Scientists question electronic voting

[Ed Gerck]

Anton Stiglic wrote:

> ----- Original Message -----
> From: "Ed Gerck" <egerck at nma.com>
>
> [...]
> > "For example, using the proposed system a voter can easily, by using a
> > small concealed camera or a cell phone with a camera, obtain a copy of
> > that receipt and use it to get money for the vote, or keep the job. And
> > no one would know or be able to trace it."
>
> But that brings up my point once again:  These problems already exist
> with current paper-ballot voting schemes,

Maybe you missed some of my comments before, but these problems
do not exist in current paper-ballot voting schemes. Why should
e-voting make it worse?

> what exactly are you trying to
> achieve with an electronic voting scheme?

My target is the same level of voter privacy and election integrity that a
paper-ballot system has when ALL election clerks are honest and do not
commit errors. Please see Proc. Financial Cryptography 2001, p. 257 and
258 of my article on "Voting System Requirements", Springer Verlag.

> To you simply want to make
> the counting of the votes more reliable, and maintain the security of all
> other aspects, or improve absolutely everything?

Of all aspects that need to be improved when moving to an electronic
system, the most important is the suspicion or fear that thousands or even
millions of electronic records could be altered with a keystroke, from
a remote laptop or some untraceable source. This goes hand-in-hand
with questions about the  current "honor system" in voting systems,
where vendors make the machines and also operate them during an
election. It's the overall black box approach that needs to improved.
The "trust me!" approach has had several documented problems
in paper ballot systems and would present even more opportunities
for fraud or even plain simple errors in an electronic system.

The solution is to add multiple channels with at least some independence.
The paper channel is actually hard to secure and expensive to store
and process. Paper would also be a step backwards in terms of efficiency
and there is nothing magical about a paper copy that would make it
invulnerable to fraud/errors.

Cheers,
Ed Gerck


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