掌控美国总统大选的，其实是三家公司

三家公司掌控了美国的大选。Election Systems & Software、Dominion Voting Systems和Hart InterCivic拥有美国投票机市场92%的份额，在政府急需在2020年大选前升级投票系统的背景下，它们又将大赚一笔。

2016年大选时，有16个州之下的县里，在投票时使用了没有备份记录的无纸化设备。美国国土安全部后来警示称，这其中有6个州的选举系统成为了黑客攻击目标。现在人们普遍认识到，无纸化设备是最不安全的。一些州政府控制了投票方式，另有一些州将决定权交给地方政府，但在多数州里，官员们试图购买新的投票设备。

纽约大学布伦南司法中心选举改革项目的主管劳伦斯·诺登说：“这种过渡仍然在进行，但我希望每一个成为竞选战场的州，都有投票的纸质备份。”诺登预测，在2020年大选中将有90%的选票有纸质备份。

一些安全专家，例如国家风险解决方案公司的首席执行官丹尼尔·瓦格纳，则认为做到这些还不够。

“在我们的选举过程中，有着巨大的落差和不一致性，而地方、州和联邦政府做得太少，也太迟，没能改变什么，特别是2020年大选又要来临。”瓦格纳说。

事实上，美国国会还未将提升2020大选投票安全的资金分配到位。

还有一年就要大选了，各个州都在增强威胁评估和大选后的审计计划，但自2016年以来最急需的改变在哪里？市民和官员们都深深地感到大选投票机制的脆弱。（财富中文网）

本文另一版本登载于《财富》杂志2019年11月刊，标题为《确保2020大选的安全》。

译者：宣峰

Three companies control the fate of United States elections. Election Systems & Software, Dominion Voting Systems, and Hart InterCivic dominate 92% of the voting machine market, standing to make bank as states rush to update their systems before the looming 2020 election.

In 2016, counties in 16 states used paperless equipment without backup records. The Department of Homeland Security later notified six of those states that hackers targeted their systems. There’s now widespread recognition that paperless machines are the least secure. Some state governments control voting methods, others delegate the decision to local authority, but in most of those states, officials are moving to purchase new machines.

“The transition is still happening, but I’m hopeful every battleground state will have a paper backup of every vote,” said Lawrence Norden, director of the Election Reform Program at the NYU Brennan Center For Justice. Norden predicts 90% of votes will have paper backups in 2020.

Some security experts like Daniel Wagner, CEO of Country Risk Solutions, still don’t think it’s enough.

“There are massive gaps and inconsistencies in our electoral process, and the local, state, and federal governments are doing too little, too late to make a meaningful difference, especially by 2020,” Wagner said.

Indeed, the United States Congress has yet to allocate funds to improving security for the 2020 election.

A year out, states are increasing threat assessments and plans for post-election audits. But the greatest change since 2016? Citizens and officials alike are viscerally aware of their vulnerability.

A version of this article appears in the November 2019 issue of Fortune with the headline “Securing the Vote for 2020.”