Diebold's state certification pending further tests of company's voting machines 
by Shane Mizer    The Eureka Reporter  12/23/2005 
  
Secretary of State Bruce McPherson announced Tuesday that the state of California will not certify Diebold Inc.?s voting system until more federal testing can guarantee the security of Diebold?s memory cards.

?During a thorough review of the application for the Diebold system currently pending certification, we have determined that there is sufficient cause for additional evaluation,? McPherson said.

McPherson?s main recommendation is for Diebold to turn over its proprietary source codes for a review and evaluation by the Independent Testing Authorities, who had once tested parts of Diebold?s machines, with the exception of the source codes on Diebold?s memory cards.

?The entire system has gone through the ITA testing, it?s just a small portion of the source codes for the memory cards that were not reviewed,? Director of Marketing for Diebold Election Systems Mark Radke said.

?This action doesn?t close any doors as far as Diebold?s certification goes, (but) it may place further tests and obstacles in the way,? Humboldt County Registrar of Voters Carolyn Crnich said. ?I think the secretary of state is trying to be very thorough and it sounds like Diebold is cooperating fully. This is not a month or two setback, but a matter of days or a few weeks.?

According to press secretary Jennifer Kerns, a test demonstration on Diebold?s AccuVote-OS machine is scheduled between now and Jan. 1 as a replacement for the Nov. 30 test, which was postponed after Finnish security expert Harri Hursti said he was unable to attend. AccuVote-OS is the voting machine system used in Humboldt County.

Last week, Florida?s Leon County Election Supervisor Ion Sancho decided he will no longer use Diebold?s voting system after being told by Diebold to adopt their AccuVote-TSX touch screen model, which, according to Sancho, doesn?t provide the same amount of paper trail as the optical scan system.

After he made the decision to stop using Diebold, Sancho invited a team of security experts, including Hursti, to challenge the overall integrity of Diebold?s voting system.

?I did external hacks and found that it was not possible, but when we did red team testing (internal tampering) it showed that an individual could go into the main elections computer and alter the election data and exit without that penetration being recording on the audit log,? Sancho said.

Florida?s Volusia County, which Sancho described as ?ground zero? in the 2000 presidential election, has also stepped forward and announced they no longer intend to use Diebold?s voting system.

?There is so much information that is coming at me from organizations, other counties and people, and then there?s the federal government breathing down your neck to make a decision,? Crnich said. ?This is not a enviable position.?

Crnich said it is ultimately her decision whether the county chooses to continue use of Diebold?s voting system, but that other certified voting systems like ESNS Election Systems and Software may not necessarily provide the county with a better alternative. According to Crnich, the secretary of state is also conducting a review of the ESNS voting system.

?In spite of all of the controversy, when the Humboldt County Board of Supervisors allowed the county to only purchase enough TSX systems in order to be HAVA (Help America Vote Act of 2002) compliant and to continue to look for more alternative systems, I saw this as a patch and not as a solution,? Crnich said.