Electronic voting

2016 is the presidential election year in the United States and many people all over the world are eagerly waiting to see who the next President will be. One area which is undergoing change as a result of technology is of course voting. In recent years, considerable interest has been generated in relation to electronic voting. However, electronic and/or online voting is inadvisable for several reasons. Anonymity is a critical aspect of voting in any democracy. Anything that compromises voting anonymity can lead to corruption or bribery. With that in mind, here are few things to bear in mind in regard to electronic voting machines.

1. The first problem is how to audit the electronic voting machine. How can you really ensure that whatever software you decide to use on the voting machine, will actually be the software on the machine on election day? However secure you may think the voting machines are, they cannot be absolutely secure.

2. Votes in transit. Whatever way you decide to transmit the voting data from the machines to the final count will contain risk of interference. However securely you may try to transmit the voting data, risks will be involved.

3. The central count program. This is the program that will take all of the voting numbers and calculate the final result. This program will be susceptible to hacking, however securely you try to protect it.

In view of the fact that somewhere between 5% and 50% of all desktop computers worldwide are infected with some kind of virus, we must be extremely careful in regard to how we design electronic voting software or hardware. The video below carefully addresses the points above and explains why electronic or online voting is inadvisable. As we embrace caution, it is important that we proceed with caution, particularly as it relates to politics. There is a huge incentive for people to skew electoral results so that they can ensure that their chosen candidate or party gets into power. In view of the political turmoil all over the world right now, this could be potentially disastrous. On top of that, we must never lose sight of the fundamental principles upon which democracy is based, namely accountability, transparency and control of the abuse of power. 


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