We’ve long warned about the dangers that electronic voting and tabulation systems pose to our democracy, not just from simple insider attacks and domestic hacking, but also from foreign governments and other, even shadier entities.
In 2009, just by way of one of scores (if not hundreds) of examples, we covered the chilling presentation given by the CIA’s cybersecurity expert Steven Stigall to a panel convened by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission (EAC) during a field hearing in Orlando, FL. Stigalll warned at the time: “You heard the old adage ‘follow the money. I follow the vote. And wherever the vote becomes an electron and touches a computer, that’s an opportunity for a malicious actor potentially to…make bad things happen.”
“For several years,” Stigall said, according to the transcript [WORD], “I’ve worked with others in my organization to try and identify foreign threats, emphasis on ‘foreign threats,’ to important U.S. computer systems. A few years ago it occurred to us that that should include potential foreign threats to the computers upon which our elections in this country are increasingly dependent.”
Well, funny thing. Remember that Osama Bin Laden guy? On Thursday, The Hill and others published a list [PDF] of about forty English-language books said to have been found at Bin Laden’s compound when he was killed. Among them, amusingly enough, were “9/11 conspiracy theory” books. Another was the New York Times best-seller The Best Democracy Money Can Buy
Interesting. But look at what else showed is said to have been found on Osama’s bookshelf…
Yes, that’s right. The 2004 classic that gave the name to so much of what we’ve been covering on this very blog since that infamous year, Black Box Voting: Ballot Tampering in the 21st Century
When I called her last night for comment, she pointed me to a quick piece she posted in response at her site, BlackBoxVoting.org, on Thursday, describing the revelation as “Bizarre. Odd. Stunning.”
The book is now available for free download on her website as she’s working on several new books, including what she told me was to be a “completely revised and updated version of Black Box Voting for 2016.”
“As I thought about it, I couldn’t understand how Osama could really have gotten his hands on a physical copy of the book,” she said. “Only about 800 physical copies went out, though by now we’ve had well over half a million downloads of it. The only time physical copies were available, it was only 2 1/2 years after the Sept. 11 attack, and Osama was supposedly hiding in a cave having dialysis or something.” She says it’s likely that Bin Laden had one of the freely available Internet versions of the book.
In 2004, she notes, during the Bush Administration, someone from D.C. had requested a copy of the book “for the White House Library”. Harris added, “If the White House Library still has it then I guess the book is on Obama’s bookshelf and Osama’s bookshelf. Quite a demographic spread.”
With a nod to Palast and some of the others on the list, she told me, “It’s good company to be in.” She added: “It looked to me from his reading list, he was looking at how fucked up the Western World really is.”
Maybe so. But recall the warnings from the CIA’s Stigall to that EAC-convened panel, warning of “all of the things that foreign actors try and do to effect the outcome of the election long before Election Day.”
“I’ve referred a lot to hackers in this presentation,” he said at the time. “I’m not really concerned about the 18-year old wannabes. I’m concerned about the 28 or the 38-year old folks who have been doing this a long time and who may be under contract for some other organization. In other words, an organized structured effort to throw an election.”
Now who would possibly want to do that?
(Snail mail support to “Brad Friedman, 7095 Hollywood Blvd., #594 Los Angeles, CA 90028” always welcome too!)
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If the White House Library doesn’t still have that copy, then is it possible that Osama wound up with Bush’s copy? Hmm.
Hard to believe they get away with this nonsense, almost as if they are not even trying.
This is a list of books that must be close to truth, as CIA doesn’t like them and wants to see them burned.
Regarding Osama, he long, long dead before.
And to think that some writers consider the bin Laden bookshelf to be a testament to American transparency (LA Times).
Another thought: the list may be the propagandist version of “here is what bin Laden reads, so if you are of this ilk, you could be unAmerican.”
By propagandist, I mean those we have to trust to believe this was a real list in a real bin Laden pad.
Corrupting an American Presidential election can buy you the commander-in-chief of the world’s most substantial military.
Do it once our elections are fully computer-based, and there will be no paper trail to confirm suspicions. Yet academics and corporations, including “election integrity advocates,” continue to work on internet-based voting. War is peace, up is down, politics is never what it seems, and people are incredibly stupid.
Compare our willingness to spend on the military with our willingness to spend on elections.
Mitch Trachtenberg @5 writes:
Aren’t the two forms of spending symbiotic? The military industrial complex spends money on elections so they will reap huge returns via public spending on the military. Then a small percentage of the huge profits from previous military spending is reinvested in the next election cycle, creating a black hole down which American tax dollars forever disappear.
Oh. My. God. Not sure what to make of this news – I’m both giddy and slightly skeptical. But HEY – no such thing as BAD PR…right? (Good on Bev!) And FWIW, I think “Obama has a copy, and Osama had a copy” should be the tag line for her new edition.
(Thanks for the post, Brad! Circulatin’ ya..as is my tendency.)
“Among them, amusingly enough, were “9/11 conspiracy theory” books.”
Couldn’t stop laughing. Really amusing – here, the guy who did it, was reading nonsense about detonations, free fall, “have it pulled”, etc, etc – you know, all the really weird and wild stuff leftists nutcases come up with.
Good to see you have both feet on the ground Brad.
Good point Brad. Keep the jokes coming.
Louis @ 8 said:
I’ll let Alex Jones — currently at work to prevent the “Jade Helm 15” imminent “federal government takeover of Texas” — know what a “leftist” he is.
Ernest,
I’d meant “willingness to spend on election administration,” but mis-stated “willingness to spend on elections.”
I think the greatest threat of a computer-stolen election comes from the United States spy agencies and their fan-boys, and I suspect they are working behind the scenes to make internet voting more palatable.
I would put zero faith in any claim of cryptographic protection.
I also feel the leaders of these agencies have already demonstrated their willingness to ignore the Constitution and other law. I can easily see them “saving America” by preventing the election of a President who failed to see the threat, and the vital importance of our military, our defense contractors, and our spy agencies.