyone with even a modicum of training could have succeeded. They didn’t need to be in the polling place – within a few hundred feet (e.g., in the parking lot) is easy, and within a half mile with a rudimentary antenna built using a Pringles can. Further, there are no logs or other records that would indicate if such a thing ever happened, so if an election was hacked any time in the past, we will never know.

Verified Voting in the News: Voting machine password hacks as easy as ‘abcde’, details Virginia state report | Guardian

Touchscreen voting machines used in numerous elections between 2002 and 2014 used “abcde” and “admin” as passwords and could easily have been hacked from the parking lot outside the polling place, according to a state report. The AVS WinVote machines, used in three presidential elections in Virginia, “would get an F-minus” in security, according to a computer scientist at tech research group SRI International who had pushed for a formal inquiry by the state of Virginia for close to a decade. In a damning study published Tuesday, the Virginia Information Technology Agency and outside contractor Pro V&V found numerous flaws in the system, which had also been used in Mississippi and Pennsylvania. Jeremy Epstein, of the Menlo Park, California, nonprofit SRI International, served on a Virginia state legislative commission investigating the voting machines in 2008. He has been trying to get them decertified ever since.

Verified Voting in the News: Hacked Touchscreen Voting Machine Raises Questions About Election Security | NPR

Computer security experts have warned for years that some voting machines are vulnerable to attack. And this week, in Virginia, the state Board of Elections decided to impose an immediate ban on touchscreen voting machines used in 20 percent of the state’s precincts, because of newly discovered security concerns. The problems emerged on Election Day last November in Spotsylvania County. The AVS WINVote touchscreen machines used in precinct 302 began to shut down. “One machine would go and crash. They’d bring it back up. Another one would crash,” said Edgardo Cortes, the state’s elections commissioner. “Starting in the early afternoon, they brought in a piece of replacement equipment that experienced the same issues when they set it up in the precinct.” Cortes added that elections workers had a theory about what had caused the problem. “There was some interference,” he said, “potentially from a wireless signal from an election officer [who] was streaming music on their phone.”

Verified Voting in the News: Meet the e-voting machine so easy to hack, it will take your breath away | Ars Technica

Virginia election officials have decertified an electronic voting system after determining that it was possible for even unskilled people to surreptitiously hack into it and tamper with vote counts. The AVS WINVote, made by Advanced Voting Solutions, passed necessary voting systems standards and has been used in Virginia and, until recently, in Pennsylvania and Mississippi. It used the easy-to-crack passwords of “admin,” “abcde,” and “shoup” to lock down its Windows administrator account, Wi-Fi network, and voting results database respectively, according to a scathing security review published Tuesday by the Virginia Information Technologies Agency. The agency conducted the audit after one Virginia precinct reported that some of the devices displayed errors that interfered with vote counting during last November’s elections.

Virginia: Lynchburg-area election officials ‘very concerned’ over report critical of touchscreen system | News & Advance

Local election officials were taken aback by a new report that could lead to the elimination of a touchscreen voting system used in nearly 30 Virginia localities — including Appomattox County, Nelson County and Lynchburg. “We are very concerned,” said Mary Turner, secretary of the local electoral board in Appomattox. “… We’ve been using these machines for many years, and we’ve not had any problems with them.” The report, released last week by the Virginia Department of Elections, questioned the security and reliability of the WinVote touchscreen voting machine. It specifically found that a WinVote’s wireless network — a feature unique to this model — may make it prone to crashing and vulnerable to cyberattack.

Virginia: Faced with WINVote voting machine concerns, Botetourt plans to count votes by hand | Roanoke Times: Virginia

In response to concerns about glitches with some voting machines in Virginia, election officials in Botetourt County will be counting votes by hand for the June 9 Republican primary. The decision to go old-school, made Friday by the county’s electoral board, comes amid growing concerns about WinVote touch-screen voting machines, which are used in about 20 percent of Virginia’s precincts, including those in Botetourt. A vote to decertify the machines statewide could be taken as early as next week at a Virginia Board of Elections meeting in Richmond. In anticipation of not being able to use the WinVote machines for the June primary, the electoral board accepted a recommendation from Registrar Phyllis Booze: Borrow three voting machines from a vendor with whom the county is negotiating the purchase of all the equipment that it will need for the November elections.

