Fitrakis v. Husted et al

Filing 3

MOTION for Temporary Restraining Order by Plaintiff Robert J Fitrakis. [ELECTION ISSUE(S) CITED] (Attachments: # 1 Affidavit, # 2 Exhibit A, # 3 Exhibit B, # 4 Exhibit C, # 5 Exhibit D, # 6 Affidavit, # 7 Attachment 1, # 8 Attachment 2, # 9 Attachment 3, # 10 Attachment 4, # 11 Attachment 5) (jcw1)

Declaration of James “Jim” March

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I, JAMES “JIM” MARCH, hereby declare:

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I make the following declaration regarding Ohio's election processes.

I have

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personal knowledge of the matters set forth below, and, if called upon to do

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so, would testify competently thereto.

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1) I have extensive professional experience working with computer technology

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since 1984.

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personal and professional work on election systems) totals approximately 17

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years and includes computer technical support, systems administration,

My experience in the computer industry (completely separate from

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technical writing, training and security analysis.

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and support certifications for Novell and IBM networking components, and have

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received a broad range of ongoing industry training through my career in high-

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tech computer industry.

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I hold authorized install

In recent years, I have used my experience to provide

technical assistance to persons and organizations active in the analysis of
computer-based voting systems.

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2) Beginning in June of 2003 I was given access to a variety of materials
related to Diebold Election Systems Incorporated (“Diebold”) and their
corporate ancestors Global Election Systems Inc. and Spectrum Print and Mail.
These materials were provided to me primarily by writer/activist Bev Harris,
who obtained them from a public, unsecured Internet site run by Diebold.

The

first batch of materials obtained by Ms. Harris in January 2003 included
running program files, a variety of election data files, system manuals,
source code for some components, internal corporate memos (some marked “not
for customer review”), industry-specific documents and the like.

This

material included functional copies of the Diebold “central tabulator”
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software known as GEMS – Global Election Management Software.
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3) After I assisted Ms. Harris in sorting through the material she had
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obtained from the public, unsecured Diebold website, she posted much of this
material, including the GEMS tabulator software code, on a public website.
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Declaration of James “Jim” March

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4) In the years since I have testified in numerous court cases, the most

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recent in a mandamus and injunction action in Pima County AZ on Nov. 1st 2012.

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My testimony is available and online at: http://youtu.be/IFY1iwE2qzI

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5) I currently sit on the Pima County Election Integrity Commission, an

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official advisory body to the Pima County Board of Supervisors.

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unpaid position I meet in accordance with AZ's open meetings laws.

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hold a position of member of the board of directors, Southern Arizona chapter,

In this
I also

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ACLU, and I am a founding and current board member at

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http://blackboxvoting.org – a nationally known 501(c)3 organization which

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investigates and comments on electronic voting issues.

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declaration on behalf of any of these named organizations.

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I do not write this

I am in possession of an electronic copy of a document titled “AGREEMENT
BETWEEN THE OHIO SECRETARY OF STATE AND ELECTION SYSTEMS AND SOFTWARE LLC”.
There is a contract number of “2013-004”.

It is 28 pages long, in PDF format

from what appears to be original scanned paper documents.

There is no obvious

evidence of tampering with the document – the resolution, fonts and other
formatting/stylistic issues are consistent throughout.

For the purposes of

this declaration I will assume this document to be accurate and I will comment
on it on that basis.

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6) This document purports to describe a custom software application created by
Election Systems and Software (“ES&S”) that will have the following
characteristics:
a) It will run on the primary central tabulator computers that add up the

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vote totals for each county that is already an ES&S customer.
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b) It will have access to the central tabulator database, extracting
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information into a very simple, standard data format known as “comma
separated values” or .CSV.

These .CSV files will contain actual, live vote
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Declaration of James “Jim” March

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totals organized most likely by precinct, original voting method (precinct,

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mail-in, early voting, provisional voting, etc.) and vote totals for

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candidates, issues, etc.

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7) For a number of reasons, I believe that this custom software is not

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necessary for the conduct of elections and is in fact highly dangerous – the

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presence of this software significantly reduces the odds that the election

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results (on a county or statewide level) will be legally and/or

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constitutionally correct.

My analysis follows.

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8) First, I have examined the election results created by the “normal” (or

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“built in”) election reporting tools included with the standard, certified

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ES&S central tabulator application.

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The results reports so created are

entirely adequate to figure out who won and lost, on a precinct or
jurisdiction-wide level.

The standard, certified ES&S system can also produce

electronic data file results that can be written from the central tabulator to
a CD-ROM or other such media for uploading to the Internet.

Transcribing the

results for use by some other system might take a little bit of time but is a
simple enough matter.

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9) Like any modern election management system the vote totals (along with
candidate/race names, precinct numbers and the like) are stored in a database.
ES&S uses a variant of SQL – Structured Query Language – which can be read to
and written from a number of different programs.

The situation is the same

with world processing files – a Microsoft Word .DOC document file can also be
read by and worked with in WordPerfect, AbiWord, OpenOffice, LibreOffice and

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others.
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10) What ES&S has chosen to do here is extremely dangerous and exactly what
you'd want to do if you wanted to plant a “cheat” onto the central tabulator.
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Declaration of James “Jim” March

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Their custom application written in a variant of the COBOL programming

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language would have full contact with the central tabulator database on both a

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read and write basis, while running on the same computer as where the “master

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vote records” (the central tabulator database – the “crown jewels” of the

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whole process) are stored.

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11) Under this structure a case of accidental damage to the “crown jewels” of

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the election data is possible.

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using uncertified, untested software would be child's play.

A case of deliberate tampering of that data

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12) What they should have done is perform the normal export of the election

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results by way of the standard process built into the central tabulator, print

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that out to paper, then write a program that runs on some other computer to

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takes the electronic output from the standard central tabulator software as an
“input” and then spit out industry-standard .CSV data as an “output”.

In this

scenario the new custom software to create .CSV files could not possibly
change the “crown jewels” data because it doesn't have access to the original
source records – only a copy.

And if that new custom application messed up

and mis-reported results, a quick eyeball check against the standard central
tabulator results would reveal the issue in a matter of minutes.

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13) What they have done instead is criminally negligent just from a standpoint
of data security.

To double-check the results after this new system is

implemented you'd have to go back to the original paper and/or any remaining
“poll tapes” from the precincts (“cash register” type paper strips containing
that precinct's vote totals).

“Poll tapes” from the mail-in vote process may

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not even exist – most systems feed mail-in votes from scanners straight into
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the central tabulator with no independent record of the vote.

In either case

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there would need to be public records access to either the poll tapes (if they
exist or new ones haven't been faked up on a small PC printer meant for cash
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Declaration of James “Jim” March

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registers) or the original paper ballots.

There has been widespread media

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complaints about the lack of access to either sort of public records in Ohio

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(esp. the 2004 election) and elsewhere.

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access to those records would allow alteration or replacement of those

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documents.

Common public records delays in

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14) In conclusion, the idea of producing industry-standard .CSV data files of

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election results is not inherently bad.

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however is unspeakably stupid, excessively complex and insanely risky.

The method of execution chosen
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medical terms it is the equivalent of doing open heart surgery as part of a

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method of removing somebody's hemorrhoids.

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either the dumbest Information Technology “professional” in the US or has

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criminal intent against the Ohio election process - and if I were to guess it

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Whoever came up with this idea is

would be the latter.

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Pursuant to 28 U.S.C. §1746, I declare under penalty of perjury that the
foregoing is true and correct.
Executed this 3rd day of November, 2012 at Tucson, Arizona.

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Jim March

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