Hacking Democracy

When touch-screen voting machines are installed in her community, Bev Harris decides to do some research. Harris discovers that black boxes aren't exactly fool-proof—-far from it. As technology experts attest, the code is vulnerable to manipulation. Worse yet, after-the-fact changes are undetectable. So, Harris forms a grass-roots organization and proceeds to dig deeper. They reveal a system riddled with inaccuracy, incompetent election officials, and electronic voting machines that can be programmed to steal elections. They take on voting machine manufacturer Diebold and go dumpster diving at a county election official's office, uncovering evidence of miscounted votes. Over the course of three years, they find several troubling instances of corporate malfeasance and computer malfunction, and her findings lead the State of California to file criminal charges against Diebold. 81 min. Download here.