As a result of Florida 2000, some Americans concluded that paper ballots simply couldn't be counted, even though businesses, banks, racetracks, lottery systems, and others count and deal with paper all the time. Instead, paperless computerized voting systems (Direct Recording Electronic or DREs) were touted as the solution to "the Florida problem". Election officials in the U.S. were told that DREs in the long run would be cheaper than alternative voting systems. They also were told that DREs had been extensively tested and that the certification process guaranteed that the machines were reliable and secure. No mention was made of the costs ballot design, of pre-election testing, and of secure storage of DREs; nothing was said about the threat of hidden malicious code; no mention was made of the inadequacy of the testing and certification processes, to say nothing of the difficulty of creating bug-free software. Why were independent computer security experts not consulted about such a major and fundamental change in how elections are held? Why were some election officials and policy makers hostile when computer security experts warned of the risks of computerized voting to the point of accusing computer scientists of being "fear mongers" and Luddites? How could Harris Miller, the President of the Information Technology Association of America, a lobbying organization that has received compensation from voting machine vendors, claim on Election Day 2004 that, "Electronic voting machine issues that have been cited are related to human error, process missteps or unsubstantiated reports"? How would he know? Why would anyone listen to him?
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