The U.S. presidential election of 2008 has already decided one issue: Electronic voting systems still have a long way to go before they are trusted.

Under the Help America Vote Act (HAVA) of 2002, states were given federal funds to buy electronic voting machines that satisfied certain certification guidelines. Six years later, many states are left with machines that have no independent audit trail, making any recount essentially a sham. As the presidential election for 2008 nears, states are dumping touchscreen voting machines that have no audit trail and looking for ways to shore up the physical security of the systems.

The result is a clear trend, says an article in McClatchy Newspapers citing Election Data Systems: While nearly half of voters used touchscreen voting systems in 2006, only a third will do so this election. States even have voting-system graveyards, where millions of dollars worth of electronic voting systems sit, unused, on shelves, according to the Associated Press.

"We store them very, very carefully in the hopes that someone, someday may decide that we can use them again," Deborah Seiler, San Diego County's Registrar, told the news service. The county spent $25 million on the devices.

Electronic voting machines, especially touchscreen systems, have gone from being seen as a technological savior for American elections to a national boondoggle resulting in millions of dollars in waste. A report on the voting systems in use in Ohio -- dubbed the Evaluation and Validation of Election Related Equipment, Standards and Testing (EVEREST) -- found serious security issues remain with the systems. Researchers have called for a revision of the voting system guidelines, perhaps most importantly a mandate that electronic voting systems have a software independent audit trail.

Voting machine makers have refuted the results of most security tests, stressing that in a practical election setting that they do not consider most attacks a threat. Earlier this year, researchers told voting machine makers that they need to have constructive discussions over the future of electronic voting.

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