24.2-625.2. Prohibition of wireless communications on voting equipment:

There shall be no wireless communications on election day, while the polls are open, between or among voting machines within the polling place or between any voting machine within the polling place and any equipment outside the polling place.

I guess it depends on whether or not interpretation of the law considers the e-poll books as part of “voting machines”, but I think that they should be, since they are vulnerable to compromise and can influence the outcome of an election.

Avi Rubin (an electronic voting system expert) had direct, negative experiences with them in Maryland elections (search for “electronic poll books” in the linked post below:

http://avi-rubin.blogspot.com/2008/11/my-day-at-polls.html

My stance remains the same – use exactly as much technology as a problem requires.

Paper ballots (of the marking kind, not the punch) coupled with optical scanners, to my mind, satisfy the following five fundamental requirements of a meaningful election (mine overlap with and extend Schneier’s):

1) Accuracy – The method of capturing votes must reliably capture each voter’s intent.

2) Anonymity – A voter’s identity must not be connected with hus ballot, allowing each voter to express hus intent without fear of retaliation.

3) Auditability – The outcome must be provably true. For instance, paper ballots make recounts possible. Purely electronic voting machines do not.

4) Scalability – Voting systems need to be flexible enough to accommodate a variety of scenarios, e.g., several different contests on a single election day, massive numbers of voters, etc.

5) Trust – A voting system must be intuitive to use and (within reason) understood by every citizens using it.

Bonuses (Boni?):

6) Speed – Optical scanners make it possible to report returns quickly. Were it not for our pitiful attention spans, this would not even be worth mentioning.

7) MrPikes’ Law – Use only as much technology as a problem requires. Anything beyond that increases complexity and invites unintended consequences. For instance, you may have heard that some Virginia precincts had a problem with the paper ballots yesterday… Voters (having been out in the rain) got their ballots wet and they gummed up the scanners. So what is MrPikes’ high-tech, multi-million dollar, super silver bullet countermeasure for next time?

Bring a fucking iron.