Some voting machines in the US are so old officials can't even tell when they've been hacked

Brennan Weiss
Mar. 20, 2018, 4:04 PM
Old voting machines pose a security risk to the integrity of US elections, cybersecurity experts warn.
A total of 41 states have voting machines that are at least a decade old.
Many of these machines leave no paper trail of votes, making it nearly impossible to tell when hackers manipulate the vote.
Some lawmakers are calling for reforms, but Congress has yet to provide the necessary funding.
For all the hubbub about election security in the US ahead of the 2018 midterms, there is one issue that almost no one seems to be talking about: old voting machines.
A total of 41 states currently have voting machines that are at least a decade old, according to the Brennan Center for Justice, leaving thousands of systems vulnerable to hackers and other security risks that could compromise election results.
With old voting machines come a whole host of issues: outdated software, machine breakdown, spare replacement parts that are near impossible to find.
On Tuesday, the Senate Intelligence Committee, which is investigating Russia's meddling in the 2016 US election, called on states to "rapidly replace outdated and vulnerable voting systems."
"At a minimum, any machine purchased going forward should have a voter-verified paper trail and no WiFi capability," the Committee said in its draft summary of steps that state officials can take to ensure the integrity of elections.
But the problem with old voting machines isn't necessarily that they can be easily hacked, said Marian Schneider, president of the advocacy group Verified Voting.
The issue is that when machines are compromised, it's often impossible to tell....