Talk:Diebold

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[edit] NH Primary

Don't think that there's any basis for stating there's a discrepancy to be honest. Someone would have to do some serious investigation work to prove it anyway. Ironically, this part of the article was actually removed before I could remove it. --24.61.183.36 (talk) 04:19, 10 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Old messages

How 'bout this latest news: Diebold has a single key design that opens every voting machine, and they posted a picture of the key on their own site. The key can be, and was, duplicated from that photo, and as has been proven by Princeton, all a hacker needs is 60 seconds with an open machine to infect it, and all connected machines, with a virus. [1] and [2]

Question: How wide spread is the use of diebold voting machines? Anyone have info on this?

I have seen them as far away as small ferry ports in Thailand, Image:Http://img291.imageshack.us/img291/7451/operationstatusvb8.jpg

The following quotes are really flamebait.

I don't see what makes them flamebait or why they should all be deleted. They are certainly shocking and funny (in a dark sort of way) but so what? They are accurate, pertinent and revealing. I'd like to see at least a few of them go back, perhaps in a new section near the end like "Quotations from Internal Diebold Documents" --LeeHunter 00:37, 7 Aug 2004 (UTC)

The may also be copyright, though fair use could cover our use. Noting that there is controversy about the election systems is on topic. Noting that documents exist, and links to them is on topic. The exceprts are not - at least not now when they make up the majority of the artical. One good sample might a good idea though.

“Elections are not rocket science. Why is it so hard to get things right! I have never been at any other company that has been so miss [sic] managed.” [3]

“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.” [4]


“I feel that over the next year, if the current management team stays in place, the Global [Election Management System] working environment will continue to be a chaotic mess. Global management has and will be doing the best to keep their jobs at the expense of employees. Unrealistic goals will be placed on current employees, they will fail to achieve them. If Diebold wants to keep things the same for the time being, this will only compound an already dysfunctional company. Due to the lack of leadership, vision, and self-preserving nature of the current management, the future growth of this company will continue to stagnate until change comes.” [5]

“[T]he bugzilla historic data recovery process is complete. Some bugs were irrecoverably lost and they will have to be re-found and re-submitted, but overall the loss was relatively minor.” [6]

“28 of 114 or about 1 in 4 precincts called in this AM with either memory card issues "please re-insert", units that wouldn't take ballots - even after recycling power, or units that needed to be recycled. We reburned 7 memory cards, 4 of which we didn't need to, but they were far enough away that we didn't know what we'd find when we got there (bad rover communication).” [7]

“If voting could really change things, it would be illegal.” [8]

“I need some answers! Our department is being audited by the County. I have been waiting for someone to give me an explanation as to why Precinct 216 gave Al Gore a minus 16022 when it was uploaded. Will someone please explain this so that I have the information to give the auditor instead of standing here "looking dumb".” [9]

“[...] while reading some of Paranoid Bev’s scribbling.” [10]

“Johnson County, KS will be doing Central Count for their mail in ballots. They will also be processing these ballots in advance of the closing of polls on election day. They would like to log into the Audit Log an entry for Previewing any Election Total Reports. They need this, to prove to the media, as well as, any candidates & lawyers, that they did not view or print any Election Results before the Polls closed. However, if there is a way that we can disable the reporting functionality, that would be even better.” [11] (emphasis added)

“4K Smart cards which had never been previously programmed are being recognized by the Card Manager as manager cards. When a virgin card from CardLogix is inserted into a Spyrus (have tried CM-0-2-9 and CM-1-1-1) the prompt "Upgrade Mgr Card?" is displayed. Pressing the ENTER key creates a valid manager card. This happens in Admin mode and Election mode.” [12] One Member's Position


“[I am] committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the President next year.” Walden O'Dell, CEO of Diebold, in mid-2003 invitation to Republican fundraiser at his home in September[13] 142.177.168.90 17:27, 19 Jun 2004 (UTC)

This article is not an article at all. It's a journalistic hit piece. I do not like black box voting at all and Diebold sounds like horrible (not to mention doomed) technology to me (I prefer paper or punch card systems), but this article is so POV and so poorly written that I could barely scratch the surface when trying to NPOV it. I strongly suspect it would be better to throw it out and start over again. Has anyone remotely capable of dispassionate writing authored any of this article? Daniel Quinlan 09:52, Nov 10, 2003 (UTC)

