301 Week 3 Coda in the Key of F2654hD4 and Douglas Jones on Today's Voting Machines

In the story behind the Diebold AccuVote voting machines scandal, what was "F2654hD4?"

An encryption key hard-coded into the voting machine source code.

When was the digital encryption standard (DES) deprecated by the National Institute of Standards and Technology?

When it was replaced by the Advanced Encryption Standard in 2001

List three vulnerabilities of the AccuVote source code that were identified by computer scientist Aviel Rubin.

Election officials' all had a default "1111" pin, The system used to anonymize the voting order didn't work properly, Cryptography was not properly utilized where it was required

List two deficiencies in the DieBold Accuvote system identiied by Harri Hursti.

Removable memory, Easy-to-circumvent hardware security

How do Independent Testing Authorities (ITAs) validate voting machines?

ITAs compare voting machine results with past outcomes or canned datasets.

Why are the ITAs as they're currently configured inadequate to validate election equipment?

ITAs don't inpect "under the hood" of voting machines for vulnerabilities.

Are computing professionals allowed to inspect the source code of voting equipment?

Yes

What is the standard procedure for determining weaknesses/vulnerabilities in source code?

Running source code through a commercial-quality source code analyzer

List three vulnerabilities of the DieBold AccuVote source code identified by the UC Berkeley computer scientists.

Buffer overruns, Buffer underruns, Pointer errors

What models do computer scientists use to validate mission-critical systems like those used in aircraft, by NASA, etc.

High-confidence software development paradigms

What do voter verifiable paper audit trails (VVPAT) verify?

The most recent behavior of the particular voting machine.

What is the weakness of the current implementations of VVPAT?

It cannot verify for voters that their vote was counted.

What is the part of today's digital voting systems that is the most vulnerable?

DRE voting machines