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Brave New Ballot: The Battle to Safeguard Democracy in the Age of Electronic Votingby Aviel Rubin
Synopses & ReviewsPublisher Comments:Democracy has never been more vulnerable. The problem is right here in America. How to Sabotage an Election Become an election judge and carry a refrigerator magnet in your pocket Program every fifth vote to automatically record for your candidate Bury your hacked code Avi Rubin, a computer scientist at Johns Hopkins and a specialist in systems security knows something the rest of us don’t. Maybe we suspected it, maybe we’ve thought it, but we didn’t have proof. Until now. The electronic voting machines being used in 37 states are vulnerable to tampering, and because the manufacturers are not required to reveal—even to the government—how they operate, voters will never know if their votes are recorded accurately. Follow Rubin on his quest to wake America up to the fact that the irregularities in the 2004 elections might not have been accidents; that there are simple solutions that election commissions are willfully ignoring; that if you voted on an electronic machine, there’s a chance you didn’t vote the way you wanted to. Learn what you can do the next time you vote to make sure that your vote is counted. Imagine for a moment that you live in a country where nobody is sure how most of the votes are counted, and there’s no reliable record for performing a recount. Imagine that machines count the votes, but nobody knows how they work. Now imagine if somebody found out that the machines were vulnerable to attack, but the agencies that operate them won’t take the steps to make them safe. If you live in America, you don’t need to imagine anything. This is the reality of electronic voting in our country. Avi Rubin is a computer scientist at Johns Hopkins University and a specialist in systems security. He and a team of researchers studied the code that operates the machines now used in 37 states and discovered the following terrifying facts: The companies hired to test the election equipment for federal certification did not study the code that operates the machines and the election commissions employed no computer security analysts. All votes are recorded on a single removable card similar to the one in a digital camera. There is no way to determine if the card or the code that operates the machine has been tampered with. It’s very easy to program a machine to change votes. There’s no way to determine if that has happened. There were enough irregularities with the electronic voting machines used throughout the 2004 election to make anyone think twice about using them again. Avi Rubin has testified at Congressional hearings trying to alert the government that it has put our democracy at risk by relying so heavily on voting machines without taking the proper precautions. As he has waged this battle, he has been attacked, undermined, and defamed by a prominent manufacturer. His job has been threatened, but he won’t give up until every citizen understands that at this moment, our democracy hangs in the balance. There are simple solutions and, before you vote in the next election, Rubin wants you to know your rights. If you don’t know them and you use an electronic voting machine, you may not be voting at all. Review:"Rubin, professor of computer science at Johns Hopkins, tells the fascinating story of how he set off a media storm in the summer of 2003 when he and two graduate students revealed that the Diebold electronic voting technology in use in 37 states was riddled with errors and problems. A self-described 'computer-geek,' Rubin was publicly accused of undermining democracy by officials he describes as desperate to save face after investing state money in the machines. He also became the object of an e-voting industry campaign to smear his work, especially after it was revealed that he had connections to a voting software company. Refreshingly, he describes this potential conflict of interest with considerable candor. Rubin's account of his mounting frustration as governmental and industrial spin doctors continued to champion electronic voting in the face of its manifold problems, and turned electronic voting into a partisan issue, is a sympathetic one. Despite the inability of his critics to understand it, his explanation of the technological issues at the heart of electronic voting is clear, and his argument that votes need to be verifiable in order for the democratic process to be meaningful is so reasonable that it sounds almost revolutionary. (Sept. 5)" Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.) Synopsis:Imagine for a moment that you live in a country where nobody is sure how most of the votes are counted, and there’s no reliable record for performing a recount. Imagine that machines count the votes, but nobody knows how they work. Now imagine if somebody found out that the machines were vulnerable to attack, but the agencies that operate them won’t take the steps to make them safe. If you live in America, you don’t need to imagine anything. This is the reality of electronic voting in our country. Avi Rubin is a computer scientist at Johns Hopkins University and a specialist in systems security. He and a team of researchers studied the code that operates the machines now used in 37 states and discovered the following terrifying facts: • The companies hired to test the election equipment for federal certification did not study the code that operates the machines and the election commissions employed no computer security analysts. • All votes are recorded on a single removable card similar to the one in a digital camera. There is no way to determine if the card or the code that operates the machine has been tampered with. • It’s very easy to program a machine to change votes. There’s no way to determine if that has happened. • There were enough irregularities with the electronic voting machines used throughout the 2004 election to make anyone think twice about using them again. Avi Rubin has testified at Congressional hearings trying to alert the government that it has put our democracy at risk by relying so heavily on voting machines without taking the proper precautions. As he has waged this battle, he has been attacked, undermined, and defamed by a prominent manufacturer. His job has been threatened, but he won’t give up until every citizen understands that at this moment, our democracy hangs in the balance. There are simple solutions and, before you vote in the next election, Rubin wants you to know your rights. If you don’t know them and you use an electronic voting machine, you may not be voting at all. Synopsis:In 2003, Aviel Rubin touched off a national debate when he revealed that security glitches in the Diebold electronic voting machines could make it easier for election results to be compromised. Rubin himself became the center of the uproar: Diebold initiated a campaign to ruin his career; election officials in localities that had invested in the system dismissed his findings; and the media, misinterpreting his objections to specific weaknesses, cast him as a Luddite. <BR>In "Brave New Ballot, Rubin tells the story of his role as a whistle-blower (including the toll it took on his career and family) and recounts his observations as an election judge in Baltimore County, which gave him a full picture of electronic voting in action. Addressing both technical and legal problems, he shows how easy it is to rig an election. He describes the vulnerability of computerized systems to tampering, not only by insiders like poll workers but also by outsiders able to breach the system without detection. <BR>The election process for millions of voters is being transformed as electronic voting machines replace older mechanical systems throughout the country and Internet voting becomes a reality. "Brave New Ballot is the first book to describe the systemic imperfections that may have affected past elections and to spell out what must be done to assure fair elections in the future. About the AuthorAviel D. Rubin, Ph.D. is Professor of Computer Science and Technical Director of the Information Security Institute at Johns Hopkins University. He is also the founder and president of Independent Security Evaluators, a security consulting firm. In 2004, Baltimore magazine named him Baltimorean of the Year for his work on electronic voting security, and the Electronic Frontier Foundation gave him its prestigious Pioneer Award. He has testified three times before the U.S. Congress, as well as before the U.S. Election Assistance Committee. He is the recipient of a National Science Foundation Grant to study electronic voting. Dr. Rubin has appeared on 60 Minutes, CNN, NPR, and Wired News, and in the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, the Baltimore Sun, and many more newspapers. What Our Readers Are SayingBe the first to add a comment for a chance to win!Product Details
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