The election is next week, and some of us will be voting on machines that may or may not properly register our selections and will also leave no paper record of any kind that might be used to clear things up in the event of miscast votes. For us, democracy is at the mercy of any possible malfunction.
MIT’s Technology Review flags this breakdown of those states that have entire districts that rely entirely on direct recording electronic voting machines (DREs), the paperless voting technology that has proved controversial in the past.
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“Several states rely on computerized voting machines that don’t print out a paper record that can be verified by voters and recounted by election officials if necessary,” the Review states. “Such machines are in use in 16 states, as indicated in red on the map above. Computer scientists and fair-election advocates have warned for years that potential software malfunctions are possible threats to the integrity of elections in counties and states that use these machines.”