North Carolina: Proposed bill would delay voting machine upgrades | Morganton News Herald

A new bill filed in the state House of Representatives would delay some counties, including Burke, from having to buy new voting equipment. HB 373 would extend the time those counties would have to implement paper ballots. State Rep. Hugh Blackwell (R-86), who is a co-sponsor of the proposed bill, said there are 36 counties, including Burke, to which the bill would apply. Burke and the other 35 counties use direct record electronic voting machines, which create a paper receipt of a voter’s choices.

Virginia: Study Examines Problems with Virginia’s Voting Machines | WVTF

n interim study by the Virginia Department of Elections indicates that numerous localities have voting machines that are wearing out—and some have potential security problems. The investigation was prompted by reports of irregularities during last November’s election. The result could be a new and costly requirement to replace some widely used touch-screen voting machines. Last fall, a few voters recorded videos to prove that when they touched one candidate’s name, their machines marked a different name. Elections Commissioner Edgardo Cortés says those machines were properly maintained. “And most of it does appear to be related to old equipment. It’s just past the end of its useful life, so they’re having issues with calibration, battery life—just all sorts of things that you see in older technology.”

Philippines: Comelec drops touch screen voting | The Manila Times

The Commission on Elections (Comelec) will no longer purchase precinct-based direct recording electronic (DRE) machines amid questions on the reliability of the touch screen technology. Comelec spokesperson James Jimenez on Tuesday said the Comelec en banc had shelved the bidding of the project, which should have been part of the poll body’s P2.503 billion voting machines procurement program. Jimenez explained that the project has not been totally scrapped but the commission is “going a little slower on it than we used to.” The Comelec en banc recently came out with a resolution suspending the progress of the second round of bidding for the DRE and the pilot testing of the technology.

Pennsylvania: Philadelphia Officials Hoping For New Voting Machines By 2017 Primary | CBS Philly

Philadelphia officials are focused on getting new voting machines to replace the original crop of electronic machines, now more than a decade old. But a bit of bureaucracy may hinder the purchase. The mayor’s new budget sets aside $22 million for new voting machines, with the hope to having them in place for the May 2017 primary. At a city council budget hearing this past week, Chief Information Officer Adel Ebeid said the current machines are past their useful life.

Virginia: Report questions security, accuracy of some Virginia voting machines | The Washington Post

Dozens of local governments — including Fairfax City and Arlington — could be left scrambling to replace all of their voting machines after a state report called into question the accuracy and security of one-fifth of Virginia’s aging equipment. The state Board of Elections will decide at a public hearing on April 14 whether to scrap the touch-screen voting machines used in 30 counties and cities. The board will accept public comment through April 12. Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s administration is eager to settle the issue in time for the November election, when all General Assembly seats will be on the ballot — but also before the 2016 presidential contest. … The latest voting machines flap was prompted by complaints from voters who had trouble casting ballots in November. McAuliffe, who said he grappled with a malfunctioning machine at a Richmond precinct, called for an investigation into machine irregularities.

Kansas: Sealing of votes means time is past for researcher seeking paper records, Kobach says of election lawsuit | The Wichita Eagle

Secretary of State Kris Kobach said a researcher wanting to check the accuracy of voting machines from the November election missed her opportunity to do so before the votes were sealed. For the first time, Kobach commented Friday on a lawsuit, in which he is a defendant, involving election results in Sedgwick County. Kobach was added as a defendant Wednesday to a lawsuit brought in the Sedgwick County District Court by Beth Clarkson, the chief statistician for the National Institute for Aviation Research, who is seeking to study the accuracy of reported vote tallies in Sedgwick County. She emphasized that this activity is independent from her duties at the institute.

