http://www.newsreview.com/issues/sacto/2004-02-26/news.aspNews
Hacking Diebold
Sacramento activist Jim March takes on touch-screen voting
By Jeff Kearns
Photo By Larry Dalton
You can take Jim March’s voting rights when you pry them from his cold, dead fingers.
The dreary hallway outside of Sacramento Superior Court Judge Raymond Cadei’s fourth-floor courtroom was packed with attorneys, activists and reporters--everyone except the two guys responsible for bringing the whole group there from all parts of the state. The February 18 hearing was for a lawsuit filed by Sacramento activist Jim March, who’s recently become a leading agitator for electronic-voting security. His lawsuit, charging that touch-screen voting machines made by Diebold Inc. are full of holes that “pose a grave threat to the security and integrity of the statewide elections to be held on March 2,” had the potential to throw the election into chaos. Specifically, March wanted the judge to order that the 19 counties using Diebold voting systems be required to add safeguards to prevent tampering.
Secretary of State Kevin Shelley, who also was named as a defendant, issued a statement saying he “appreciates the concerns raised by the plaintiffs and shares many of them” but is only focused on the March 2 election for now. Earlier this month, Shelley issued a directive telling county registrars who use certain machines to take additional security measures. Registrars in 10 counties, however, wrote back to say they refused because the stepped-up security would be too expensive and too much work. The lawsuit filed by March cited the “open revolt” as evidence of the need to “reduce the risk of vote tampering.” Huddled at the end of the hall were four high-priced attorneys for Ohio-based Diebold, which grosses $2 billion a year selling automated teller machines, biometric technology, ID-card systems and other gizmos. Attorneys for several counties that use Diebold machines stood nearby, waiting to argue against any interference in their election processes. Elections watchdog Kim Alexander was there,
as was Bev Harris, an author and activist famous for rabble-rousing against Diebold. Jeremiah Akin, a Riverside programmer who runs a voting-security Web site, also showed up. When a reporter asked Akin if Jim March had shown up, he said with a smile, “You’ll know him when you see him.”
Akin was right. Just then, a man in a black cowboy hat, dark blazer, bolo tie, black pants and cowboy boots rounded the corner. At 6-foot-4 and 280 pounds, the mustachioed, bespectacled 37-year-old March was impossible to miss. After 15 years of doing tech support and network administration in the Bay Area, where he grew up in the coastal San Mateo County towns of Pacifica and Half Moon Bay, March moved to Sacramento last year to embark on a new career as a gun lobbyist. He’s a registered Republican with a Libertarian bent. He lives across the street from the Capitol. He wears the brim of his hat pinned back on one side--“For the cell phone,” he said. To demonstrate, he took out his cell, extended the antenna and held it to his uncovered ear.
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After 45 minutes, Cadei announced that he would deny the request for a temporary restraining order. “The petitioners have failed to present any evidence of any actual threat,” he said. “At this point, it’s merely speculative.” As everyone filed out, March grabbed his hat and turned to leave. “The judge misunderstood what this was even about,” he grumbled. “The judge bought into the county’s line of arguments that it was Armageddon.” March said he’d keep fighting for better security. He wouldn’t say what his next move would be, only that there would be one. “The real story about what really happened here will come out in the next two months,” he said.
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