Paper Vote Canada

Machines will produce 99.4% of the election results for the upcoming 2004 presidential election. With all the hoopla over voting machine "glitches," porous software, leaked memos, and the creepy corporations that sell and service these contraptions, and with all the controversy that surrounds campaign financing, voter registration, redistricting issues, and the general privatization of the election process--we are missing the boat on the biggest crisis facing our democracy.

Americans aren't really voting. Machines are. Call it faking democracy.

[Think of voting as a three-step process: marking, casting, and counting ballots. Once a machine is involved in any one of those steps, the result is hard evidence of the machine's output--and only circumstantial evidence of the voter's input.]

And no one seems to be challenging it. As far as I can tell from my own investigations and from discussions with law professors, attorneys, and others, there has never been a lawsuit that challenges the right of machines to be used in the voting process.

...

The only fix that will give Americans back their constitutional right to vote is to ditch the machines.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 8:48 am (0) comments /

Switzerland is planning to introduce eVoting through the Internet in a constituency of about 9,000 voters in Geneva as a first step to wiring the whole country.

Who would not like to sit in their favourite arm-chair sipping tea and render their service to democracy. eVoting may just be the answer.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 8:45 am (0) comments /

"We started out with a customer rather than a technology," said [CanVote creator] Church, referring to the local government. "We didn't have a lot of money or time. We were trying to figure out how to get phone, Internet, and go. We didn't want to go back to paper ballots. We wanted something different, something better."

And while security may be the biggest issue in general with election systems and software, Church said the local Canadians were more concerned with putting something in place in time for polling.

CanVote's Church readily acknowledged that the complexity and security needs for the local elections in Ontario pale in comparison to the initiative-laden, multiple-candidate, multiple-race elections that take place in the States. "Our elections are much lower profile elections," Church said. "The security thing is nowhere near as big an issue as it would be for Americans. In our case, it was kind of like, if a mayor doesn't get elected, nobody cares."

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:41 am (0) comments /

An effort to erase doubts about new ATM-style voting machines by backing up digital votes with paper records is gaining ground nationwide, as state officials heed warnings about security and potentially messy recounts.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 4:15 pm (0) comments /

Election Commission officials say this general election will be the last time that anyone will ever suffer the pangs of bogus voting. From the next round of elections — general or state — the Indian voter will gain protection from a national photo voter list. ...

To make more use of information technology to check fraudulent voting during elections, the Election Commission is exploring a proposal to use biometrics technology to identify the voter.

Biometrics uses the thumb or the pupil of the eye — both of which have unique characteristics — to identify the voter. “There can be no better method than this to identify the voter. It will need investments but will encourage more people to come to the polling stations,” said an Election Commission official.

The officials also said there would be special focus on harnessing information technology to ensure the compilation of quick and accurate results.

India will depend solely on electronic voting for the coming elections. Electronic voting machines are at present stand-alone devices and there is no plan to hook them up to a central server to speed up the process of counting.

Election Commission officials said there were problems associated with such a process but they were exploring options for future elections.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 10:29 pm (0) comments /

3:15 - 4:30 pm, Empire Ballroom
Plenary 12: Electronic Voting: The Great Paper Trail Debate

If your next vote is cast on a touch screen voting machine, how will you know that it was counted correctly? Many computer scientists and public interest groups argue that voter verified paper ballots are a necessary check for the integrity of our elections. Opponents of voter verified paper ballots counter that they unnecessarily complicate the voting process, add needless expenses, and make providing access for the disabled more difficult, without really improving the integrity of elections.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 7:01 pm (0) comments /

In December, Maryland Del. Karen S. Montgomery (D-Montgomery) drafted legislation to require voter-verified paper records. Voters would be allowed to correct errors they find on printouts of the votes they are about to cast. If the printout matches the voter's touch-screen decisions, the voter then would cast the electronic ballot, and the paper version would be stored for use in any recounts. Ms. Montgomery's measure also would require random checks of the paper records in 2 percent of election precincts against the computer records, to search for evidence of possible tampering. The technology exists and ought to be included in the voting system. A number of states, including California, have voted for requirements that would create paper trails

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:45 am (0) comments /

Has anyone considered the possibility that the security and privacy requirements for financial transactions may differ from those for on-line and telephone voting? Limited liability plays a big role in the security of financial transactions (in North America, anyway; I understand the U.K. is a bit different). Would it play any role in on-line voting? It isn't like a voter can point to an unbalanced cheque book at the end of the month when something goes wrong.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:19 pm (0) comments /

The president of Diebold Election Systems pledged Wednesday to fix multiple problems plaguing its oldest touchscreen-voting customer on the West Coast.

