FCC Takes Action On First Do Not Call Violation

Diebold Employed At Least Five Convicted Felons In Management Positions

from the um...-background-checks,-anyone? dept

Thu, Dec 18th 2003 9:34am — Mike Masnick

This is sounding more and more like a bad movie. In fact, if someone wrote this script, I'd bet it would get rejected as being way too implausible. Not only has Diebold been shown to have incredibly insecure technology on their electronic voting machines (universal password: 1111), had their (very partisan) CEO say that he was going to help his party win the election, been trying to sue every whistle-blower who calls them on this, admitted that they're going to try to jack up prices for anyone who tries to force them to add a paper trail and been caught using uncertified software in a recent election (breathe...), now it also turns out that they've employed at least five convicted felons in management roles at their voting machine subsidiary, according to Bev Harris, who has been leading the charge against Diebold. In fact, a senior VP of the group, who was responsible for writing and maintaining the code used in their voting systems, served time in prison for "stealing money and tampering with computer files". Diebold says that the guy left at the time they acquired his company to become their e-voting subsidiary, but they're still using this guy's code.

Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.

Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.

While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.

–The Techdirt Team

9 Comments

If you liked this post, you may also be interested in...

Reader Comments

Subscribe: RSS

View by: Time | Thread

Director Mitch, 18 Dec 2003 @ 10:50am

Why not MAKE it into a Movie?
Mike, your supressed ambition is calling. Why not work on that screen play you always had a desire to do? It involves writing, which you do every day, technology, which is your interest, and poor business ethics, which is a pet peeve (well the last one is true for everyone).
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- Mike (profile), 18 Dec 2003 @ 10:58am
  
  Re: Why not MAKE it into a Movie?
  Are you making a pitch to "direct" the movie, Director Mitch? ;)
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
- aNonMooseCowherd, 18 Dec 2003 @ 11:04am
  
  Re: Why not MAKE it into a Movie?
  If you do, Diebold will no doubt sue you, but then you can auction off their subpoena on EBay as a PR stunt.
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
  - scott, 18 Nov 2004 @ 1:29pm
    
    re: being sued by BoldLie (sorry, dyslexic)
    from my journalism classes in college, i learned that truth is always a defense in the court of law.
    [ link to this | view in chronology ]
christopher power, 28 Jan 2005 @ 10:41am

convicted felons
i am shocked to know that the only news a convicted felon gets is disgraceful news. furthermore i emplore you to think with your brain about why it is that those felons were hired. ever heard of a scape goat. a convicted felon has nothing to lose right?! is it just possible that there are few convicted felons who have in fact turned their lives around and are struggling just to get a job that pays decent wages and live in a decent community? by live in a decent community i mean be allowed to live in a community where people will not pre judge or use this person as a scape goat. it is not all the felons doing the crimes. wake up and smell the air...look at the natural water sources...research the ozone depletion. grow up the goverment has been using the public mass to fling the proverbial rocks at the felons and all the while the welfare system is being dragged down. i would suggest you do a little more research bfore running off at the mouth.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
- RYAN HACKBARTH, 21 Aug 2006 @ 1:45pm
  
  Re: convicted felons
  Thank you for your comment. I am a felon who is trying to turn my life around, who came across this web-site while looking for options for felons. This Mike charactor seems to be a very sheltered, ignorant, s.o.b. who pissed me off. So thank you for your reply.
  Ryan Hackbarth
  [ link to this | view in chronology ]
NA, 2 May 2007 @ 1:57pm

RYAN HACKBARTH
I personally know Ryan...Hackbarth as I was stumbling through websites and came across his name. Yes, he IS a felon, but one heck of a guy! Only God can judge us, that's for sure.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
caleb mckean, 2 May 2009 @ 6:30pm

thanks
Thanks for the useless piece of information. I will jot that down as a useless bit of information and store it in my memory file under the heading junk mail.
Felons should not be categorized this way. I make my employer a lot of money. I hold myself to a higher ethical standard than I did when I committed my crime.
Traffic felon for life.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]
Dave, 28 Dec 2009 @ 5:16pm

The writer
The writer of this article is in fact a sexual predator of children under the age of two and has no credibility to write about other felons.
Sex offenders quit posting these frivolous articles.
[ link to this | view in chronology ]