Smartmatic bails from e-voting biz after media heat

Smartmatic, of Sequoia Voting Systems infamy, is taking its ball and going home, after becoming fed up with the intense public scrutiny its voting systems have received. "Given the current climate of the United States marketplace with so much public debate over foreign ownership of firms in an area that is viewed as critical U.S. infrastructure -- election technology -- we feel it is in both companies' best interests to move forward as separate entities with separate ownership," said Antonio Mugica, president of Smartmatic. Of course, we really would've just been happy with a voting system that didn't, say, have the ability to register multiple votes per voter, but we suppose that's too much to ask. A big stink has been raised in regards to Smartmatic's Venezuelan ownership and some supposed ties to Venezuelan president Hugo Chavez, and it appears Smartmatic isn't up for the fight. Smartmatic had previously agreed to an investigation by the US Treasury Department, but now that they're putting Sequoia on the auction block, they've withdrawn from the review process. Any takers?

[Via Techdirt]

[eflyer @ Dec 28th 2006 8:30AM]

Unfortunetly these systems are only marginally better than the current systems we have used in the US for decades. Registering multiple votes currently happens with the old systems ya know.

I don't see a day anytime soon where e-voting systems will be widely accepted. There is always a group of people that would rather stay with the current system because it's much easier to manipulate than a system who's OS can be updated to remove flaws.

[Carlton B. @ Dec 28th 2006 9:53AM]

Notwithstanding the fact that security around the whole electronic voting process should be tight and that people should trust the results, what surprises me is that despite the intense scrutiny and probing into these systems, not one entrepreneurial type has been able to design a better system using today's technology.

[Platy @ Dec 28th 2006 11:52AM]

I don't know about Sequoia systems but I invite you to take a look at Smartmatic's own technology. As far as I am concerned they have addressed every e-voting issue that has ever come up in the machines they provided for the Venezuelan elections: paper trail, multiple printout of counting votes, machines disconnected from the net during the elections, code auditing, etc. It is possible to make e-voting systems that work, the US authorities just don't want to hear about it. In fact, if you look at the recent Venezuelan election. The fact that in the recent very polarized Venezuelan elections the opposition accepted the results is in part credit to this voting system.

[NHAnimator @ Dec 28th 2006 12:39PM]

I vote this a quality story.

[NHAnimator @ Dec 28th 2006 12:39PM]

I vote this a quality story.

[NHAnimator @ Dec 28th 2006 12:39PM]

I vote this a quality story.

[DeaDGoD @ Dec 28th 2006 3:48PM]

Why is everyone so up in arms about the electronic voting? We all know that we're going to be doing e-voting eventually (that is, if Bush don't find a way to become supreme dictator before the next election...). It must just be because of previous flaws, and that it's a non-american company....

[rhavenj @ Dec 28th 2006 6:35PM]

wowowo hold it. Don't go saying the Venezuelans accepted the polarized results. The people did not. The only ones who did are the politicians, who no longer reflect the views of the Venezuelan people.