Diebold Strikes Back -- With an Ad Campaign (Heads-Up, Ohio DUers!)

[PeakOil2008]

Diebold goes on the defensive

October 06, 2003

In an effort to fight back against critics of its electronic voting machines, Diebold Election Systems in Green plans to launch a marketing counterattack that first will target Ohio election officials and voters.

The campaign - likely to include rare Diebold television and radio spots - is a response to a research report critical of the machines and subsequent national media coverage. The report, co-authored by a professor who sat on the advisory board of a Diebold Election Systems competitor, contends several flaws in Diebold's AccuVote touch-screen models make the machines susceptible to hackers and tabulation errors.

The report, as well as several newspaper editorials, called into question Diebold's ability to ensure accurate elections, and state government leaders began to ponder alternatives to the country's leading provider of electronic voting systems. Now, Diebold wants to redeem itself in the eyes of its home state consumers and resell itself to a skeptical nationwide market.

"There will be an ad campaign that focuses on some of the issues raised in the media recently," said Mark Radke, director of voter industry for Diebold Elections Systems. "The campaign speaks primarily about the fact that our equipment is secure."

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HA! Who do they think are they kidding? Thanks to the work of Bev Harris and many other people I do not know (though they are just as deserving of recognition here), we now know better.

I plan on blasting these bastards -- particularly the CEO who promised to deliver Ohio to Bush and the GOP in 2004 -- in a letter to my hometown paper's editorial section. If you are a Buckeye DUer, I encourage you to do the same. We cannot afford to allow the corporate machine to control our elections!