Working on the NPOV edits (more like rewrite). I have a question about the statement that "The software architecture common to both [Election Systems & Software, Inc. and Diebold Election Systems, Inc.] is a creation of Mr. Urosevich's company I-Mark." I can't find any support for this statement, and I get the sense that it is a misconception. Can anyone confirm or deny this statement? I'll look into it further later on. Right now, I'm going to sleep. -- Anthony DiPierro 09:12, 17 Dec 2003 (UTC)

Jim March, an electronic voting activist, has made a number of posts on slashdot with some excellent information: [14] [15] [16]. They include a lot of interesting information, like how the head programmer of the GEMS system was previously arrested for computer-aided accounting fraud. This should probably be integrated into the article in an NPOV manner. --NeuronExMachina 07:42, 8 Sep 2004 (UTC)

[edit] from article

Smuj added :

In a fundraising letter to Republicans, Walden O'Dell wrote he was, "committed to helping Ohio deliver its electoral votes to the president [G.W.Bush]."

While this is true, it shouldn't just be stuck at the top of the article like it was. --Whosyourjudas (talk) 02:02, 5 Nov 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Diebold Election Systems

Is there any reason to have a separate article at Diebold Election Systems? It would make sense if there were a lot to say about Diebold relating to its other divisions or general corporate history or whatever, but the Diebold article is entirely about voting machines. I don't know how much anyone would ever be moved to write about Diebold's ATM machines and the like. I suggest merging the DES information here and converting Diebold Election Systems into a redirect. JamesMLane 07:21, 19 Dec 2004 (UTC)

Makes sense to me, Diebold is encyclopedia worthy only because of DES. --Zenyu 13:54, Dec 21, 2004 (UTC)
I don't think we should do away with the Diebold article - it should just describe the company from a NPOV. The controversy is really about the election systems division -- their ATMs aren't controversial, right? So we should move the stuff about voting machines to Diebold Election Systems and merge, I believe.Bryan 16:46, 14 December 2005 (UTC)
Somehow we ended up with both articles, and the same material in both. As someone points out below, the DES is only a few percent of the company's business. OTOH, that is the portion which generates the news and controversy and which overwhelms the rest of the article. We can decide again if they should be merged (for real this time) or not. Perhaps it would be easier to edit the DES material with it as a separate entity. It's poorly organized now, neither chronological nor thematic. This is an election year so our DES coverage will become increasingly important. Cheers, -Willmcw 01:30, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

I pulled *this* tidbit out for grammar and verification reasons. I would like a cite for Procomp being involved with Diebold Election systems, and this should probably go in the Diebold Election Systems article. "The electronic voting technology was supported by his subsidiary in South America, PROCOMP, which have the know-how of this since the '90."

[edit] Passive voice etc

From the article:

The term "black box voting" was coined to describe machines that, like those made by Diebold, use closed source software, do not print paper ballots, and do not use any reliable digital authentication techniques.

Who coined it? -- Bruno Latour (1987) uses the term "blackboxing" (as one word) to describe the process of obscuring the process of knowledge making.

Some experts claim that this structure is easily compromised...

Which experts?

I urge anyone who can answer these questions to do so, in order to Wikipedia:Avoid weasel terms. Graue 23:48, 28 May 2005 (UTC)

Our own article on Black Box Voting http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Box_Voting both notes the name of the coiner of the term and provides a semi-credible cite. -Anon

http://www.tallahassee.com/mld/tallahassee/11811936.htm

This ref link at the bottom is dead. Couldn't find a replacement. Not sure if quote should be removed if it has no ref.

Thanks for noticing that. I replaced it with a different link to the same article. -Willmcw 17:54, 15 September 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diebold safes?

Any connection to the Diebold Corporation in Ohio that Eliot Ness was chairman of after Capone was nabbed? -Fuzzy 20:33, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

Never mind. I see the brief mention up top of them manufacturing vaults. I lost it in the massive tide of voting controversy. -Fuzzy 20:37, 14 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diebold CEO leaves (someone add this please)

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Diebold_CEO_resigns_after_reports_of_1212.html

--grazon 21:19, 13 December 2005 (UTC)

In your article the CEO did leave. The threatened lawsuit is mentioned. There is now a PR Newswire article about the *filed* lawsuit we could link: http://phx.corporate-ir.net/phoenix.zhtml?c=106584&p=irol-newsArticle&ID=796582&highlight=

I don't know if that last link is appropriate for the article, so I'm not adding it.

