Elections & Electronic Voting

As a network of, and forum for, computer professionals concerned with democracy and society Planetwork has been closely following issues related to electronic polling for several years. The links listed here are by no means comprehensive, nor can we attest to their individual accuracy, however, there are a number of excellent efforts underway to try to discover in detail what happened in key states in the 2004 election.

While much of the focus among computer professionals has been, and continues to be, on the outrageous new DRE (computer touch screen) polling equipment without a paper audit trail, we should not lose sight of the larger chain of custody problem whereby virtually all election results in many states are transmitted to central computers for tabulation.

As we have found in so many other technical discussions, the issues are ultimately social as much as technical. In this case the core problem is a system wherein the polling and counting of ballots are administered by partisan state and local officials. Our election system is so inherently flawed in this regard that Jimmy Carter has stated that it does not meet the minimum standards for international certification.

Summary of the Situation - updated Nov 19, 2004

Exit Poll Election Results Map - Nov 15, 2004

The Unexplained Exit Poll Discrepancy PDF download - Nov 10, 2004

Graphics depicting exit polling vs. official results

Boxer Joins Conyers to Force Debate of Election Results - Jan 6, 2005

Summary Article from American Free Press - Dec 31, 2004

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann's Blog

The 2004 Vote: What Really Happened? Experts to Provide a Report to the Nation - Common Cause - Dec 6, 2004

UC Berkeley Researchers call for Investigation of Florida E-Vote
Nov 18, 2004

email links page an archive of messages & suggested actions
also track the evolution of the bogus Peter Coyote "media lock-down" email

MORE LINKS the best of the links we have received

Votewatch
http://votewatch.us/reports/view_reports

Black Box Voting
http://www.blackboxvoting.org

Verified Voting
http://verifiedvoting.org

updated Jan 3, 2005