New Jersey’s Voting Equipment from Sequoia Voting Systems Ruled “Safe, Accurate and Reliable” by New Jersey Superior Court

Yesterday, Mercer County, New Jersey Superior Court Judge Linda Feinberg released her ruling in favor of the defendants in Reed Guscoria, et al., Plaintiffs vs. James E. McGreevey, et al., Defendants (Docket No.:Mer-L-2691-04). This decision can be read in its entirety at: http://www.judiciary.state.nj.us/decisions/index.htm.

“Sequoia is exceedingly pleased with the court’s decision that affirms what Sequoia and our customers throughout New Jersey and the United States have long known and experienced – that our voting equipment is indeed safe, accurate and reliable,” said Jack A. Blaine, chief executive officer of Sequoia Voting Systems.

Within this 191 page decision are many important points, some of which are highlighted here, word-for-word from the Superior Court’s decision:

• The court agrees with defendants that the claims regarding security risks of the AVC (Advantage) are not consistent with the State’s over fifteen year record of successful elections using this voting system. The record is void of any evidence to establish that any election has ever been compromised due to the fraudulent manipulation of an AVC Advantage voting system. As noted by defendants, “if the mere physical or technological possibility of criminals to supersede government activity were to warrant strict scrutiny, then many regulatory decisions, both in and out of the election context would not survive constitutional review.”

• The court is satisfied that the State’s decision to certify paperless DRE (Direct Record Electronic) voting systems as an alternative to paper ballots, and the decision by the various counties to use such a system, represents reasonable nondiscriminatory choices, and thus do not violate a voter’s equal protection or due process rights. The same result has been reached in other jurisdictions.

• There is simply no evidence to conclude that absent complete access, coupled with malicious intent to alter the results of an election, the voting machines have failed to correctly and accurately count every vote cast. The court rejects the notion that the AVC (Advantage from Sequoia Voting Systems) is not reliable because it cannot be secured from tampering.
• In this case, the court finds that the voting rights are not severely restricted by the use of paperless voting machines. First, the court finds that, absent pre-meditated criminal activity, the voting systems in this State are safe, accurate and reliable. In the case at bar, Appel (Professor Andrew Appel from Princeton University) and his team examined the AVC (Advantage) under artificial laboratory conditions with unfettered access to two AVC (Advantage) machines and the source code, for a period of one month. Second, there is no evidence of tampering of an AVC (Advantage) in any election in this State, or any impermissible alteration of any vote. Instead, the record is replete with testimony from State and County election officials that, over the many years of use, not one election result in the State has been adversely affected.
• It is undisputed that the DRE voting system (the AVC Advantage from Sequoia Voting Systems) has been in use since as early as 1979. While this opinion will discuss important steps the State must take to address certain issues raised during trial, not one witness presented evidence that the AVC, outside of a controlled academic setting, has ever been hacked. In fact, other than the “option switch bug,” (note on “option switch”: The option switch problem occurred when a board worker pressed an inappropriate sequence of buttons on the option switch panel. This problem was discovered in the February 2008 primary. The problem, once identified, was corrected by placing a plastic shield over the operator panel. In the primary elections held since that time, no problems have been reported.) the expert witnesses and county election officials agreed that, absent purposeful and criminal intrusion by an outsider or insider, the AVC (Advantage) records votes cast and produces accurate results.
• Interestingly, absent the hypothetical situation of criminal access and the installation of fraudulent software, plaintiffs’ own expert (Princeton University Professor Andrew Appel) did not find any malicious software in the source code or any irregularities that would result in the AVC (Advantage) failing to count votes as cast.

Additionally, Sequoia Voting Systems wishes to point to the following findings of the court that are specific to Sequoia’s voting equipment. These findings are also word-for-word from Judge Feinberg’s decision and can be found on pages 159 – 162:

• No AVC (Advantage) has ever been demonstrated to have been hacked, other than in an academic setting, in this State or any other state.
• There has never been a demonstrated incident of an attempted attack or a verified attack of any AVC (Advantage) voting system in the United States since its use began at least as early as 1979.
• Replacement of the AVC (Advantage) ROM chip with a fraudulent ROM chip is not a realistic risk. The systematic one-by-one replacement of ROM chips by an intruder, or even an insider, would require mechanical and physical changes to each and every machine.
• It would be extremely unlikely that one could replace DRE firmware with fraudulent firmware while leaving no detectable evidence of that under real election conditions.
• The technical barriers to producing fraudulent firmware, and the necessary step of reverse engineering the source code, are substantial.

• The notion that fraudulent firmware can continue to operate, as anticipated, for future elections, is completely unrealistic.
• Viruses do not present a legitimate risk to the AVC (Advantage). The notion that some kinds of fraudulent firmware can automatically propagate themselves from one AVC (Advantage) to another is purely hypothetical.
• The viral mode theorized by plaintiffs’ expert through the use of the daughterboard is fictional.
• There is no documented incident where anyone has ever manufactured a fake AVC (Advantage) Z80 chip containing fraudulent firmware.
• There is no documented incident where any fake microprocessor was ever inserted into an AVC (Advantage).
• The court rejects the so-called “perfection standard.”
• Installing fraudulent Z80 chips would take hundreds of hours to do, and presents the same problems with breaking in and replacing ROM chips on an individual machine-by-machine basis.
• Appel never demonstrated that the data in an AVC (Advantage) results cartridge could be altered.
• Daughterboard manipulation by direct access does not present a serious risk.
• The presence of third-party software does not constitute a serious risk.
• There is no evidence that the AVC (Advantage), in its normal state: (1) has design flaws that cause votes to be lost; (2) encourages voter and poll worker error; or (3) permits fraudulent manipulation.
• The software design of the AVC (Advantage) does not cause any votes to be miscounted.

Judge Feinberg’s decision also ordered that New Jersey’s voting machines be fitted with antiviral software and not be connected to the Internet. Sequoia also recommends this to its customers. Judge Feinberg’s decision stated voting machines must be monitored and she suggested the use of video cameras to record any activity in their vicinity, a recommendation that Sequoia also supports. She also suggested that municipal clerks, election boards and others undergo training on chain of custody, tampering and other security issues, a recommendation that is again supported by Sequoia. The decision also ordered that the State of New Jersey’s panel that determines whether voting machines should be certified must add specialists in the field of computer science, and ordered that this to-be-reconstituted panel review the AVC Advantage’s voting machine certification within 120 days.

“We are happy with Judge Feinberg’s decision and are looking forward to continuing our long-standing partnership with the state of New Jersey and our county election customers,” said Blaine. “We look forward to the review of the Advantage voting equipment by New Jersey’s expanded certification panel and working cooperatively with this group.”

About Sequoia Voting Systems (www.sequoiavote.com)

Sequoia Voting Systems is an American-owned and operated international election technology provider headquartered in Denver, Colorado. Sequoia has over a century of experience in providing accurate, reliable and innovative voting solutions to hundreds of customers throughout 16 states and the District of Columbia including the City of Chicago and Cook County, Illinois, the State of Louisiana, the State of Nevada and the majority of counties in California. Sequoia's product suite includes a comprehensive election management system, precinct-based optical scan voting units, high-speed central count optical scan ballot readers, full-face and paginating electronic voting equipment with optional printers that produce voter verified paper records and electronic pollbooks. In addition to its robust election technology products, Sequoia also supplies customized training solutions, ballot design, printing services and complete implementation and support programs to its customers.