Officials in Alameda County, purchaser of a $12.7 million Diebold electronic-voting system in May 2002, reserved judgment on whether the McKinney, Texas, firm is capable of delivering on its promises.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:48 pm (0) comments /

"California has a lemon law which protects consumers if they buy an automobile that doesn't work. So far, electronic voting in California is a lemon. It needs to be fixed," said Sen. Ross Johnson, R-Irvine.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 9:09 pm (0) comments /

Monday, March 08, 2004  

UPA workshop and panel on voting

We're running a panel and a workshop on voting at the Usability Professionals' Association conference in Minneapolis this summer.

This workshop will look at the social, civic and methodology issues in ensuring the usability of voting systems and new voting concepts currently being trialed. The goal of this workshop is to bring together practitioners, officials and researchers from around the world to look at the issue of e-voting/e-participation through the lens of usability and user-centered design.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:48 am (0) comments /

Extended Call for Papers: Voting, Elections, and Technology

Micah Altman Micah_Altman@harvard.edu
Thu, 4 Mar 2004 19:22:28 -0500 (EST)


Due to the scheduling of other journal issues, the SSCORE editor has given
us an opportunity to extend the original deadline for submissions to this
special issue until June 15.

Call for Papers: *Voting, Elections, and Technology*
a special issue of _Social_Science_Computer_Review_

This special issue of Social Science Computer Review will bring together a
collection of high quality academic work that extends, refines and
challenges our understanding of the use, state of the art, and challenges
associated with voting and election technology, broadly conceived.

This special issue will bring together papers that investigate specific
cases of the use of technology in voting and elections, as well as analysis
of policy, and reviews of the state of the art. Papers from a broad range of
social science perspectives are encouraged. Submissions can be in the form
of full papers (maximum 20 printed pages) or in the form of short papers (5
printed pages). Post-graduate students are particularly encouraged to submit
early work in the form of short papers.

*Sample Topics*: E-voting, Online voter survey methods, Technologies for
election forecasting, Agent,based models of voting behavior, Web,based
campaign fundraising, Redistricting technology, Policy implications

[Abridged for RISKS. For more on SSCORE, see this URL:
http://hcl.chass.ncsu.edu/sscore/sscore.htm
]

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:44 am (0) comments /

For some inexplicable reason, the U.S. is rushing to eliminate the only physical record of the mark made by each voter, going to straight touch-screens with no paper trail. Canada doesn't allow this. Neither does Japan. Why are we so casually throwing away the only real audit trail that protects our vote?

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 9:57 am (0) comments /

Then the machine displayed this message:

"Recording Vote. Please Wait."

A couple of moments went by, then the machine displayed this final message:

"Vote Recorded, Thank You"

I waited for the output. Nothing happened. Ok, I guess I was done voting.

It would have been a wonderful experience except for one thing. There was something missing. Something very important.

There was no human-readable, physical evidence that my vote had been captured and stored the way that I had intended.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:55 am (0) comments /

Scattered technical problems were reported in the early hours as voters in 10 states, including California, New York and Ohio, went to the Super Tuesday polls to choose a Democratic presidential nominee and decide primary contests for congressional and state races.

Advocates of electronic voting say paperless ballots save money and eliminate problems common to old systems. But the technology brings a new breed of security concerns, like software errors and hackers that could make the results unreliable.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:56 pm (0) comments /

The BBC is reporting on the use of over a million Electronic Voting Machines (EVM) in India for Parliamentary elections in April. With a billion people and an electorate of 668 million, it is by far the largest democratic election exercise in the world.

