Smart Cards That Activate Voting Machines Go Missing In Tennessee
Posted on November 3, 2006
Drudge has the siren up on this one.
Political insiders have expressed alarm after 12 voter smartcards have gone missing from one Shelby County, TN early vote location!
The cards are used to activate electronic voting machine.
The location at the center of the controversy is Bishop Byrne High School on E. Shelby Drive in Memphis.
The polling place started out with 25 cards. By Wednesday, 11 were missing, says an eyewitness.
The location was given 5 more smartcards on Thursday.
And another card went missing!
As of Friday morning, a total of 12 smartcards had gone missing, out of the 30 give to the location.
Someone possessing a smartcard could use ‘off the shelf equipment’ [equipment that reprograms the card] and alter it to be used multiple times, and cast multiple votes.
One concerned insider explains: “Shelby County Board of Elections has been notified. They said is was ‘not a big deal’ because, they said, the cards are deactivated. But the reality is, you can buy the equipment at computer stores to reactivate them. It’s on the Internet how to reactivate the cards!”
Meanwhile, The Tennessee Bureau of Investigation is reviewing reports by the Shelby County Election Commission that two people voted twice during early voting in Memphis.
Dist. Atty. Gen. Bill Gibbons said he’s referred the cases to the TBI for investigation along with other matters he declined to discuss.
Poll watchers are expected to turn out Tuesday to observe voting in Tennessee’s heated U.S. Senate race between Chattanooga Republican Bob Corker and Memphis Democrat Harold Ford Jr.
Developing…
My initial thought on this is that these voting machines need better security and monitoring if the cards are so easy to steal. With Corker up in the current polls it makes one wonder just who might be behind this. It really is a serious development. Hopefully this can be fixed swiftly. Whoever loses in Tenessee…you can bet this will be brought up. Yep, get ready for a nasty battle after the election no matter who wins.
Do you have any idea how long we are gonna be sifting through the muck that is the Shelby County election system if this Senate race is close. Junior and the gang will want every vote counted and the Corker folks will be shouting about dead people voting 19 times. This thing will be a true mess. A long drawn out mess.
If Corker doesn’t win this thing going away he best be going over his personal and campaign budgets right now looking for money to fund a protracted legal battle because this may get real nasty, real quick, and it may not end on election day.
It truly is no big deal, because nobody trusts the numbers that come out of Shelby County anyway. What’s a couple of extra votes? Just ask the Ford Family. They’ve been the primary beneficiaries of Memphis voting shenanigans for decades.
In the comments someone claiming to be an Election judge, which I can not prove or deny…yet regardless has as valid an opinion as anyone else, says this shouldn’t be such a big deal.
The smartcards are programmed for each individual voter and reused many times. When the Judges in the Precinct confirm the eligibility of each voter, a smartcard is programmed and given to the voter for use in a touch-screen maching. After the voter has cast the ballot, the smartcard is automatically reprogrammed to prevent the voter from voting more than once. In fact the card will be rejected if a voter tries to cast another ballot.
Since the smartcard is in the voters hand it is not surprising that some will walk out of the polling place. It is however, difficult to see how this card could reasonably be used again. This is because the person attempting fraud with this card would have to be able to do the following 1)reprogram the card with specialized equipment 2)Know the proper code to for the precinct (each precinct is different and some may have 2 or more codes) where they are going to use it 3)get past the Election Judges to gain access to a machine 4)find a way to make the number of voters and the number of ballots cast agree. These 4 items are big hurdles to overcome. It would be easier to vote as someone else than to use a lost smartcard.
Freepers are reacting.
On a related note: Texas Rainmaker reports that Democrats are trying to prevent soldiers from casting ballots in New Jersey.
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3 Responses to “Smart Cards That Activate Voting Machines Go Missing In Tennessee”
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I am an Election Judge this November. We will be using smartcards for electronic voting. The loss of a number of these cards is not surprising NOR IS IT SOMETHING WHICH SHOULD BE OF GREAT CONCERN.
The smartcards are programmed for each individual voter and reused many times. When the Judges in the Precinct confirm the eligibility of each voter, a smartcard is programmed and given to the voter for use in a touch-screen machine. After the voter has cast the ballot, the smartcard is automatically reprogrammed to prevent the voter from voting more than once. In fact the card will be rejected if a voter tries to cast another ballot.
Since the smartcard is in the voters hand it is not surprising that some will walk out of the polling place. It is however, difficult to see how this card could reasonably be used again. This is because the person attempting fraud with this card would have to be able to do the following 1)reprogram the card with specialized equipment 2)Know the proper code for the precinct (each precinct is different and some may have 2 or more codes) where they are going to use it 3)get past the Election Judges to gain access to a machine 4)find a way to make the number of voters and the number of ballots cast agree. These 4 items are big hurdles to overcome. It would be easier to vote as someone else than to use a lost smartcard.
In other words, this is a rather implausible way to commit voter fraud. Keep it simple stupid applies here too.
Is the data on the cards encrypted?
If so, that adds another level of complexity to any fraud attempt.
One and two are not that big of hurdles if the individual is question is known by the right individuals and the security is weak. Three and Four may be greater obstacles but that depends on the security procedures in place which I have no clue and for security reasons do not want to know.
The question is why doesn’t someone get the card from the voter on the way out as voters used to have to drop off their ballot.