DoD’s Email Vote Plan Called “Far Worse”
by Jerry Depew
Even the Department of Defense is fretting over its new email voting scheme, now involving only a handful of states including Iowa. One computer scientist told a reporter the new system is “far worse” than the plans that were scrapped in 2004:
Last month, an internal Defense Department review of its ballot system “found significant concerns surrounding the e-mailing of voting materials.'’ The review stated: “E-mail traffic can flow through equipment owned and operated by various governments, companies and individuals in many different countries. It is easily monitored, blocked and subject to tampering.'’
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David Wagner, an associate professor of computer science at the University of California-Berkeley, said the system of fax and e-mail was “far worse'’ from a security perspective than the Pentagon’s last attempt to solve this issue: an online voting system the Pentagon canceled in 2004 because it could not prevent electronic ballots from being altered or erased.
Iowa joined this “far worse” system with considerable fanfare last month.
JD