The [Wisconsin] Elections Board staff recommends that the State Elections Board revoke the approval of any electronic voting systems, including the recently approved touch screen systems,

When the EVMs had an experimental outing in five state elections in November, they drew a fascinated reaction from the electorate in rural areas.

"You won't believe the kind of response," said Mr Simha.

"Some of them were thrilled to punch the machines. I have seen so many happy villagers."

A cart of Diebold electronic voting machines was delivered today to the
common room of this Berkeley, CA boarding house, which will be a polling
place on Tuesday's primary election. The machines are on a cart which is
wrapped in plastic wrap (the same as the stuff we use in the kitchen). A few
cable locks (bicycle locks, it seems) provide the appearance of physical
security, but they aren't threaded through each machine.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 5:56 pm (0) comments /

Speaking to an audience of fellow cryptographers and security experts, Rivest cautioned against the "digitizing" of votes. "We know only too well the difficulties of securing complex electronic systems," Rivest said. Technology companies and municipalities should "go slow," and "keep it simple," relying on paper ballots and audit trails to verify the data collected by electronic voting kiosks, he said.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 7:59 pm (0) comments /

In a test election parallel to the Student Union election at the WU Vienna in May 2003 the possibility to cast votes electronically (e-voting) will be available for the first time in Austria. A prototype developed at the WU Vienna by Prof. Prosser and his research group e-Voting.at is used that has been funded by the Anniversary Fund of the City of Vienna.

This system implements an absentee voting procedure and is based on the Austrian National ID Card ("Bürgerkarte"): Before Election Day the voter applies for the issuing of an electronic voting token, that is saved on the National ID Card. On Election Day only this electronic voting token is supplied by the voter to prove his right to cast a vote. Special cryptographic methods ensure strict voter anonymity and the non-repudiability of the results.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 7:55 am (0) comments /

Computer scientists are concerned that new electronic voting machines - already bought by several US states - have been designed to have the capability to transmit vote tallies wirelessly.

Critics of e-voting have previously cited uncertified software upgrades or bugs in the programs as problems, but they say the new touchscreen machines' wireless potential poses a novel security threat.

The makers of the new machines, Diebold Electronic Voting Systems in Canton, Ohio, point out that none of the AccuVote-TSx machines currently contain the matchbox-sized card required to make a wireless network connection.

But, unlike their predecessors, they do have a slot for the card, called a PCMCIA slot. And Diebold spokesperson Mark Radke told New Scientist that wireless capability could be implemented "if required by the jurisdiction" simply by inserting a card and configuring the machine.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 7:51 am (0) comments /

Although a private Australian company designed the system, it was based on specifications set by independent election officials, who posted the code on the Internet for all to see and evaluate. What's more, it was accomplished from concept to product in six months. It went through a trial run in a state election in 2001.

Critics say the development process is a model for how electronic voting machines should be made in the United States.

Called eVACS, or Electronic Voting and Counting System, the system was created by a company called Software Improvements to run on Linux, an open-source operating system available on the Internet.

...

The commission posted drafts as well as the finished software code on the Internet for the public to review.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 7:39 am (0) comments /

With the presidential primaries underway, the security of electronic voting still hangs like a chad in the political air.

For months now, computer security experts have butted heads with state and federal elections officials over how best to assure tamperproof e-ballots without creating voting chaos, as was the case with paper-and-punch-hole votes during the 2000 presidential election that led to the reforms.

But just as more citizens anticipate voting booths with touch screens, rather than tilting levers, much remains uncertain about the security of e-voting data and whether cash-strapped municipalities can meet recommended, potentially costly security standards.

Diluting confidence was last month's admission from VoteHere Inc., a Washington-based company that develops security technology for election voting, that sensitive software blueprints were stolen during an attack last fall. That intrusion may be linked to the March 2003 theft of source code from Diebold Election Systems of Ohio, which was broadcast on the Internet and found to contain serious security vulnerabilities.

At a recent symposium sponsored by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, security experts advocated better products -- not just procedures -- to ensure accurate and auditable e-votes.

