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From: Black Box Voting
If your state uses ES&S voting machines, this is a public education message to keep you informed about important public policy issues.
Wisconsin citizen John Washburn has obtained public records showing that Election Systems & Software, citing murky needs to alter hardware on all computerized voting systems (M100 scanners, AutoMARK, Unity servers, iVotronics), has failed to gain federal approval and therefore failed to gain state approval, so it is threatening its maintenance contracts with local election officials.
This is equivalent to your car dealer warning you that unless you let them make an adjustment to your car that makes it violate your state's emissions laws, they will punish you by charging you extra on a maintenance agreement you've already paid for, or refuse to service your car.
As Washburn correctly points out, it is difficult to imagine any part common to all these systems. We don't know what ES&S wants to change, but we do know that if election officials allow this, a private company will gain inside access to voting machines to add, delete, or switch something, without really telling us what they are doing. [...]
We cannot have democratic elections when private companies run elections on secret software and information is hidden from the public. The core problem is Freedom of Information and -- once achieved in elections, the core solution must always involve individual citizen vigilance, just as the founders of this nation intended. [...]
>All Things Reform Mobile: allthingsreform.mofuse.mobi >Capitol Switchboard: 202-224-3121 (not toll-free) >US House/Senate Mobile: bit.ly/members >Contact your reps tips: bit.ly/dear >Shortened All Things Reform URL: bit.ly/dw
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