E-voting vendor blocks security audit with legal threats

New Jersey election officials have scrapped plans for an independent audit of Union County voting machines because the vendor, Sequoia Voting Systems, says that unauthorized third-party security reviews would violate the county’s license agreement. Sequoia threatened the county with legal action when it learned that election officials were planning to send the machines to a respected Princeton University computer scientist for analysis.

California to recertify insecure voting machines
Sequoia voting machines used in five counties in New Jersey during the recent primaries exhibited unusual errors and emitted electronic tallies that were inconsistent with the total counts from the paper trail. Sequoia claims that the contradicting numbers are the result of operator error rather than a technical flaw. Election officials viewed Sequoia’s explanation with skepticism and decided that the irregularity justified an independent review of the machines.  Read more 

Um, anyone care to explain this to me? WTF is going on?

TRENTON, July 1 — Unable to break a bitter impasse with the New Jersey Legislature on a new budget, Gov. Jon S. Corzine signed an executive order today that shut down the state’s government for the first time in its history.
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