[edit] Notice The Relative Financial Importance of Election Systems to Diebold

If you look at Diebold's Q1 '05 SEC filing, you'll observe that election systems are about 2.4% of Diebold's global sales revenue. It might be worthwhile to put this surprising tidbit in the article. Cite:

Excerpt from Q1 '05 SEC filing:

Revenue Summary by Products and Services


                                          For the quarter ended
                                                March 31:
   
                                         -----------------------
                                                  2005      2004
   
                                         ------------- ---------
 Financial self-service:
 Products                                    $ 173,347 $ 154,262
 Services                                      215,156   207,495
   
                                         ------------- ---------
 Total financial self-service                  388,503   361,757
 Security:
 Products                                       62,535    57,415
 Services                                       83,340    64,210
   
                                         ------------- ---------
 Total security                                145,875   121,625
   
                                         ------------- ---------
 Total financial self-service  security       534,378   483,382
 Election systems                                5,856    14,873
   
                                         ------------- ---------
 Total Revenue                               $ 540,234 $ 498,255

Cite: http://finance.yahoo.com/q/sec?s=dbd&partner=mf -> Click on 5-May-05 10-Q Quarterly Report Full Filing at EDGAR


Please note that this section was added by what seems to be a Diebold-owned machine. If you look at contributions of this IP, you'll notice deletion of sections critical of the company, and a wholesale page replacement. I find this data highly suspect- I'm certain yearly sales or even 4-year sales of election systems would not be proportionate to this "surprising tidbit". Election system contracts may not be closed every quarter, which could explain this particular figure. That, and Diebold wouldn't be the first company (or least likely) to cook their books. What was the "contributor" trying to pull here, and can we remove this section? MJKazin 18:30, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
There is no prohibition on company employees posting material on article talk pages. The above material is publicly available and is audited. Let's not go overboard. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 18:58, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Where's the headquarters

A while back I corrected the location of the Diebold headquarters in this article, changing it from North Canton to Green. Today it was changed back, with a reference to Diebold's own web page. I'll explain why I changed it to Green. The address for the headquarters on the web page is

Diebold World Headquarters Canton, Ohio, USA 5995 Mayfair Road North Canton, OH 44720

This appears to indicate that the headquarters is in North Canton. I looked up the address in maps.google.com, though, and found that the location is just north of Mt. Pleasant Rd. Unfortunately I can't find an online map with boundaries, but I looked in my Commercial Survey map of Akron, Summit and Portage Counties and found that Mt. Pleasant Road forms the boundary between Summit and Stark counties, with Green being to the north and Jackson Township to the south. North Canton is south of that line. In fact, the road is only called Mayfair in Green. It is called Pittsburg Rd. south south of Mt. Pleasant. What happened was that Green is only recently a city, and before that it was served by a variety of post offices outside of its boundaries. This area is served by the North Canton post office, but the headquarters physically resides in Green. --Beirne 00:48, 30 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Diebold HQ Location

Whoops. I did the edit to North Canton. I'm actually in Green, and I never realized Diebold HQ was as well. They also have a satellite office (a field service branch) in Green, which humorously enough has a Uniontown ZIP code. My sincerest apologies.

[edit] Why John Diebold and Choicepoint in the article?

The See Also lines include reference to John Diebold and Choicepoint. Is John Diebold the business management expert from the same family that founded the Diebold, Inc. in this article? I spent 15 minutes Googling and found no direct link mentioned between the two. One article discussed Diebold voting machines and John Diebold together, but did not establish a direct relationship. It makes sense to have a link to him in any case to steer the misdirected, I suppose, but it might make sense to have a disclaimer if there isn't a relationship, lest we confuse someone. Choicepoint does come up in discussions of voting irregularities, etc. Perhaps the Choicepoint link belongs on the Diebold Election Systems page?

I agree. The John Diebold of the article seems to have had nothing to do with the subject of this article. Choicepoint is only tangentially related to DES, as part of the election-related controversy even though they do not make voting systems. -Willmcw 05:04, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
What a strange coincidence. John Diebold apparently was an early supporter of automated teller machines, so I assumed there was a link. Captain Zyrain 18:26, 12 October 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Voting machine

They have a voting machine called "Diebold AccuVote TS". http://politics.slashdot.org/politics/06/07/31/1646246.shtml

[edit] National Election Data Archive information

The National Election Data Archive, headed by Kathy Dopp, keeps current with information, articles and analysis on the Diebold machines.

