Zachary Quinto Explains How To Hack An Election

Hey there, I'm Zachary Quinto,

and I am gonna explain everything you need to know

about hacking electronic voting machines.

(dramatic music)

As we approach Election Day, how vulnerable are we, really?

What are the problems?

Most of these machines are running Windows XP

for which Microsoft has not released a security patch

since April of 2014.

Most of these were installed

after the Bush-Gore recount debacle.

Though there's no evidence

of direct voting machine interference so far,

researchers have determined that these machines

are susceptible to malware, or equally if not more alarming

a well-timed denial-of-service attack.

So if you have machines that aren't working

that could create problems

that prevent people from voting at all.

The extent of vulnerability is not just hypothetical.

Late last summer Virginia decertified thousands

of insecure WINVote machines.

As one security researcher put it,

anyone within half a mile could have modified

every single vote undetected with no expertise.

The WINVote scenario is an extreme case,

but not an isolated one.

What's the good news?

First, it's important to realize

that electronic voting machines aren't as commonplace

as one might assume.

Three quarters of the country will vote

on paper ballots this fall.

Only five states, Delaware, Georgia, Louisiana,

South Carolina, and New Jersey,

use direct-record electronic or DRE machines exclusively

but plenty of other states use electronic voting

in some capacity.

Verifiedvoting.org has a handy map of who votes

using what equipment.

For what it's worth, electronic voting machines

have been this hack-able in previous elections

and there's no indication

that there's ever been any interference.

The even better news is the three states

that may decide the election, Florida, Ohio,

and Pennsylvania all have voting machines

that are in relatively good shape.

Suspicion that the results could be rigged, however,

may be the real danger of electronic voting systems.

If you can't guarantee that there was no tampering

and not every state can, it might not matter

if any actually took place.