Author: Andrew Appel
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Security against Election Hacking – Part 1: Software Independence
There’s been a lot of discussion of whether the November 2016 U.S. election can be hacked. Should the U.S. Government designate all the states’ and counties’ election computers as “critical cyber infrastructure” and prioritize the “cyberdefense” of these systems? Will it make any difference to activate those buzzwords with less than 3 months until the…
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Internet Voting? Really?
Recently I gave a TEDx talk—I spoke at the local Princeton University TEDx event. My topic was voting: America’s voting systems in the 19th and 20th century, and should we vote using the Internet? You can see the talk here:
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Internet Voting, Utah GOP Primary Election
Utah’s Republican presidential primary was conducted today by Internet. If you have your voter-registration PIN, or even if you don’t, visit https://ivotingcenter.gop and you will learn something about Internet voting!
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Apple/FBI: Freedom of speech vs. compulsion to sign
This week I signed the Electronic Frontier Foundation’s amicus (friend-of-the-court) brief in the Apple/FBI iPhone-unlocking lawsuit. Many prominent computer scientists and cryptographers signed: Josh Aas, Hal Abelson, Judy Anderson, Andrew Appel, Tom Ball (the Google one, not the Microsoft one), Boaz Barak, Brian Behlendorf, Rich Belgard, Dan Bernstein, Matt Bishop, Josh Bloch, Fred Brooks, Mark Davis,…
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Freedom to Tinker on the Radio
Today on the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation’s CBC Radio show, “The Current”, a 20-minute segment about the freedom to tinker: “Arrested, for tinkering. Young Ahmed Mohamed likes to take things apart, cross wires, experiment… and put things back together again. It’s the kind of hobby that once led to companies like…say, Apple and Microsoft. But is…
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A clear line between offense and defense
The New York Times, in an editorial today entitled “Arms Control for a Cyberage“, writes, The problem is that unlike conventional weapons, with cyberweapons “there’s no clear line between offense and defense,” as President Obama noted this month in an interview with Re/code, a technology news publication. Defense in cyberwarfare consists of pre-emptively locating the…
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Ed Felten elected to National Academy
The National Academy of Engineering announced today that Edward W. Felten, professor of computer science and public affairs, and director, Center for Information Technology Policy, Princeton University, Princeton, N.J., has been elected to the National Academy “For contributions to security of computer systems, and for impact on public policy.” From the NAE’s announcement: Election to…
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Oral arguments in NJ voting-machines lawsuit appeal
The appellate hearing (oral argument) of the New Jersey voting-machines lawsuit (Gusciora v. Christie) has been rescheduled to March 5, 2013 in Trenton, NJ. To learn what this is all about, and why you should attend, click here. To recheck the location, time of day, and date of the hearing before you go down to…
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Voting machine lawsuit, oral arguments, venue change
For those who were considering attending the oral arguments December 4th of the appeal of the Gusciora lawsuit about New Jersey’s voting machines–which I encourage you to do–the location has been changed from Jersey City to Trenton. Location: 8th Floor, N. Wing, Hughes Justice Complex, Trenton, NJ. Date/time: December 4th, 2012, 10:00 a.m. Postponed until…
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NJ Lt. Governor invites voters to submit invalid ballots
On November 3rd, the Lieutenant Governor of New Jersey issued a directive, well covered in the media, permitting storm-displaced New Jersey voters to vote by e-mail. The voter is to call or e-mail the county clerk to request an absentee ballot by e-mail or fax, then the voter returns the ballot by e-mail or fax:…