Newsmax/AP -Tuesday, Oct. 7, 2003

SAN JOSE, Calif. – Punch-card ballots from today's historic recall election are sure to get a going-over by political activists, but some computer scientists think touch-screen voting machines deserve just as much scrutiny.

Though punch-card ballots caused headaches for Florida election officials with their "hanging" and "pregnant" chads, nearly one in 10 California voters will be using touch-screen machines, which don't produce printouts voters can see. And no paper printouts, the scientists say, would make a legitimate recount impossible.

"You can't do a meaningful recount if the question is about the integrity of the voting machines themselves," said David Dill, a professor of computer science at Stanford University. He urged voters in the four counties using touch-screen terminals to vote with absentee ballots.

The concern of Dill and some of his colleagues was dismissed as overblown and irresponsible by county registrars and executives at the companies that sell and update the electronic voting machines.

None of the elections officials who supervise the 50,000 touch-screen machines serviced nationwide by Diebold Election Systems has reported glitches or computer hacks that have resulted in known miscounts or fraud, said Mark Radke, director of the voting industry division of North Canton, Ohio-based Diebold.

But according to a July study by Johns Hopkins and Rice universities, any clever hacker could break into Diebold's system and vote multiple times. Researchers found it was theoretically possible to insert "back doors" into software code that would allow hackers or insiders to change future voters' choices and determine the outcome.

Activists are demanding that ballot machine vendors include printers that produce paper receipts so citizens can confirm that paper results match their touch-screen choices. Receipts would go into a county lock-box for use in recounts.