The DRE
Tampering Challenge
I do not
believe it is feasible in practice to tamper undetectably with a well-designed
direct-recording electronic (DRE) voting machine. To demonstrate my conviction, I am willing to
bet $10,000 at 2:1 odds with anyone under the following conditions:
1. I put up $10,000; you put up $5,000. The combined $15,000 is held in an escrow
account.
2. I choose the DRE machine and lend it to you. You have one month to do anything you want to
it. At the end of one month you bring it
back to me.
3. I get one day (24 hours) to inspect it. I can do anything I want to it during that
time. At the end of one day I will state
either: (a) you have modified this machine and here is an example of what you
changed; or (b) this machine will count votes correctly.
4. If I’m right, I get the $15,000. If I’m wrong, you get the $15,000. If I choose (a), I have to demonstrate at
least one modification you made. If I
can’t do that, I lose. If I choose (b),
you have to show me a sequence of votes, within the operating parameters of the
machine, that will not be counted correctly. If you can’t do that, you lose.
5. Determination of the winner will be by an
independent observer agreeable to both parties.
If we cannot agree in advance on such a person, the challenge does not
take place. The observer will have
control over the escrow account.
6. Rebecca Mercuri has
claimed that this challenge is ineffective since you might have to engage in
illegal activities to discover how the machine works. This is not correct since you will be
operating under a letter of permission from the vendor of the machine granting
you the right to disassemble, reverse engineer, or defeat copyright protection
mechanisms (if any), etc. You will not
be given plans, diagrams, schematics, flowcharts, or code.
7. The loser pays all costs of conducting the challenge, both sides to deposit $5K in escrow to cover anticipated expenses.
8. Except for
provisions 6 and 7, this challenge has been in effect since 1996 under the
above terms and no one has accepted it.
Michael I.
Shamos
August 2, 2004