How Bitcoin Could Be Key To Online Voting

blottsie (3618811) writes If implemented correctly, the proliferation of online voting could solve one of the biggest problems in American democracy: low voter turnout. The 2014 midterms, for example, boasted the lowest voter turnout in 72 years. Making it easier to vote by moving the action from a polling station to your pocket could only increase turnout, especially in the primaries. Making online voting work is infinitely harder than it initially seems. However, in the past few years, there's been a renewed effort to solve the conundrum of online voting using a most unexpected tool: Bitcoin. The key idea is this: The main job in online voting is ensuring that the election system records someone’s vote the way they intended. Running votes over the blockchain, which is public, creates an auditable trail linking a person and their vote. Bitcoin-enabled voters don’t have to place their trust in Florida ballot counters trying to discern the difference a hanging chad and a dimpled chad—nor in black box online voting systems from private companies where what’s happening inside is a mystery. The proof is right there on the blockchain.

Comments

Secret Ballot?

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't have an auditable trail and a secret ballot.

Re:Secret Ballot?

[RingDev]

Not that I'm in favor of this, but... that isn't exactly true.

You can have an audit trail and anonymity so long as the source of the audit trail is known only to the originator.

If each year I am assigned a token at random, and the assigning system tracks only that a token was assigned, then I can look at that token and see it's audit trail to ensure that my vote was recorded correctly.

Anyone else looking at the audit trail of that token would be able to see how that token was used, but not by who.

Not sure I'm on board with online voting, but I don't believe that the audit trail and anonymity are mutually exclusive.

-Rick

Re:Secret Ballot?

[cayenne8]

You know...someone that cannot be troubled to take the small amount of time and effort to register to vote, and go to the poll to vote, likely is also NOT the type of person to take any amount of time to study the issues or people up for election and therefore, not someone I'd actively encourage to make a vote.

No vote is better than an ill-informed / non-informed vote.

Re:Secret Ballot?

[Trailer Trash]

Voter shows ID to election worker.

RACIST!!!!

Re:Secret Ballot?

[Rich0]

So the employer can demand your token, and you give it up. Would you give up your personal email password? Facebook password? The actions of the employer are illegal. Why aren't you reporting him?

It would be your word against theirs. How would you prove that they asked for your ID? It isn't like anybody with half a brain would fire you on the spot if you refused. They'd just wait for you to make a mistake, or decide they don't need your services in six months.

Today, nearly all absentee voting will allow voting outside the view of poll employees. So the employer can fill out ballots for all employees, have them come in and sign them. Then the employer sends them in. Oh, and on election day, everyone has a double-shift with no breaks (no time to vote). At best, the voter can send in a second, spoiling one (or both) votes, but I've not seen any absentee system used in the US that would allow the voter to control his own vote in that situation. If the employer is so aggressive about ensuring votes for his preferred candidate, why aren't more doing this already?

They're too cheap to have 100% of their employee population standing around for two shifts with nothing to do on election day?

If you're going to make people fill out absentee ballots and then chain them in a dungeon, sure, you can abuse the current system. However, it is MUCH harder to do it today than in a system where people take home receipts. It is also unnecessary.

Just collect electronic votes with human-readable/machine-readable audit trails. The electronic tally can be used to provide instant results. The paper audit trail can be audited using random sampling to verify the integrity of the electronic tally. The paper trail would be printed behind a window so that the voter could see that it was recorded correctly, but it would not be modifiable or removable by the voter. Then you can use all the usual controls to prevent tampering with the paper.

Re:Uninterested people aren't worth it

[DaHat]

Bingo!

The assumption that low voter turnout is a bad thing always puzzles me, as it seems to suggest that it is better to have a larger number of uninformed people voting... rather than a smaller # of people who can at least be bothered to get up off their arse and do something.

No. Hell No. Bad Idea.

[Shakrai]

There is no way that you can conduct online voting and ensure that the voter is not being intimidated. Offsite voting is a necessary evil for certain people (the handicapped and those who are unavoidably out of town on election day) but it does not need to be expanded to cover everyone. Here in New York we very specifically keep those most likely to intimidate you out of the voting booth, i.e., your employer and union official. The people that can hold a financial gun to your head if you don't vote the way they want. With online voting (or offsite voting on paper, i.e., absentee ballots) there is no way to actually ensure that the voter doesn't have a gun (real or proverbial) aimed at their head when they click 'submit.' For this reason alone I will always oppose it and other measures (vote by mail) that take people out of the polling place.

The summary also makes the assumption that low voter turnout is a big problem. This is an oft-repeated claim but there's zero evidence to suggest that increased participation rates equate to better results. People choose not to vote for many reasons; apathy likely being the biggest one, followed closely by a generalized disgust with the available options. "None of the above" is a perfectly valid option in an election, whether exercised via the write-in for "Mickey Mouse" or by staying home on Election Day.

Re:Conflating Issues

[Shakrai]

We don't need more low-information voters (89% agree that DHMO should be banned)

Well yeah. If you breathe it you'll DIE! Only a Teabagger would be against Government regulation of a chemical that's so dangerous as to cause DEATH when inhaled. Why do you hate the children? How much did Big DHMO pay you for this astroturfing?

Re:Uninterested people aren't worth it

[tverbeek]

While it's true that low-interest voters tend to be low-information voters, there is also the problem that highly-interested voters are often highly misinformed voters. You have fundamentalist preachers frightening their congregations to vote in favor of bans on same-sex marriage by telling them horror stories about gay couples adopting babies to molest; or dogmatic political organizations telling their members to vote against a candidate because she's going to take their handguns and hunting rifles away, when all she said was that she'd look into restricting sales of assault weapons. Voters who haven't been mainlining bullshit propaganda crafted to "mobilize the base" can actually have a better grasp of the truth.

Verifying a message vs. its contents

[tepples]

As your employer, I'd like to see your randomly drawn ID, you know, to verify that you really voted during the two hours you were off.

Here's the public part of a randomly drawn ID, plus a certificate signed by the election office. With the public part, you can verify that I voted but not for whom. For all you can tell, I voted for Mickey Mouse.