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from the election-won-by-over-25-billion-votes dept.
Galois's prototype voting machine wasn't available for hackers to test.
For the majority of Defcon, hackers couldn't crack the $10 million secure voting machine prototypes that DARPA had set up at the Voting Village. But it wasn't because of the machine's security features that the team had been working on for four months. The reason: technical difficulties during the machines' setup.
Eager hackers couldn't find vulnerabilities in the DARPA-funded project during the security conference in Las Vegas because a bug in the machines didn't allow hackers to access their systems over the first two days. (DARPA is the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.) Galois brought five machines, and each one had difficulties during the setup, said Joe Kiniry, a principal research scientist at the government contractor.
"They seemed to have had a myriad of different kinds of problems," the Voting Village's co-founder Harri Hursti said. "Unfortunately, when you're pushing the envelope on technology, these kinds of things happen."
It wasn't until the Voting Village opened on Sunday morning that hackers could finally get a chance to look for vulnerabilities on the machine. Kiniry said his team was able to solve the problem on three of them and was working to fix the last two before Defcon ended.
The Voting Village was started in 2017 for hackers to find vulnerabilities on machines that are used in current elections. At the last two Defcons, hackers found vulnerabilities within minutes because the machines were often outdated. The Village shines a necessary light on security flaws for voters as lawmakers seek to pass an election security bill in time for the 2020 presidential election.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 12 2019, @11:27PM (4 children)
You say that like its a new problem to solve. It has been done many times over across the globe, you can probably write a book on it - no enterprising minds needed.
One technique that comes to mind recently is in one south east asian country, the incumbent political party that formed government made a side deal with the fairly significant population in their immigration camp where they get provided with residency in particular voting blocks with the proviso that they vote for them.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by PartTimeZombie on Tuesday August 13 2019, @12:20AM
That sounds like a lot of hard work.
Why not just wait until after you've lost the election, and legislate to remove the powers of the people who won? [politico.com]
I mean, it's not like the voters know what they want, is it? [vox.com]
(Score: 2) by black6host on Tuesday August 13 2019, @01:05AM (2 children)
No, not a new problem. That was my point. Someone will almost always try to corrupt the count (Don't believe in absolutes...) Voting machine security when we can't secure much of anything else is a joke, though... I mean think about it: Equifax's breach. Who can we trust more than the folks entrusted with the info used to decide whether or not we get a loan, a house or just a damned apartment. Absolutely fucking nobody. Unless you want to trust the government which, being polite, I will describe as inept at best nowadays regarding security.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Reziac on Tuesday August 13 2019, @03:49AM (1 child)
I'll trust a boxful of paper ballots and a gaggle of mutually-hostile poll watchers over the invisible guts of an electronic voting machine.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by Immerman on Tuesday August 13 2019, @05:53AM
hear, hear