Virginia: Touchscreen problems worry Virginia election officials | Daily Press

Looking into what went wrong when Virginia Beach supporters of Rep. Scott Rigell couldn’t get voting machines to register their choice last November, the state Department of Elections found problems with some touchscreen machines — but not the kind that frustrated Rigell’s backers. Instead, it found such serious problems with another, aging touchscreen device — AVS WinVote — that it thinks the State Board of Elections should consider stopping its use altogether. … In November, dozens of Virginia Beach voters reported that machines were recording their votes for Rigell as votes for his opponent, Suzanne Patrick. The city used 820 touchscreen machines — unlike localities on the Peninsula, it relied on them as its primary means of voting. In Newport News, the two voters who reported problems on Election Day said their votes for Sen. Mark Warner were shown as votes for his GOP opponent, Ed Gillespie. The more serious problems emerged when the consultant audited the WINVote machines in Henrico and Spotsylvania counties, which are different from the machines Virginia Beach and Newport News use.

India: Election Commission for new machine to enhance voter secrecy | The Economic Times

The Election Commission wants to use a new machine which prevents disclosure of voting pattern during counting to enhance voter secrecy and has received the backing of the Law Commission, but the government is yet to take a final call on the issue. The EC has approached the Law Ministry with a proposal to introduce ‘Totaliser’ machine for counting of votes. The poll panel is of the view that by use of Totaliser, a further level of secrecy in voting and the mixing of votes at the time of counting will be achieved, which will prevent the disclosure of pattern of voting at a particular polling station.

Virginia: Report cites security issues with some AVS WinVote voting machines | Associated Press

An investigation into voting irregularities during the November general election has raised serious security concerns about equipment used in about one-fifth of Virginia’s precincts, a new report says. The report issued late Wednesday says the state Board of Elections should consider decertifying the WinVote touchscreen system and barring its use in future elections. The board is expected to conduct a public hearing on this and other options in the next few days. Link: Full DOE report on Virginia voting equipment

Kansas: Wichita State mathematician sues Kris Kobach, Sedgwick County elections commisioner seeking court order to audit voting machines | Lincoln Courier-Journal

A Wichita State University mathematician sued the top Kansas election official Wednesday seeking paper tapes from electronic voting machines, an effort to explain statistical anomalies favoring Republicans in counts coming from large precincts across the country. Beth Clarkson, chief statistician for the university’s National Institute for Aviation Research, filed the open records lawsuit in Sedgwick County District Court as part of her personal quest to find the answer to an unexplained pattern that transcends elections and states. The lawsuit was amended Wednesday to name Secretary of State Kris Kobach and Sedgwick County Elections Commissioner Tabitha Lehman.

North Carolina: Cost to switch to paper ballots in Henderson County triples to $3 million | Times-News

Henderson County commissioners thought they were looking at roughly $1 million to comply with a state law requiring the Board of Elections to switch to paper ballots. The estimated cost of replacing its current touchscreen machines has now jumped to $3 million. During a discussion of the unfunded mandate earlier this month, a majority of commissioners said they nonetheless want to hold off on setting aside any money for new voting machines in the coming 2015-16 fiscal year. “I would just say to you that this is a moving target,” advised County Manager Steve Wyatt. “I have no confidence in these numbers; I had no confidence in the previous numbers. What I am confident is right now, the law says you’ve got to change the machines.”

