Wednesday, September 13, 2006

Fragile systems

A report of one pollworker's experience working the Maryland primary gives some sobering perspective on an all-electronic voting process and the many ways it can fall apart.
When our poll books crashed, and the lines grew, I had a sense of dread that we might end up finishing the day without a completed election. As an election judge I put aside my personal beliefs that these machines are easy to rig in an undetectable way, and become more worried that the election process would completely fail. I don't think it would have taken much for that to have happened.
As somebody who still keeps a hard-copy appointment book for fear of losing my life in a PDA system crash, I find this sort of scenario chilling...

(via NowThis)

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