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This article reports on the decision of a federal judge in a California directive that decertified touch-screen voting machines and withheld future certification until vendors of those systems can meet specific security requirements as of July 2004. The decision arose from a lawsuit, Benavidez v. Shelley, brought by disability rights advocates and four California counties that oppose California Secretary of State Kevin Shelley's requirement for voter-verifiable paper audit trails. The counties also oppose Shelley's order to decertify direct-recording equipment (DRE) voting systems. The plaintiffs argued that banning the systems would disenfranchise visually or physically impaired voters. The opinion written by Judge Florence-Marie Cooper was given. Cooper noted that Shelley is responsible for ensuring that votes are counted accurately, and requiring a paper audit trail is one way of fulfilling that obligation. State and local elections officials around the country are scrambling to ensure that e-voting systems in different jurisdictions are reliable and can be secured from tampering in time for the November election. The decision follows the release of a report two weeks ago by an IT security panel that outlined a strategy for certifying the security and reliability of touch-screen DRE voting systems QuickLink 47931.

This article presents Visa U.S.A. Inc. as the recipient of Premier 100 Information Technology Leaders 2004 Best in Class award in Foster City, California. When an inaccurate charge is listed on a credit card bill, it is not just the customer who sees red. Settling a disputed charge is one of the costliest components of a credit card company's business. At Visa, a new back-office infrastructure will reduce the time and labor required to handle a customer-disputed charge by creating an online, automated process. The Visa Resolve Online project is a Web-enabled application used to facilitate changes to the re-engineered disputes process. The greatest benefit of the project has been to simplify the process by eliminating most paper documentation, reducing the time required to resolve disputes and eliminating unnecessary steps in the process. The Web-based tool gives member banks, merchants and customer support representatives real-time access to transaction data through secure browser screens or private Internet Protocol network. Subsequent releases of Visa Resolve included the ability to create and transmit chargebacks, attach images and supporting documentation and transmit large volumes of images relevant to disputes.

Highlights how handheld devices are saving the city of Palo Alto, California, large sums of money. Impact of using devices on paper usage and the workload of technicians; Use of 3Com Corporation's PalmPilots handheld device by help desk employees in California; Amount of money city invested for seven of these devices; Information on the PalmPilot device.

Reports that the Los Angeles Police Department in California has launched a computerization effort aimed at reducing administrative costs. Improvement on efficiency; Reduction of police officers' paper work.

Election officials in San Bernardino County, Calif., announced plans to defy a state-imposed ban on the electronic systems in the upcoming November 2004 presidential election. In a statement on May 11, 2004, county officials said they plan to use touch-screen voting systems developed by Sequoia Voting Systems Inc. The decision is in direct defiance of an April 30, 2004 directive by the California secretary of state that stripped the systems of their certification in 10 counties, pending security improvements. The directive also banned the use of touch-screen systems from McKinney, Diebold Election Systems in four other counties. The controversy over the use of the systems stems from research and public statements by independent IT security experts who uncovered glaring security vulnerabilities in the hardware and software used in many of the e-voting systems on the market. Jeremy Epstein, senior director for product security at WebMethods Inc. is one of thousands of private-sector executives who have signed an online petition that calls for vendors to provide voter-verified paper audit trails for their systems.