Utah: Election machines focus of first Salt Lake County audits | The Salt Lake Tribune

Voting machines and other election technology in the clerk’s office will be the subject of the first of three audits to be conducted soon by the Salt Lake County auditor. The County Council instructed Auditor Scott Tingley to begin the performance audit of the clerk’s election apparatus because the time is approaching when the existing system will have to be replaced — and the council hopes this review will shape future decisions about whether to replace current machines or switch to mail-in balloting or something else. The election machines also represent a good starting point, Tingley said, because he estimates this audit will take two to three months. Meanwhile, his teams can work on two longer audits — a three- to six-month evaluation of health services at the county jail, and a nine- to 12-month review of the county’s Day Reporting Center, which oversees individuals who have been sent to jail for a misdemeanor but are responsible enough to serve part of their sentences in the community.

Missouri: Callaway County Clerk requests new voting machines | Fulton Sun

The Callaway County Commission and County Clerk Denise Hubbard met with sales associates from Springfield-based Elkins-Swyers Company to learn about options for new voting machines. Hubbard said the current voting machines are at least 10 years old, and the most common glitch is with the piece that rolls ballots into the machine’s hub for storage. She added that piece of equipment can sometimes be fixed internally, but when the issue is more complex, the machine has to be shipped to Springfield for repairs. Clerk employees use Windows 98 on election nights. Cory Nibert, a sales associate with Elkins-Swyers, said the current machines have not yet been phased out, but parts are becoming more expensive. He and his co-worker, Steve Byers, brought a new voting machine inside the Commission’s office Thursday for demonstration. Hubbard told the commission she wanted to give them an idea of what’s available. “(The system) is very similar to what we use now. It’s just a little more computerized, maybe,” Hubbard said. “It’s a little easier, a little smoother. It’s going to cut down on man hours.”

Virginia: New voting machines under review for Lynchburg precincts | News Advance

Lynchburg is test-driving new voting machines in hopes of replacing its current system’s machines that are nearing 10 to 20 years in age. The electoral board has assembled a focus group of precinct officials, disability community advocates and political party representatives to meet with the four vendors who’ve either been certified by the state or are in the process of being certified.  The board has been making the case for a new citywide system for some time now, and City Manager Kimball Payne’s new budget proposal recommends earmarking $300,000 for the project. The new balloting system, if given the green light by City Council, would rely on paper ballots, as a 2007 state law bars the purchase of new touch screen voting machines.

Missouri: New machines will help visually impaired voters cast ballots | Southeast Missourian

A purchase approved Thursday by the Cape Girardeau County Commission will allow visually impaired voters a little more autonomy when it comes to casting ballots. Starting with April’s election, the county’s accessible voting units will have larger screens — 15 by 15 inches versus the 7-by-3-inch screens currently in use. County Clerk Kara Clark Summers said the larger screens were not available when the county originally purchased accessible voting equipment. The requirements included in the Help America Vote Act of 2002 were the kick-start that brought such equipment to many counties, including Cape Girardeau.

Philippines: Poll watchdog: Smartmatic will ensure administration bet’s victory in 2016 | Business Mirror

Election watchdog Citizens for Clean and Credible Election (C3E) on Tuesday accused proadministration legislators of paving the way for the victory of President Aquino’s presidential candidate in 2016, by ensuring that Smartmatic-Total Information Management will remain as the country’s sole provider of automated voting machines for next year’s elections. C3E co-convener Nicanor Elman said this could be the main reason key leaders of the proadministration House of Representatives “are suspiciously turning a blind eye on the frailties” of the Venezuelan company’s Precinct Count Optical Scan machines used in the past national and local polls. “What we are trying to understand is, why some leaders of Congress had apparently turned defenders and apologists for Smartmatic,” Elman said in a statement. “If ever the elections push through, the Smartmatic cheating machine seems part of the grand equation for the administration,” he added.

Utah: House barely passes tweak to new primary election process | The Salt Lake Tribune

The Utah House narrowly passed a bill that would let a party’s delegates choose the party’s nominee if nobody in a primary election gets more than 40 percent of the vote. The bill is in response to last year’s compromise between lawmakers and organizers of Count My Vote, which was pushing a voter initiative allowing candidates who gather enough signatures to get to the primary ballot without going through the traditional caucus-and-convention process. Rep. Marc Roberts, R-Santaquin, said the concern is that someone would win the party’s nomination without winning a majority of the vote. His bill was amended to let delegates make the decision between the top two vote-getters if no nominee gets at least 40 percent. “I think we should demand at least 50 percent. We will live at 40 percent at this point,” Roberts said.

