[ale] OT: U.S. Presidential Election Can Be Hacked

[Bob Toxen]

This is from ACM this week:

"U.S. Presidential Election Can Be Hacked"
IDG News Service (04/10/08); McMillan, Robert

A recent audit of the three most widely used electronic voting systems
has found that the machines can be hacked, says University of California,
Berkeley professor David Wagner.  The audit, which was conducted as
part of California's review of electronic voting, found that hackers
could install a computer virus on three systems from Diebold Electronic
Systems, Hart InterCivic, and Sequoia Voting Systems.  The virus could
then spread to machines throughout the county and alter the vote count.
"The three systems we looked at are three of the most widely used around
the nation," Wagner said during an e-voting panel discussion at the RSA
Conference on Thursday.

 "They're going to be using them in
the 2008 elections; they're still going to have the same vulnerabilities
we found.  He says the problems uncovered in the audit affect not only
California counties, but counties across the country.  Yet despite the
pervasiveness of the problem, academics such as Wagner will find it
difficult to approach voting system vendors because of the deep mistrust
that exists between the communities, says Florida State University
professor Alec Yasinsac.  He says vendors feel that if they talk to
security researchers, it could be tantamount to admitting that they
have bugs.

http://www.pcworld.com/businesscenter/article/144431/us_presidential_election_can_be_hacked.html