For those not in the know, Hursti said it sounds shocking to hear that voting machines can be bought and sold for little money.

"People think it's a big deal but it happens all the time. Most of the time the seller is a government, a county, or it is electric recycling. ... And it is a good thing because hackers are a resource to make things safer."

Hackers like him, he said, are not interested in weaponizing the weaknesses they find. "The reason you pop open the machine is to learn the vulnerabilities" of each machine, in order to safeguard democracy, he added.

And there are plenty of other machines to tinker with, while he waits for the Michigan investigation to unfold.

"I bought two others last month, so I'll get started on those," he said.

This article just makes me cynical -- why election official so worried about people getting their hands on scrapped voting machines if they aren't rigged or terribly insecure? While there are plenty of legal ways that elections are rigged, such as voting laws and gerrymandering or simply stuffing political candidate's favorited groups coffers full of public cash. I tend to think lawful corruption and lawful ways of stealing elections is much more common illegal means, but who knows, this just makes me suspicious.