E-voting Trials and Tribulations

Alex Susor writes "This article is about the new digital touch screen voting system in Georgia, the first state in the nation to adopt this method of voting statewide. Demonstration machines were set up at the recent primaries to teach voters about the new system (to be in place for the November general election) and had some big problems." Compare and contrast to systems in Florida and Germany.

Comments

Why do we need to go to polls at all?

[t0qer]

I don't want to leave my house. Why can't I vote over the internet?

Just mail me my username/password, i'll go to whatever website you want me to go to and vote. I'm sure 1/2 the /. population agree's with me. Are you listening politicians?

Re:Why do we need to go to polls at all?

[Beryllium Sphere(tm)]

There are also non-technical reasons for going to polling places to vote.

If all the voting happens in a public place with poll watchers from all parties, then it's harder for someone to lean over a voter and pressure him/her. That's also the reason for the rules restricting who's allowed to accompany a voter and "help" with the voting process.

Secret ballots with secret software

[leighklotz]

I wonder if it's really legal to have votes counted by a machine that has secret software inside that voters are not allowed to examine?

Chris Riggall, a spokesman for the secretary of state's office, attributed the problems to errors by poll workers, a glitch in the Windows operating system that runs the machines ...

Shouldn't voters in Georgia be able to file an FOI request to find out what's happening to their votes?

Windows??

[Doppler00]

I usually wouldn't bash windows but this is not the right solution for this. Why would you rely on such complexity for a system that is supposed to be simple and easy to use? Just imagine how easy it would be to break into this system and change it.

A better solution would be to use an embedded microcontroller or other simple hardware device for each voting station and then connect that to a central database server running a much more secure operating system. I think that voting and it's integrity deserve as much mission critical attention as safety systems in an automobile. There simply shouldn't be any failure here. Relying on an OS with several millions of lines of code just to input a few votes just doesn't make any sense.

Re:Computerized voting restricts access to voters

[MAXOMENOS]

Voters who are not computer savvy will likely become confused by the unnecessary complication of the new voting machines and many are likely to cast their ballots in error, possibly voting for a candidate they had no intention of supporting.

I think you're over-estimating the complexity of the system for the user.

It's not hard: you see the candidate you want, you touch their name. Their name lights up. If you want to change your vote, you touch a different name. Once you've picked your candidate, you move on to the next page. You can change your vote later. When you want to accept the ballot, just press a last panel on the screen.

This isn't rocket science. It's as easy as the paper ballots, if not easier.

The reliability and accuracy of paper-based systems is what led to the mess in Florida in 2000.

I agree with you on the hacking and digital manipulation. There are ways around this, but only if the system is well-designed. Of course, there are all sorts of ways to manipulate the system to produce a desired result, both subtle (place the candidate's name on the second page of a list of names) and gross (stuff the ballot box with 'votes' for your guy from 'voters' who are dead.) No paper system is 100% tamper proof.