Diebold is not alone

Why War? has links and information leaked from Diebold Election Systems’ internal mailing lists. Check this out:

“I have become increasingly concerned about the apparent lack of concern over the practice of writing contracts to provide products and services which do not exist and then attempting to build these items on an unreasonable timetable with no written plan, little to no time for testing, and minimal resources. It also seems to be an accepted practice to exaggerate our progress and functionality to our customers and ourselves then make excuses at delivery time when these products and services do not meet expectations.”

Some or all of that probably sounds familiar to anyone who’s been doing development for a while. I definitely would hold critical systems like voting systems to a much higher standard than that. The groups responsible for certifying voting machines should really torture test them and prod at them for vulnerabilities. I get the feeling that not enough of that kind of testing has gone on.