Researchers hack India's voting machines

[Dave Farber <dfarber () me com>]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: Joseph Lorenzo Hall <joehall () gmail com>
> Date: April 28, 2010 7:28:06 AM EDT
> To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net>
> Subject: Researchers hack India's voting machines

> http://indiaevm.org/
>
> Security Analysis of India's Electronic Voting Machines
>
> J. Alex Halderman, Hari K. Prasad, Rop Gonggrijp
>
> Abstract: Elections in India are conducted almost exclusively using
> electronic voting machines developed over the past two decades by a
> pair of government-owned companies. These devices, known in India as
> EVMs, have been praised for their simple design, ease of use, and
> reliability, but recently they have also been criticized because of
> widespread reports of election irregularities. Despite this criticism,
> many details of the machines' design have never been publicly
> disclosed, and they have not been subjected to a rigorous, independent
> security evaluation. In this paper, we present a security analysis of
> a real Indian EVM obtained from an anonymous source. We describe the
> machine's design and operation in detail, and we evaluate its
> security, in light of relevant election procedures. We conclude that
> in spite of the machine's simplicity and minimal trusted computing
> base, it is vulnerable to serious attacks that can alter election
> results and violate the secrecy of the ballot. We demonstrate two
> attacks, implemented using custom hardware, which could be carried out
> by dishonest election insiders or other criminals with only brief
> physical access to the machines. This case study contains important
> lessons for Indian elections and for electronic voting security more
> generally.
>
> -- 
> Joseph Lorenzo Hall
> ACCURATE Postdoctoral Research Associate
> UC Berkeley School of Information
> Princeton Center for Information Technology Policy
> http://josephhall.org/



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