It seems that the United States isn’t the only country having problems with e-voting. They’re having problems up in Canada too. Mike at Techdirt is on the case:
Following a report by Quebec’s electoral chief that runs through all of the problems Quebec had with e-voting machines last year, the government has extended an injunction against e-voting machines that had been put in place after the problems in the election became clear. The elections official admits that there’s no way to tell if last year’s election results were accurate or fair–but that there’s nothing that can be done now. Some opposition politicians, however, are thinking of trying to force the election to be wiped out and held again, claiming that the results clearly were incorrect. To make it even more fun, the firm that supplied the e-voting machines, PG Elections, is apparently upset that Quebec hasn’t paid their bill in full for the machines that didn’t work properly. Even worse, they seem to shrug off the problems: “We have to admit that we did have a few problems,” but he then suggests you have to give them some leeway because “It was the first time all Quebec municipal elections were held on the same day and that so many used electronic voting.” I’m sorry, but if the one thing your machines are supposed to do is handle the election and count people’s votes, it really needs to do that–and trying to brush it aside because it was the first time so many of your machines were being used isn’t just a bad excuse, it’s a reason no one should use your machines again.
Damn straight. I mean, seriously, when’s the last time you heard Ford say “Yeah, our cars tend to break a lot. But give us a break! We’ve never produced this many cars in a single year before.” Vendors need to demonstrate their products are secure before they’re used in real elections.
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