Here is the link: National Election Data Archive

[edit] Deletion of electronic voting additions from Jklappenbach

I'm the one who's been putting each new Diebold outrage into the Security Concerns section - so believe me that I'm on your side in this issue. But what's been added is not directly relevant to Diebold [and Soapboxing as well, to be perfectly frank - however much I agree with it], so it really can't stay. I would suggest putting that kind of material into Electronic_voting#Opposition_to_Electronic_Voting. Ribonucleic 00:57, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

The material on the voting belongs in Diebold Election Systems. This article is devoted to the much larger parent company. -Will Beback 04:05, 1 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] ABC News on security concerns

Not sure if this is the right article for it, but ABC News has an article [17] on electronic voting and come security concerns. An interesting quote from a computer security expert:

  • Diebold's "system is utterly unsecured. The entire cyber-security community is begging them to come back to reality and secure our nation's voting."

If the concerns are really that serious then I think the article needs to reflect this.

No, this is not the right article. You want Diebold Election Systems. -Will Beback 03:46, 24 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] DES disambiguation link on top of the page

This link led directly to the Security Concerns section, instead of just the article. I've since fixed it.

[edit] Fair use rationale for Image:Diebold logo.png

Image:Diebold logo.png is being used on this article. I notice the image page specifies that the image is being used under fair use but there is no explanation or rationale as to why its use in Wikipedia articles constitutes fair use. In addition to the boilerplate fair use template, you must also write out on the image description page a specific explanation or rationale for why using this image in each article is consistent with fair use.

Please go to the image description page and edit it to include a fair use rationale. Using one of the templates at Wikipedia:Fair use rationale guideline is an easy way to insure that your image is in compliance with Wikipedia policy, but remember that you must complete the template. Do not simply insert a blank template on an image page.

If there is other other fair use media, consider checking that you have specified the fair use rationale on the other images used on this page. Note that any fair use images uploaded after 4 May, 2006, and lacking such an explanation will be deleted one week after they have been uploaded, as described on criteria for speedy deletion. If you have any questions please ask them at the Media copyright questions page. Thank you.BetacommandBot 02:23, 3 June 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Fair use response

See Image:Diebold logo.png

[edit] Anonymous edits from Diebold

Seems Diebold has some habit of editing wikipedia for their own benifit. May I suggest that someone who knows this article read over & summarize Diebold's past modifications? It'll help everyone recognize them when they eventualyl start using named accounts. JeffBurdges 14:22, 14 August 2007 (UTC)

This seems to be the anon involved. The vandalism occured almost 2 years ago and isn't ongoing (and of course we're under the eye of the media on this), so I don't think wikipedia needs to react. There should be some kind of collaboration though to look through this list and fix any outstanding edits --frotht 17:25, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
Sorry for jumping in with my own two cents, but isn't the fact that Diebold tried to suppress criticism by vandalizing Wikipedia noteworthy? If I were writing a report, say for a high school writing class, the fact that they try to suppress journalistic efforts would be of extreme interest. In fact, I can't imagine their vandalism not being noteworthy. Comments? Sliver 19:58, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
It is noteworthy to the extent that it has been noted in a reliable source, such as Wired. Vandalism that we observe on our own is non-notable and reporting it would be original research. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 20:07, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
The fact that edits were made from someone at Diebold whitewashing Diebold's page at Wikipedia is not, in my estimation, all that notable. Keep in mind that this wasn't the execution of some internal policy, but simply some single individual going to town on the Wikipedia article, probably while they were bored at work. It's often difficult to take a step back in these situations and ask whether this sort of thing is notable, or only feels notable because it lands so close to home. The general rule of thumb I use is, would another encyclopedia mention this in an article about Diebold? Would it belong in an article 100 years from now, looking back at the full sweep of the company's activities? I would say no. JDoorjam JDiscourse 20:49, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
Not notable! Not notable! How the heck can you say that this isn't notable! We don't KNOW that it was someone bored at work making an edit. And why would they? The chances of it getting caught and resulting in bad press for them was too great, and this bored office worker may well have lost his job. But if a higherup was involved, then that would make more sense. I'd say malicious edits to cover up bad press are pretty damn important, and easilly worth a mention. Wikipedia has things of lower importance than this.--Tapok 21:00, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
Doorjam, I don't think your test is a very good one. Wikipedia is not like "other encyclopedias". We have the luxury of including vast amounts of otherwise useful and interesting data that space considerations would kill in a dead-tree encyclopedia. The canonical example, Britannica, can only put so much on a page before it runs into prohibitive printing, editing, paper, and volume costs. We at Wikipedia have none of these. We are free to include anything we find worthy of the idealized encyclopedia -- one not bound by money or size. Are you seriously saying the metric we should apply to ourselves is the same metric by which dead-tree encyclopedias MUST abide by? I sincerely hope this isn't what you're saying, because it's an indefensible position.
I submit that one metric we ought to be using is the metric of relevancy and historical significance. A much better metric than the dead-tree metric is the high school student metric. If it's worthy of a high school report, then it's worthy of Wikipedia (my high school metric is a sufficient, not necessary, condition, of course. A high school student would never reproduce the Kirchhoff diffraction integration details). In any event, I think the original research argument has merit, but I still say the fact that vandalism from the Diebold IP block occurred.
I'm sufficiently on the fence post about this to not fight for it. However, if someone can demonstrate that Diebold has, in the past, engaged in similar behavior in the past, then I think even the "original research" argument falls to pieces. Anyone familiar with similar cases in which Diebold suppressed negative press about itself? Sliver 23:31, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
I doubt the edits are notable unless some news agency reviels the source. You may research the source yourself and write about it at wikinews, but I imagine your trail is cold. People have already categloged these edits below. So everyone can easily see the editor a Diebold emploie might make. And thus they can't hide behind named accounts as easily. I'd say that's all that matters here. JeffBurdges 12:16, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

