
“Certainly, I don’t think we should buy a flawed machine for $6 million,” she said. Porder thinks there are better options than the ICE machines, and she questions if the county can get by without any new machines this year. “Sometimes you wonder if they’re lobbying for a particular company – and you could quote me on that.”īut critics such as Deborah Porder said they aren't sure what the big rush is. “We’re waiting to hear from the state before we buy any machines 'cause I’m sure if we pick another machine there are going to be some people out there saying that machine is no good,” he said. The last time the county bought new machines, he said many people didn’t like that model either. Reggie Lafayette, co-commissioner of the county elections board, said he will wait for the state to answer some questions before moving forward with the ICE machines. The county’s current machines are aging past their useful life, they say, and a new service contract with Dominion would be needed even if the old machines are kept.īy staying with the same manufacturer who built the current machines, the county will have consistency and not have to start from scratch in terms of training and software, the county commissioners said. Is there a rush?Ĭounty elections officials want new machines ahead of the fall when a new law goes into effect to allow early voting for the first time in the state. “There’s lots of mitigations in place to make sure they operate as intended, securely,” he said.

Unless anything changes, the state’s position is that the machines are safe. John Condon, a spokesman for the state Board of Elections, said other commissioners are considering that request. The concerns are enough that at least one state election commissioner, Douglas Kellner, is asking that the alleged flaw be analyzed and retested for security.
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But videos online have demonstrated not much time is needed to break into a vote machine, and Appel said hackers could introduce malware into a manufacturer’s software update and manipulate machines that way.

Hackers would have to get into the machines at a poll site or while in storage, he said, and security and poll watchers would prevent that. “They’re not capable of connecting to the Internet either wirelessly or hard wire so that takes away almost all – almost all – hacking capabilities.”

“The voting machines in New York state have no access to the Internet whatsoever,” Colety told The Journal News/lohud. Doug Colety, co-commissioner of the county Board of Elections, said he considered the machines “virtually unhackable.” The new ICE machine combines the ballot-marking function and scanning, which Appel said means if tampered with the machines could add marks to a ballot after a voter already inserted it into the machine.Ī Dominion spokesperson didn’t respond to an interview request, but representatives have defended the security of the machines. Those “Plan B” machines mark a ballot, but it still must be carried and inserted into the other machine to be counted. They scan paper ballots and drop them into a box within the machine without any opportunity to alter it.Īt county polling locations, there’s also a separate, rarely-used device that marks ballots for people who may want assistance filling out a ballot, have a vision impairment or other disability. The machines Westchester uses today are an earlier ImageCast model by Dominion. If a result is contested, officials can recount the paper ballots manually or audit a sample of the paper ballots to ensure the real results are the same as the computer’s tabulations. PORT CHESTER ELECTION: Trustee candidates talk about the top issues facing the villageĮven though elections have become mostly counted by computer, Appel said, their integrity is still ensured by paper ballots. ROCKLAND VILLAGE ELECTIONS: Who's on the ballot VILLAGE ELECTIONS 2019: See who is running for what, and where to vote “But we still have to recognize that in the end any computer can be hacked … and we still have to be able to run elections that we can trust.” “The voting machine manufacturers are doing their best to make their machines hard to hack and improve their security,” Appel told The Journal News/lohud. He said the ICE machines, manufactured by Dominion Voting Systems, have a basic design flaw. The county plans to spend $6.1 million for 420 new ImageCast Evolution machines, but lawmakers may delay a vote expected Monday due to unanswered questions.Īndrew Appel, Eugene Higgins professor of computer science at Princeton University, has written extensively about voting machine security. Hackers may be able to manipulate the new voting machines Westchester County plans to buy, allowing extra votes to ballots after they’re cast.
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