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University Developing Technology To Vote On Your Tablet, Smartphone

Posted by samzenpus on from the rock-the-vote-from-home dept.

smitty_one_each writes in with this story about a professor developing a new electronic voting system. "A Clemson University professor is developing a new electronic voting system that will allow voters to cast their ballots from home computers, tablets and smartphones. As Clemson's chair of human-centered computing, Juan Gilbert has lead teams of students over the last 10 years to create an online voting system accessible at home or on the go that will be more accurate, have increased verification and make voting more accessible to people with disabilities by offering mobile and voice-command options."

10 of 259 comments (clear)

  1. So now... by MouseTheLuckyDog · · Score: 5, Insightful

    hackers will not only steal my identity, they will steal my vote.

    1. Re:So now... by MouseTheLuckyDog · · Score: 5, Funny

      I'm from Chicago. Democrats have been doing it for decades.

    2. Re:So now... by mi · · Score: 4, Insightful

      The only way to do so is buy the human.

      You can also bully or otherwise coerce the same human, which is what the anonymity was meant to prevent.

      The "fix" is simpler, easier, and cheaper than today's voting system, and would fix most of what's wrong with it.

      So, your proposal is to abolish the voting anonymity... Interesting, but I'm not sure, I like that.

      --
      In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
    3. Re:So now... by Opportunist · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Trust is actually the big issue with electronic voting, no matter the form it takes. Not that it was untrustworthy (it is, but that's not even the point). The point is that you HAVE to trust it unless you're one of the few that can actually audit it (even if you were allowed to).

      With pen&paper voting, all it takes to verify and audit an election is the ability to see where that voter made his X and to count the paper slips. That's an ability one can sensibly expect from any human being of average intelligence. Hell, even the average US voter should be able to accomplish that. Same for being part of the supervision collective to ensure that everything is in order. You can see that ballot and how it is glued shut, you can see how people deposit one slip of paper in it, that's plenty to ensure that everything is going according to plan and order.

      No such luck with any kind of electronic voting. Not with the currently in place e-voting booths, and most certainly not with online voting where you have exactly ZERO chance to audit anything. What's left is that you can trust the powers that are that everything is in order. You, Mr. Joe Average, cannot verify it. You cannot verify that the machine works as planned (even if you were allowed to examine its code, you could not understand it), so at the very least you'd have to trust those computer nerds.

      The big threat is here that it is no longer trivial to debunk voting fraud conspiracies. Today you can just dump the slips on whoever dares to call you a fraudster and have him count. What do you plan to do when someone calls your voting machines and online voting procedure into doubt? Then all that keeps your system afloat is that people trust you. If they don't, wave good bye to your system's stability because a system where people do not believe in its legitimation is waiting for a revolution.

      --
      We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
  2. When I tried something similar by GoodNewsJimDotCom · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Back when Digg was big and Reddit was new, I wanted to make a factional voting site. Basically it works like this: Everyone votes and downvotes stuff like Reddit. But everyone also has sub categories for their affiliation. An example might be: Democrat/Republican. They'd have a long check list and radio buttons of different affiliations. This way something opposing groups disagree on would be voted up for their own personal faction.

    We were going to have petitions where you could negative sign the petition to disagree. So politicians don't see a list of 10,000 signatures when 100,000 people hate it.

    The problem we had was determining who is a registered voter. It is hard to verify people as having a real identifier especially if you have no start up capital to send out stamps for snail mail verification methods. And another problem is once you have registered voters, how do you watch out for hackers? We decided we couldn't solve these problems and gave up.

    Someone really could make a hyper democracy site though. there's a market for it. Educate the voters on their desires for politics, and tell them which of their elected officials voted for or against certain topics they're interested in! It is real simple in concept. It'd start out as a voter education site, but if it seriously got powerful, politics could be different with an educated voter base.

    --
    God spoke to me
    1. Re:When I tried something similar by swillden · · Score: 4, Funny

      Darned right. People should vote based on real facts. From Oprah.

      --
      Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
  3. Nope by dugancent · · Score: 5, Informative

    As long as there is the ability for someone to stand behind you and make sure vote a certain way, I won't support it. No one knows how I vote when I step into a voting booth.

    --
    SJWs are the new boogeyman. -Me
  4. Re:Won't happen by Dan+East · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I think you have it backwards. According to the Maxwell Poll, 60-80% of welfare recipients voted Democrat. Generally speaking, welfare recipients receive welfare because they have low income. People with low income can't afford as much gadgetry. Thus it will make it even more convenient for a higher percentage of Republicans to vote compared to Democrats because more of them can afford the hardware. You can expect Democrats to resist this far more than Republicans.

    (I know, I took your post insulting the intelligence of people who disagree with your political viewpoint literally, but you are wrong regardless of your motive)

    --
    Better known as 318230.
  5. Re:Won't happen by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Generally, the smarter a person gets, the more republican they tend to lean in ideology even if they insist on remaining democrats or liberals.

    Except that studies consistently result in findings contrary to that assertion. Higher intelligence is associated with politically liberal views almost across the board, with a secondary emphasis on movement toward the political center. Conservative ideology does not become more prevalent with increases in either intelligence or educations.

    Decent survey of literature here:
    http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/unique-everybody-else/201305/intelligence-and-politics-have-complex-relationship

    Also:
    http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/millennial-media/201304/do-racism-conservatism-and-low-iq-go-hand-in-hand

    Your bias also shows in your anecdote about voter ID laws--empirically, Republicans are responsible for most election-related shenanigans. But then again, someone getting preemptively defensive about accusing people of an impliedly illogical "insistence" on "remaining" liberal might simply prefer to ignore the evidence and make unsupported claims.

  6. Would not be democratic... by Casandro · · Score: 5, Informative

    it would not be democratic, at least not by German standards, since the layperson cannot check it. Even if it's secure, which it cannot be, you need at least a degree in mathematics and several days of work to understand and check it yourself. Since a voting system must be resistant to large scale attacks, i.e. the government conspiring against the voters, it is vital that everybody can check it for themselves.

    With pen and paper everything is easy to check. You look into the ballot before it is sealed, you check if everyone just throws in one ballot, and on the end you can count the ballots easily. This is something which can be checked trivially.