Comment by btilly | Hacker News Reader

Comment by btilly | Hacker News Reader

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It seems unlikely for the result of the election to change even if one state was hacked, so it's not like anyone's skin is even on the line.

You don't seem to have followed this story. The whole point is that we have a very realistic possibility that Trump's unexpected win was due to manipulation of electronic polling machines. Possibly by Russia.

To be specific, Clinton was projected to win Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. If she had, she would have won the election. Instead Trump won all three by around 1% each. Across those states, Trump did about 7% better in precincts that used electronic voting than in ones that didn't. A recount of the ballots cast can tell us whether he really earned those votes, or the machines were manipulated.

This kind of manipulation of electronic voting is well within the abilities of US security experts. It is also within the abilities of countries like Russia. Russia had an obvious preference, and has demonstrated the willingness to use cyber attacks to manipulate elections.

538 does a better job of debunking this than I ever could:

http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/demographics-not-hacking...

The articles don't debunk each other, they are in fundamental agreement on observable facts.

Both accept that it is possible for the Russians to hack the election. Both state that it is reasonable that Trump actually won. Both agree that the only way to be sure is to conduct an audit.

They do differ. The medium article digs into depth on the technical details of how doable the hack is. The 538 article digs into depth on the quality of the statistical evidence.

They come to opposite conclusions. The medium article concludes that we should audit because eventually someone will try to manipulate the election. 538 is more concerned with raising public concern about fairness. I am more concerned with actual fairness than perception, so I agree with the medium article.

I'm focusing on the fact that there's a real possibility Russia hacked the election. By de-emphasizing the possibility that it might have changed the actual election results, it makes it more likely that this won't be a partisan issue.

Russian hacking of the US electoral system is a far, far greater threat to American democracy than Trump being President.

> The whole point is that we have a very realistic possibility that Trump's unexpected win was due to manipulation of electronic polling machines. Possibly by Russia.

No, we really don't.

For this rather wild speculation to have happened:

* The Russians would have had to know exactly which counties would be swing counties, in at least three different states, two of which nobody imagined Trump even had a chance in, in an election year when the best pollsters and analysts in the United States were caught completely flatfooted by the results all over the country.

* They'd have to be lucky enough to pick swing counties that use electronic voting. For example, in Wisconsin there's a mix of electronic and paper ballots across the state.

* And they'd have to know exactly what the vote counts would be weeks in advance so they could slip in ju-u-u-u-ust enough extra votes to give Trump a razor-thin margin of victory.

Look, I realize the election results were traumatic to lots of people, but if you cling to conspiracy theories to avoid dealing with that you're going to spend a long time in the wilderness. I'd advise you instead to work on persuading more people that your political program is the right one. It'll work better in the long run.

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