Swiss Town Holds First Internet Vote

Posted by ryuzaki0 on Monday January 20, 2003 @01:40AM from the buy-socks-and-choose-politicians dept.

felix.rauch writes "According to an article on Swissinfo, a small town near Geneva (Switzerland) held the first Internet-based vote this weekend. 44% of the voters (323) cast teir ballot over the Internet. Officials believe it may have been the first Internet-vote worldwide. While the Swiss media seem enthusiastic about the project, I see serious security and privacy concerns. The voters had to enter a 16-digit password, as well as their birthplace, date of birth and another number sent to them by post. Personally I think Internet-voting should be avoided until it's implemented by an open zero-knowledge protocol and checkable afterwards. Who can give a guarantee that nobody tampers with the results or creates a database with citizens voting information?"

2 of 277 comments (clear)

Re:This should be in the US. by ExportGuru · 2003-01-20 05:30 · Score: 0, Troll

Don't forget that Swiss who don't vote are fined 50 SFr and the Swiss are known to be stingy. That potential fine skews the data.
Re:Similar concerns for normal voting. by treat · 2003-01-20 05:46 · Score: 0, Troll

Here in Geneva, we've been voting from home for a long time.
Do you have no history of people being forced to vote a certain way by employers, gangsters, and the like? In the US, we must vote in secret (there are mail-in absentee ballots but they are the exception) so that there is no way for someone to be forced to vote in a certain way.