Orange County CA will be attaching tech devices to 9 of their most heavily used drop boxes for the June elections. This OC pilot program is an effort to remotely know the number of ballots inside those boxes. The device is a glorified padlock that includes a scanner, cellular modem, and batteries. The first thing you might wonder is why? If OC is collecting ballots on regular or daily basis, why do they need to know the quantities remotely? The simple answer is….they don’t.
Here’s how it works. A “BoxLock” device the size of a hockey puck is attached to the front of the drop box. Voters who registered for “OC Ballot Express” tracking can walk up to the box, push the button, scan their envelopes bar code, then drop it in the box. Using a cellular modem, the device sends data back to BoxLock in Atlanta. The voter then receives a text message telling them what they already know….they just put a ballot in that box. Wow!
But that isn’t entirely true. BoxLock only knows if a bar code was scanned. It doesn’t know if an envelope went inside the box. Also, many voters will not sign up for “OC Ballot Express” because it demands their cell phone number. Those who signed up and scanned their envelope are the only ones counted. Some might deposit first and forget the scan. Some might scan but not deposit their envelope. The bottom line is this. BoxLock will only know the number of scans, not the actual number of ballots inside the box.
To view the status of these boxes, staff at the OC Registrar of Voters must have internet access, a browser, or possibly use unsecure cell phones. They must login to the BoxLock software, which could be in Atlanta, or an unknown cloud server location. Staff can then view the scan numbers for each box. This approach adds and exposes another layer of election information over the internet. Fraudsters might gain access to this info as election day approaches. It will help them decide which precincts and boxes are best to stuff, and by how much, so they won’t be flagged for excessive voters.
The word “election day” is almost entirely erased from California. Their elections have become more like glorified survey’s taken over 29 days. According to the CA SOS, ballot boxes must be emptied every 96 hours at the least. In those 10 day before the election, this drops to 48 hours. Orange has about 115 boxes across the county. It shouldn’t be that hard to empty the boxes at least once a day. Some elections empty them every few hours. OC drop boxes are massive in size, so overfilling shouldn’t be a concern.
By directing people away from the U.S. Postal boxes, election jurisdictions are bypassing one of the most powerful deterrents to mail-in ballot fraud. Using a USPS blue box to aid in the commission of a crime is a Federal felony. Severe penalties can be levied. Also, Federal law enforcement including the US Postal Inspector can investigate. The DNC knows private made ballot box’s have none of these ramifications. It’s why they push them relentlessly.
BoxLock’s technology is solid for use on shipping containers, deliveries, and remote access. But it doesn’t fit for elections or resolve one single ballot stuffing issue. They can’t capture video or images of voters. They can’t insure only one ballot per voter is inserted, or appropriate numbers per law. They have no way to scan every ballot that enters the box, and so on. To make matters worse, their mobile apps, the administration applications, and the back-end infrastructure were all built by someone else, a company called Digital Scientists.
What’s most amazing is the announcement of this OC pilot program. Media organizations repeated almost verbatim the same talking points. It’s safe, more secure, transparency, creates trust, voter confidence, and so on. KTLA Ch.5 News in Los Angeles provided a short video praising the technology. The press agent for OC simulates scanning the ballot but doesn’t actually activate the scanner (button). Media asked no hard questions.
Garrett Fahy from the OC Republican National Lawyers Association called the drop box scanners “a promising development for voters…encourages lawful participation, increases confidence….transparency…greater trust in our elections.” Did the DNC write these comments for Fahy? This pilot doesn’t prevent one iota of election fraud. Fahy needs to review recent True The Vote cell ping testimony and GP interviews.
Software engineer Mark Cook has interviewed election officials across the country in the last few years. At 7:15 of this video he explains “Election systems are so complicated they are nearly impossible to understand. Election officials don’t understand the very systems they use to do their jobs. And this is frightening to them. So they have to lean on vendors.” Most patriots want less election technology, not more. What is OC doing here?
