The drumbeat of speculation that the Russians somehow hacked, disrupted, or even altered the U.S. presidential election culminated in recommendations last week to prevent what only may have happened from ever happening again.
As odd as that sentence may sound, its stated goal may be even more baffling in states like Minnesota where election tampering just isn't an issue.
That's because, "We still are a pen-and-paper state. Hard to hack paper," as Secretary of State Steve Simon pointed out in an interview with News Tribune Editorial Board members earlier this year. "We have a longstanding, really strong, bipartisan insistence in this state for always having a paper trail."
Such documentation - just in case and so we can be assured of accurate election results - isn't in place in at least 14 states, many of which converted to paperless, touch-screen, or other more-modern forms of voting technology after the hanging-chads controversy in Florida that followed the 2000 presidential vote. But old-school states like Minnesota now seem far better insulated from elections-tampering.
Yes, in Minnesota, ballots marked with pens are fed into a counting machine, but that machine, in accordance with state law, cannot be and shall not be connected in any way to the internet. So hacking isn't possible there, either.
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It's no surprise then that, in last fall's election, "We were not hacked, compromised, or penetrated in any way, which is great," Simon said. "To stay one step ahead of the bad guys: It's tough."
But it has to happen, especially with allegations of tampering and voter fraud, whether substantiated or not, only growing louder. Vigilance can assure it remains a non-issue.
None of this is to suggest that the recommendations released last week were without merit or should be ignored. They certainly can be considered - and in all states, too, no matter how voters vote.
The top recommendation from both the Brennan Center for Justice at the University of New York School of Law and University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Harlan Reynolds is to return, nationwide, to paper ballots and backup paper records. States like Minnesota can simply check this one off.
In the interest of "ballot security," vote-counting should be transparent and regularly audited, Reynolds wrote in an op-ed for USA Today.
Also, "voter ID should be strictly enforced, as it is in all advanced democracies, to ensure that only eligible voters vote," he said. "And voter registrations should be audited frequently to ensure the removal of voters who have died or moved away. Maybe we should even dye voters' fingers to prevent revoting, as is done in many other countries. There's no way to hack that."
Being hack-proof: that can be the goal - bearing in mind that, sometimes, less technology and more old-school can equal improved security.
-- Duluth News Tribune
