Voting machines raise concerns

Dashiell Beardsley, right, feeds his ballot into a voting machine during early voting in Albuquerque, N.M. The National Congress of American Indians and other groups have been working to turn around low voter participation that has persisted in Indian Country for decades. AP/Susan Montoya Bryan

WASHINGTON—Few want to even think about it, but the 2012 US election result could be clouded by problems with voting machines … again.

Twelve years after the Florida punch-card debacle in which thousands of votes went uncounted in the crucial state, some experts cite similar concerns about voting technology.

“I’m not sure we’ve made forward progress since 2000,” said Douglas Jones, a University of Iowa computer scientist and coauthor of a book published this year, “Broken Ballots.”

“We’ve put a tremendous effort into changing the voting systems, but in many cases we’ve discarded systems too quickly and replaced them with systems that we haven’t examined enough.”

Jones said technology used on some vote machines is now close to a decade-old and should be updated. And some systems have security flaws or may not allow for recounts or audits, he noted.

“Whenever an election is close all of the weaknesses become apparent,” he said. “I expect there will be some states where the margin is so close that people will raise questions about irregularities.”

A frequent target for critics is the use of touchscreen voting machines, which lack a paper backup. Around 25 percent of Americans are expected to use paperless electronic voting, according to the Verified Voting Foundation.

A report earlier this year by two activist groups and the Rutgers University School of Law said systems used in 20 states were either “inadequate” or needed improvement.

That includes 16 states that use paperless machines in some or all jurisdictions. Six states were ranked “good” and 24 “generally good.”

Superstorm “Sandy’s” destruction has added another element of uncertainty, says Thad Hall, a University of Utah political scientist and researcher for the Voting Technology Project.

“No power means that [vote machines] will only operate as long as their batteries last,” he said. “It also means that voters voting on paper ballots will not have the use of scanners to identify errors on their ballots.”