National: House Democrats Express Concerns About Outdated Voting Machines | Baltimore Citybizlist

Rep. Elijah Cummings, D-Baltimore, joined other House Democrats in a letter Wednesday urging the Government Accountability Office (GAO) to review the status of voting machine technology and the potential problems posed by using outdated equipment. The members asked the GAO to review challenges state and local jurisdictions face with aging voting systems, the impact of federal standards on developing new voting systems and benefits and challenges of policies in place regarding voter turnout. The letter cites a report by the Presidential Commission on Election Administration issued in January 2014, which lists its findings and recommendations to President Barack Obama. Congress passed the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) of 2002 as an attempt to modernize voting technology, including optical scanning and touch screen voting devices.

Louisiana: State officials address voting issues, technology changes | KSLA

Voting in the state of Louisiana could be changing in the next three to five years. The machines that are in use now are becoming a thing of the past. Officials are having to use parts from older machines to keep some of the current machines running. The Secretary of State’s office said that Louisiana needs to move to voting via tablets in the near future. Technology is on their radar, but so is addressing problems with the current voting system. “The participation of voters is weak,” Schedler said Wednesday before a house committee. He said registering voters is no issue, but getting people back to take part in the process is a problem, particularly among the 18-26 year old crowd. He added the more opportunities people have to vote, be it early voting or by absentee, the turnout has decreased.

Maryland: Rockville election will use new voting machines | Gazette.Net

Rockville will be a guinea pig for Maryland’s new voting machines, but city officials say they’re comfortable the new machines won’t cause problems in the city’s November election. There may be other municipalities that use the new machines in their elections this year, but Rockville will be at least one of the first jurisdictions in the state to use them, said Nikki Charlson, deputy administrator of the Maryland Board of Elections. The state Board of Public Works in December awarded a $28.14 million contract to Election Systems & Software of Omaha, Neb., for more than 3,100 machines to scan ballots and count votes.

National: Election panel GOP wants to eliminate is back in action | Jackson Clarion-Ledger

The federal agency that helps states improve their election systems is warning that aging voting machines could create problems in next year’s presidential election. Many of the machines were purchased more than a decade ago, according to the Election Assistance Commission. “It’s a big concern not just for us, but (for) state and local officials who are running these elections,” said Christy McCormick, new chairwoman of the independent, bipartisan commission. “Hopefully, they can prevent any major problems in 2016, but it’s going to be a challenge.” It’s one of several issues the EAC plans to highlight as it ramps up operations after four years without enough commissioners for a quorum. The commission held a public hearing Tuesday to discuss its plans, and recently kicked off a listening tour to hear from local election officials and advocates. Commissioners will visit New Orleans next week. “It’s like our moment to be able to reinvigorate the commission and figure out what our stakeholders need from us going forward,” McCormick said.

Voting Blogs: Restaffed EAC Advances Voting Systems in First Meeting | Adam Ambrogi/Democracy Fund

At its first meeting on Tuesday, the new quorum of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) took an important, much-awaited step toward making the work of election officials easier and improving the voter experience around the country. For four years, the lack of a quorum of Commissioners blocked the accreditation of new voting system test laboratories, which meant only two facilities in the country were able to review the quality and accessibility of voting systems. Yesterday’s accreditation of a third test laboratory promises to help alleviate the looming risk of major voting machine problems that have worried many smart observers. Federally accredited labs commonly test products we use everyday, from toasters to children’s toys, to ensure they are safe. Similarly, to protect the legitimacy of our elections, the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) requires the EAC to put voting machines through rigorous testing and certification.