The Security Mentor

The New York Times magazine writes about touch-screen voting machines.

It's a well researched article full of facts, even if it dismisses early critics of electronic voting machines as "fringe" and "scared senseless computer geeks". Security people argue about most things but I've never seen one defend electronic voting machines in their current form.

So the article is not too concerned about security, but gives a long list of reliability problems that e-voting systems have had. I mean a long list. Notice that this is a security problem in itself: imagine a partisan election official allocating the least reliable machinery to opposition precincts.

One lesson from recent changes in Ohio is that many problems can be avoided by thoughtful, careful election administration (a "model of professionalism", the article says). Do you know who's supervising your elections? Is he or she doing a good job?

It's worth reading. Remember that being an informed citizen is good for security.