"Good procedures are no excuse for deploying machines that are grossly insecure," says Avi Rubin, technical director for Johns Hopkins University's Information Security Institute.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 1:29 am (0) comments /

Dans un premier temps, le projet "Vote électronique" de la Chancellerie fédérale a pour but de provoquer la discussion politique ainsi que de suivre et d'évaluer des essais-pilote permettant de trouver une réponse aux différentes questions soulevées par ces nouvelles technologies.

Après évaluation des essais-pilote, il s'agira de prendre les décisions politiques nécessaires à l'introduction du vote électronique.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 8:05 pm (0) comments /

Opposition parties have urged Mr Cullen to defer the introduction of electronic voting, which is due to go nationwide in next June's local and European elections.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 4:16 pm (0) comments /

As misgivings about online voting systems grow in the US, New Zealand’s chief electoral office intends pressing ahead with an e-voting pilot in one electorate for the 2008 general election.

Such a limited initiative will allow any mishaps or disputes over electronic votes to be contained, says the chief electoral office’s manager of electoral events, Robert Peden.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 8:32 am (0) comments /

The Government has defeated an opposition motion calling for electronic voting to be deferred until an independent electoral commission has been established to oversee it.

The motion tabled by Fine Gael, the Labour Party and the Green Party was defeated by 59 votes to 55.

Speaking for the Government, Junior Minister Pat "the Cope" Gallagher accused the opposition of trying to cast a shadow over a perfectly good system.

He also said he believed the public was happy with the electronic voting system, despite the absence of a paper trail to verify results.

In 2002, the Irish government began the introduction of the Nedap/Powervote system, for electronic voting in the Republic of Ireland. We believe that this system poses a threat to our democracy.

Electronic voting is being rushed upon voters around the world with little regard for the risks and the costs to our democracies. In Europe, the UK and Denmark are holding e-voting trials as part of the 2004 European elections. France, Spain and Ireland have also held trials. E-voting is already established in Belgium and Switzerland. The European Commission is looking at introducing e-voting across the EU, and the Council of Europe is developing guidelines for elections involving e-voting.

We feel that voters and candidates must be able to feel certain that voting intentions are accurately recorded. If any doubts do arise then all stakeholders must be able to verify and audit all aspects of the election.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 7:52 am (0) comments /

The Nedap/Powervote system is to be used in local elections in Brest in March, and will be extended to a number of other constituencies for the European Parliament elections in June.

THE KOŠICE higher territorial unit and the city's technical university are preparing to run a test presidential election vote via the internet.

The city wanted to run a test vote in early February asking registered voters several questions, including whether they agreed that Slovak legislation should change to enable the e-vote.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 1:13 pm (0) comments /

California's reliance on electronic-voting technology came under renewed scrutiny Thursday when two state lawmakers unveiled a measure to create new safeguards and a voting-rights group urged voters not to rely on touch-screen machines in next month's election.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 1:08 pm (0) comments /

Mobile phones, digital TV, postal voting and that ubiquitous holy grail, the "worldwide interweb", will be at the disposal of a total of 6.5 million voters this year, taking Britain (or at least England) further away from what Robin Cook described as the "anachronism" of the pencil stub, and closer to the government's stated ambition of an e-enabled general election some time after 2006.

High-tech methods of voting via email and text message should not be used in next year's elections to local councils and the European parliament, a report warned today.

In Britain, enthusiasm for e-democracy (which includes e-consulting as well as e-voting) runs high in official circles. Last year's local e-voting pilot was the largest ever held, with 146,000 votes cast electronically. However, hopes for electronic voting in June's elections were complicated by the clash with European elections (apart from anything else, the need to include Gibraltar as part of south-west England).

The government is still committed to offering e-voting in a general election "some time after 2008". The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister last month began working with local authorities to set up a system of electronic electoral registers, essential if people are to vote electronically while outside their own constituency.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 12:43 pm (0) comments /

Proportional representation, scrapping the permanent voters list and new rules for election advertising will all be on the table as part of a sweeping review of Canada's Elections Act announced yesterday.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:51 pm (0) comments /

In south Florida last month, an electronic-voting system from Election Systems & Software was used in a special election to fill a seat in the state Legislature. The election was decided by 12 votes. However, more than 130 voters cast blank ballots using the touch-screen system.

