39 counties' vote systems in question – Los Angeles Times

There is a really interesting story in the LA Times today about California’s voting technology decision.

I am quoted in it and wanted to explain the last part of the quote. The reporter noted that one “hack” that was done was to squirt liquid into the VVPAT printers to make them not work. I responded that you could do the same hack with paper ballots; drop a lit cigarette into the ballot box. I had never actually thought of that as a hack but it came to mind as being pretty analogous!

I also went back and read all of the Secretary of State’s orders and I am having trouble finding exactly what the vendors have to do to get their optical scan systems re-certified. I am assuming it is only the ballot management software that are affected, but the language in the orders is not overly clear on this point.

Finally, the Secretary of State notes that if NASA had a safety concern with the space shuttle it doesn’t continue to fly missions. I would note that this analogy is funny because you did not see NASA flying Apollo space missions while the shuttle was being fixed. Is that was the SOS would have done if she ran NASA?