Voting machine vendors have an alarming history of deception. In July 2018, cybersecurity journalist Kim Zetter reported that, despite ES&’s prior denials, ES&S’s election-management system (EMS) computers were sold with remote access software between 2000 and 2006. ES&S won’t say where it installed the remote access software that it lied about, but claims it’s been removed. According to Zetter’s article, Diebold’s EMS computers were sold with remote access software as well, and Dominion refused to comment.

The installation of remote access software in EMS computers is a big deal because these are centralized county or state computers used to program all voting machines in the county or state. According to Zetter’s reporting, some of these computers also include the central tabulators that aggregate all precinct totals.

But the vendor lies don’t end there. On August 8, 2019, Zetter further reported that ES&S’s EMS computers also connect to the internet, something else that ES&S had said was not the case but that leading election-security experts had long suspected.

Meanwhile, ES&S installed wireless modems in ballot scanners in Florida, Wisconsin, and Illinois starting in about 2015. Although some election officials claimed that these modems do not connect to the internet, this too was a lie, as further reported by Zetter.