Did 4 Chan Find a Major Flaw in the 2020 Oregon Election Voting System?
What does one do when they are alerted to a crazy Twitter post that claims that the Oregon election systems have a significant flaw… You investigate. And that is just what I did.
When word started to spread about this vulnerability, it was late Saturday night, early Sunday morning. Matthew @WhjteHovse posted one of those tweets.
Matthew wrote, “4chan discovered a major bug in Oregon’s online voting system that allows anyone to change someone’s registration & vote. If you know someone’s Name & Date of Birth, you can change their vote.”
Matthew later added, “This is crazy. It’s been discovered that by entering anyone’s Full Name & DOB, you can view & alter their vote. This can be used for major election fraud. How on earth could this be a mistake?”
Several other Twitter users pointed out that while it appears someone would be able to change a vote, the vote would not actually be cast as an actual form must be signed. The same user also claimed that this form would only be granted to those with absentee ballot status.
Matthew provided several screenshots to offer as evidence of confirmation.
One commentator posted a video that appears to be a screen recording of a person going through the same process in Washington State too. However, it needs to be noted that there has been no evidence to suggest that one could actually “change” someones original vote.
Joshua, who lives outside of Portland, Oregon, was asked to try and log into the system and see what kind of experience he has.
Within minutes Joshua commented on what he found.
“So the Oregon mark my ballot “hack” is somewhat real. You can go on the Oregon sec states website and click on the “my vote: track your ballot” link and then just type in someone’s full name + DOB they listed when they applied for their driver’s license and then get into a site with a link called “mark my ballot” that site will take you to a ballot basically. “
“I have no idea how it will affect results for Oregon, but I don’t like it, that’s for d*** sure. I also don’t like that so far that I haven’t found any way to verify that my ballot was counted towards the correct candidates. Oregon is only mail-in ballots this year, supposedly because covid is so dangerous.” Joshua also added that he is more concerned that his vote could be changed or even nullified, rendering his vote mute (PT News Network has not independently verified this claim).
There is some concern that one could access this data to serve as a way for people to find out how you voted and could be used against you in the future. With the uptick in violence against people with different political views, one has to wonder if a “target” list of political rivals could be generated.
Oregon is one of a handful of states that decided that in the wake of COVID-19, that it is too dangerous to vote in person. Every ballot will be mail-in or dropped off at a ballot box.
The discovery also took Jennifer by surprise, who lives in nearby California. “Yes, I would not be happy with that. I would be concerned that my vote would be changed, and at least here in, Ventura county, in California, they have a tracking system so you can track your votes I’m not sure about the actual votes or ballot but you can track that your ballot got there or when it was sent to you you can track that it’s coming to you we are going to hand-deliver our ballots this year though we get absentee.”
Voters that I spoke with are worried that they will be disenfranchised by a system that is not tested, tamper-proof, or safe for all to participate in the very hallmark of our democracy; to vote for their chosen candidate and to do so in private. ,
Orgegin’s Secretary of State website, states that one can use my Vote feature to:
- check if you are registered to vote
- view your voter registration information
- update your voter registration
- check the status of your ballot
- find contact information for your county elections office
- find contact information for your elected officials
- find a ballot drop site
It is unclear if one could change a person’s vote or create some type of disqualification from the total vote count or if this curious detail is significant in any meaningful way.
