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Open Source Voting Machine Reborn After 6-Year War With IRS (Wired)
Wired is reporting that the Open Source Digital Voting (OSDV) Foundation has finally gotten approval for its non-profit status from the US Internal Revenue Service after applying for it in February 2007. "Then the revolution stalled. The Open Source Digital Voting Foundation spent the next four years in a kind of government-induced limbo as the Internal Revenue Service delayed processing of its application for nonprofit status. That delay cost the operation an untold amount of grant and donation dollars, and though the project has produced some software, it still hasn't begun work on important things like ballot-counting and tabulation devices and accessible voting machines." OSDV runs the Trust the Vote project and seeks to create open source voting machine solutions.
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Open Source Voting Machine Reborn After 6-Year War With IRS (Wired) Posted Aug 7, 2013 3:44 UTC (Wed) by salimma (subscriber, #34460) [Link]
We need to make more noise about it -- the only IRS foot-dragging the general public seems to get to hear about is the one concerning Tea Party-affiliated organizations.
There are some really decent FLOSS folks out there (such as the Yorba guys) whose work is being hampered due to their foundation applications foundering at the door of the IRS
Open Source Voting Machine Reborn After 6-Year War With IRS (Wired) Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:12 UTC (Wed) by cmorgan (guest, #71980) [Link]
ANY foot dragging by the IRS for political reasons should be a huge deal. The idea that any government organization might target you because of your political affiliations should be disturbing.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 4:08 UTC (Wed) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link] Umh, I don't know... Electronic voting solutions are *all* flawed, and they cannot be trusted, be they based on free software or otherwise. There have been known cases (i.e. Diebold in California, 2004) where the operating software has been audited and approved, but the machines were shipped with an different software. Of course, we know of the fact because it was detected, but nothing ensures it will be detected. Then there's also Ken Thompson's argument (Reflections on Trusting Trust, 1984): How can we really, really trust that not only the reviewed code is free of trojans, but also that the whole framework it uses is? And that the compiler is as well? And the operating system? And the compiler used for compiling said operating system? Yes, the more layers we put in, the harder it would be to craft an attack — But it's a non-zero possibility. Finally, the German Supreme Court argument of 2009, absolutely rejecting e-voting solutions, is beautiful: Democracy must consist of fully auditable processes. Fully auditable means they can be auditted (i.e. at the very least understood and replicated) by any citizen. The amount of citizens that can understand code is very far from 100%.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 4:49 UTC (Wed) by ras (subscriber, #33059) [Link]
> How can we really, really trust that not only the reviewed code is free of trojans, but also that the whole framework it uses is? And that the compiler is as well?
By constructing a voting scheme verifiable without access to the code, framework or compiler. In other words there are voting schemes out there that pass the ultimate test [0], and yet allow the voters to independently verify the whole framework has implemented the algorithm correctly without access to any of the voting machinery. For example:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pr%C3%AAt_%C3%A0_Voter
There governments implementing voting systems based on this:
https://www.vec.vic.gov.au/files/RP-EVT.doc
There are several of these schemes out there. They are variously called "voter verifiable" and "end-to-end verifiable". I don't know whether the OSDV is promoting such schemes. If they aren't then I'd agree they are probably wasting their time and their donors money.
[0] The acid test for any voting system is it makes any scheme for selling votes impractical. This implies, among other things, that votes must be anonymous.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 8:34 UTC (Wed) by MKesper (subscriber, #38539) [Link]
In Germany, again, the voter MUST NOT be able to proof their own vote (to prevent pressure/sold votes).
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 9:03 UTC (Wed) by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784) [Link] My understanding is that in the UK, you can prove your vote... but you can only get the required court order if you can satisfy the judge that you have good reason to believe your vote has been cast fraudulently.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 10:48 UTC (Wed) by nye (guest, #51576) [Link]
>My understanding is that in the UK, you can prove your vote... but you can only get the required court order if you can satisfy the judge that you have good reason to believe your vote has been cast fraudulently.
