Um, the poll pads are used to encode the activation cards that are inserted into GA’s touchscreen voting machines to retrieve the correct ballot. If poll pads go down, it can cause problems for the voting machines. The poll pad vendor is run by a former GOP election official. 1/
https://twitter.com/c_c_krebs/status/1344442211358945281
I wrote about the risks of electronic poll books generally (and Knowink specifically) here. 2/ thedailyedge.substack.com/p/hacking-our-…
Knowink’s product manager once campaigned for Ed Martin who is now President of the Phylis Schlafly Eagles, which opposes the Equal Rights Amendment. 3/ 
As I wrote in my piece above, the managing director of Knowink is a former Republican election official from St. Louis. Knowink poll books caused massive problems in LA county in the primaries and, to a somewhat lesser extent in GA in the primaries. 4/
I discussed electronic poll books in some detail toward the end of this piece too, although the headline doesn’t refer to that part of the piece. 5/ whowhatwhy.org/2020/05/27/tou…
IMO, Georgia should use #handmarkedpaperballots for most voters with an exception for voters with disabilities. Pen and paper don’t require “activation.” 6/
IMO, Georgia should also use paper poll books on Election Day or at least have them as backup. Unfortunately, I believe electronic ones are necessary for early voting. 7/
11/ I don’t believe anyone has studied whether malware could be transferred from the poll pads to the touchscreen voting machines (BMDs) via the activation cards. More likely, the poll pads could be programmed to tell the BMDs to retrieve the wrong ballot or to drop races.
12/ That last point is entirely hypothetical. It has been a concern of mine though. I don’t think any experts have addressed it.
13/ Most simplistically, the poll pads could be hacked to delete names or swap addresses, causing chaos and forcing voters to vote provisionally. Or they could simply not work due to connectivity issues (LA county) or a denial of service attack.
14/ If poll pads are used to activate voting machines (BMDs), as in Georgia, then the BMDs must be activated manually if the poll pads fail. This takes longer, which is a problem bc BMDs already take longer than #handmarkedpaperballots.
15/ Plus, poll workers may not know how to manually activate the BMDs. Plus, without updated paper poll books, voters wld have to vote provisionally in this scenario anyway.
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