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U.S. NEWS Monday 6 noveMber 2017

American Democracy:

Local voting districts seen as crucial to election security

By CHRISTINA A. CASSIDY security concerns. Several
Associated Press counties had to scramble
CONYERS, Ga. (AP) — Last to buy replacements.
November, election of- Georgia, one of five states
ficials in a small Rhode where voting machines
Island town were imme- produce no paper trails, is
diately suspicious when re- testing out new ones dur-
sults showed 99 percent of ing municipal elections
voters had turned down a in Conyers, an Atlanta
noncontroversial measure suburb. Voters enter their
about septic systems. choices electronically and
It turned out that an oval are then given a paper
on the electronic ballot copy. If the paper looks
was misaligned ever so correct to them, they feed
slightly and had thrown it into a machine that
off the tally. The measure counts their vote.
actually had passed by a “This is a wonderful step for-
comfortable margin. ward,” said James Cabe,
The scary part: The out- a 37-year-old college in-
come might never have structor from Conyers. “I
raised suspicion had the re- like looking at a piece of
sults not been so lopsided. Renee Phifer, Rockdale County board of elections assistant director, left, demonstrates a new paper and verifying that
Amid evidence that Rus- voting machine at a polling site to Kelly Monroe, investigator with the Georgia secretary of state it’s the vote I cast.”
sian hackers may have office in Conyers, Ga. Georgia officials have es-
tried to meddle with last (AP Photo/David Goldman) timated it could cost over
year’s presidential elec- ed more rigorous statistical school board contests — on his agency’s website. $100 million to adopt the
tion, the incident illustrates methods for double-check- elections are run to a very After the “hanging chad” machines statewide.
a central concern among ing the votes, while others large degree by local gov- debacle in Florida threw In January, Homeland
voting experts — the huge are making or weighing ernments, usually counties. the 2000 presidential elec- Security designated the
security challenge posed changes to their voting County election offices tion into confusion, Con- nation’s election systems
by the nation’s 10,000 vot- technology. across the nation oversee gress designated $3 billion “critical infrastructure,” on
ing jurisdictions. “Always, there’s been a some 109,000 polling plac- to help states modernize par with the electrical grid
While the decentralized hypothetical. But clearly, es and more than 694,000 their election systems. and water supply.
nature of U.S. elections is a now it is a real threat,” said poll workers, and rely on But those machines are A 27-member council has
buffer against large-scale Noah Praetz, election di- a patchwork of voting now more than 10 years been formed with repre-
interstate manipulation on rector for Cook County, Illi- technology, such as opti- old. A 2015 study by the sentatives from federal,
a level that could sway a nois. “The fact that we now cal scanners and touch- Brennan Center for Justice state and local govern-
presidential race, it also have to defend against screens. at New York University Law ments. The group held its
presents a multitude of nation-state actors — Rus- Small counties are less likely School found that more first meeting last month in
opportunities for someone sia, China, Iran. It’s a very than the larger and wealth- than 40 states were using Atlanta, and a key priority
bent on mischief. different ballgame now.” ier ones to have cyberse- machines that were no lon- is establishing a process for
With a major election year Last year, Homeland Secu- curity expertise and the lat- ger being manufactured, sharing intelligence.
on the horizon, the Home- rity disclosed that 21 states’ est technology. and some election officials “It would take a substan-
land Security Department election systems had been “The proverb that a chain had to go onto eBay to find tial effort to impact our
has been working with targeted by Russian hack- is only as strong as its weak- replacement parts, includ- elections, and one that we
states and counties to ers. There was no evidence est link is certainly applica- ing modems to connect to think is very hard to do,”
shore up their election sys- they actually penetrated ble to our efforts to secure the Internet. said Bob Kolasky, the act-
tems against tampering. the systems. Experts likened elections,” Brian Hancock, In September, Virginia ing deputy undersecretary
States vary widely in what the activity to a burglar jig- director of the testing and banned touchscreen vot- at Homeland Security over-
they are doing to tighten gling a doorknob to see if it certification division for the ing machines in next week’s seeing the program. “And
security. Colorado and is locked.In the U.S. — from U.S. Election Assistance Ad- closely watched guberna- we are going to make it
Rhode Island have adopt- presidential races down to ministration, said in a blog torial election because of harder to do.”q