No one is sure why those ballots were blank. Speculation ranges from voters deciding at the last minute not to vote to software errors to voters failing to confirm their votes on the final screen. Normally, such a close election results in a recount. But without paper ballots or punch cards to check, there's nothing to recount.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:45 pm (0) comments /

In fact, it worked so well that [Markham CIO] Allen foresees potentially expanding the use of e-voting considerably in future elections.

"One of the options we're looking at -- and I'm not sure if we're going to go there -- is eliminating polls altogether," he says. "That's what some government agencies have done."

Voters could either vote over the Net or the phone, using IVR (interactive voice response) or SMS (short messaging service). Or, he adds, all polling stations could be connected to the Internet.

Q: How do we know that the vote as electronically reported was correctly reflecting what the individuals who voted actually did?

A: First, the system goes through a pre-testing process to ensure that all votes are cast and recorded correctly by the system. Then, during the election, each voter is presented with a review page prior to submission of the ballot. The system holds each individual ballot so that the voter can double-check to make sure the ballot accurately reflects voter intent.

Q: How is the electronic vote audited?

A: The system does not tally the votes but rather delivers the raw votes cast. Those votes are encrypted. The encryption key is kept by the local jurisdiction and is the only body that can access the votes and tally the results. The encryption process allows for seeding certain identified voters with a receipt trail.

This receipt trail allows for certain voters to review their individual votes prior to the tally in the system.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:40 pm (0) comments /

Federal government House leader Don Boudria said: "As minister responsible for the Canada Elections Act, electronic voting is of particular interest to me. Voting electronically addresses issues such as time and distance that sometimes prevent people from voting."

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 7:14 am (0) comments /

Local Democracy and Services to Citizens

A municipality-run Internet portal can provide citizens with on-line access to council meetings and transcripts of council decisions as soon as meetings end. On-Line voting in municipal elections will be available, and citizens can have access to discussion sites where public comment is invited on municipal issues currently before council. All municipal permits, taxes and licenses can be paid on-line 24 hours a day.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:23 pm (0) comments /

Preliminary data collected from Internet voters revealed that 93 percent of respondents would be "very likely" to vote online again in a future election and 99 percent said that an interactive web site will be helpful in future elections. This unprecedented research is funded in part by the Applied Research in Interactive Media (ARIM) Program, a joint program between CANARIE Inc. and the Department of Canadian Heritage.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 6:03 pm (0) comments /

About 25% of the US electorate is expected to vote electronically in this year's November presidential election. This is up from around 15% in 2000.

...

But Professor David Dill from Stanford University told the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science the switch may actually make things worse.

"The problem with electronic voting is your votes disappear into the electronic machine and there is no independent way to check that those results are valid," said Professor Dill.

"I know that I am not going to have a lot of confidence in the vote totals reported by those machines unless there is some independent polling or whatever that is consistent with that."

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 4:25 pm (0) comments /

The opportunities for fraud are endless. In the 2002 leadership race, which was conducted by mail, Samantha the cat was the least of the party's problem voters. Former Rhinoceros Party leader Charlie McKenzie purchased a mail-in ballot legally, and then proceeded to auction it off on EBay. Mr. Mackenzie was reported to have stated that the sale was "an experiment in democratic capitalism," and was paraphrased by reporter Jill Vardy as saying that the ballot auction was "a gentle jab at a political system run by money."

Switching from mail-in ballots to telephone or Internet balloting does not solve the problem.

...

If the leadership election organizing committee chooses any form of voting that does not involve every single voter physically turning up at the polls or (in the case of shut-ins) being visited at home by a party official, it is entirely possible that the leadership of the new party will be decided on the basis of fraud.

Even if this disaster is avoided, it is a virtual certainty that at least some of the ballots cast for the new leader of the party will have been cast fraudulently...

The committee must ensure that every such loophole is firmly shut and is transparently beyond any form of tampering.

[permanent link] posted by rakerman : 4:07 pm (0) comments /