I can't remember the name of the agency, but didn't the article for a US gov. department include a note of the positive editing done by employees? Alastairward 11:21, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

To their own article? Or generally? JeffBurdges 12:16, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

Hey guys! I'm the Diebold employee that made at least some of the anonymous edits. I was posting from my desk at work while bored. I had just discovered that you didn't have to register with Wikipedia to make edits, and had no clue that there was a rule against a company's employees editing the company's Wiki entry. I must have missed that disclaimer when I made the edits. In fact, I didn't read that there was a rule against if for another 3 months, when it was mentioned on a message board I follow. I don't work in PR, nor am I an executive or shareholder relations person of any type. In fact, I don't manage anyone, nor am I employed by the voting machines division. It was a good fath edit in the spirit of enhancing Wikipedia, and I have to say it hurts my feelings to be accused of vandalism; I wouldn't even lie to protect the company's reputation, much less stoop to vandalism. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.93.244.44 (talk) 02:55, 2 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Conspiracy theory

And this might be the latest effort by Diebold/CIA:

{Also that same month, Diebold was at the center of a scandal involving Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney's victory in the Iowa Straw Poll. In that non-binding poll, it has been reported that at least one Diebold machine has failed resulting in a recount that delayed results.[1] Other information suggests that the reason why the machine "malfunctioned" was to keep candidate Ron Paul from gaining in the polls where an outright victory would lend credibility to his campaign.[2] Meanwhile, an Iowa Independent article points out that Rommey has joked about cheating to win the straw poll.[3]}

All the above talks about is the questionable result of the Iowa Straw Poll and it even includes references.208.107.168.154 17:55, 15 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Major edits from Diebold IPs

This article has been subject to major past edits from Diebold IPs, portraying Diebold in a more favorable light. I have added a COI and disputed tag to the article until this issue is resolved. See here for details: http://wikiscanner.virgil.gr/f.php?ip1=204.151.249.0-255&ip2=208.228.181.0-255&ip3=199.222.74.0-255&ip4=65.196.80.0-255&ip5=206.171.73.0-7&ip6=81.188.24.160-167&ip7=65.243.24.0-255 Ultiam 07:30, 19 August 2007 (UTC)

I checked those edits (the most recent was in 2005) and can't find a single one which is still in the article. Most were deleitons of negative material that were reverted immediately. I've removed theCOI tag, but if you can identify a curent issue we can restore it and fix the problem. ·:· Will Beback ·:· 03:28, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

All of these diffs (from the above wikiscanner link) contain changes which have not been re-incorporated into the article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=prev&oldid=28623443
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=prev&oldid=28623410
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?diff=prev&oldid=28623375
Dan 10:03, 26 August 2007 (GMT)

This was mentioned on TWIT this week, keep your eyes open for well-meaning people. Tuor 14:44, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

No, all of the edits above were reverted.--P4k 22:57, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Election content in main article

Recent edits by User:Manufacturedthoughts have been removed because they do not relate to this article. I believe they would be better served in the Premier Election Solutions entry. Anyone besides the author disagree? The author left a unsigned message on my talk page threatening to revert the edit every day. --Electiontechnology (talk) 02:33, 5 February 2008 (UTC)