That can't be possible, because all the ballot papers are identical - there's no serial number or anything on them that could be linked to you.
*Except* (anecdote mode):
I don't know if it's the same in other countries, but in the UK you don't need to provide any form of ID to vote. Registered voters get a polling card in the post, but it's purely informational. You go up to the polling station, give your name and address, solemnly swear that you are that person, and they cross your name off and give you the ballot paper.
When we had an election a couple of months ago, my partner never received her polling card in the post. This seemed strange, because usually they both arrive together. We weren't particularly bothered though, given that you don't need it. So we got to the polling station, and I got my ballot paper, but her name had already been crossed off - somebody had come along a few hours earlier claiming to be her.
The people at the polling station had never had this happen before, so they had to phone it in and get guidance on what to do. In the end, my partner was required to provide proof of ID, and they provided her in return with a bright pink ballot paper.
So this is one example of where a vote cast could be positively tied to a specific individual.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 11:27 UTC (Wed) by james_ (subscriber, #55070) [Link]
> That can't be possible, because all the ballot papers are identical - there's no serial number or anything on them that could be linked to you.
I do not believe that this is correct, from the BBC's web site ( http://news.bbc.co.uk/news/vote2001/hi/english/voting_sys... ) :
"Not quite secret ballot
Your name will then be crossed off and the clerk will give you a ballot paper stamped with an official mark.
It also contains a serial number, which means that your vote is not in fact completely secret as it is possible, though illegal, to trace all votes to the people who cast them.
The purpose of the serial number is to stop impersonation of voters and electoral fraud."
As the original commented said this takes a court order to de anonymise, but it is possible.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 11:41 UTC (Wed) by jwakely (subscriber, #60262) [Link]
Indeed, I'm surprised the GP has never noticed this when voting in the UK.
Exactly, no secret ballot in the UK Posted Aug 7, 2013 15:02 UTC (Wed) by tialaramex (subscriber, #21167) [Link]
It's not only possible to work backwards from a UK ballot (say, one that has voted for an anti-establishment candidate) back to the named individual voter, we know from the official archives that it was done (to identify Communist sympathisers) in the past, and it really doesn't take an enormous leap of logic to conclude that it's still being done, perhaps on a bigger scale than ever. The government at the time denied it, and today's government acknowledges that it was done then but denies that it's still done now. Well that's not exactly a surprise either, is it?
Exactly, no secret ballot in the UK Posted Aug 8, 2013 8:39 UTC (Thu) by njwhite (subscriber, #51848) [Link]
Gosh, I didn't know that. Can you provide a link to further reading?
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 12, 2013 10:19 UTC (Mon) by nye (guest, #51576) [Link]
>Indeed, I'm surprised the GP has never noticed this when voting in the UK.
Honestly, so am I. At the time of the anecdote I checked my ballot paper pretty thoroughly for any identifying information, because I was wondering how they would handle the situation.
I have only voted in two *general* elections though, and might well have forgotten any details, so perhaps they're different?
Trackable votes in UK/NZ Posted Aug 7, 2013 12:56 UTC (Wed) by martin.langhoff (subscriber, #61417) [Link]
Same in NZ. Votes can be tracked down and annulled after the election. It takes considerable effort, involving courts and the electoral office, but it is doable.
In Latin America, OTOH, not being able to track down the vote is a key requirement, as there is a sad long history of trading votes for favours.
Having worked in elections-related systems, I just don't get what the obsession is with electronic voting.
Paper votes in plain white envelopes have all the right features. Yes, you can (and should) back it with an IT infrastructure to maintain voter rolls, tally the counts and recounts, etc. That's what NZ does; and to a more modest extent many LatAm countries do. AIUI, Germany does the same.
Computers have a well-deserved place in the process, just not inside the voting booth. Paper excels there, let it do its job.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 9:28 UTC (Wed) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link]
Yes, the point is that you can prove you voted, and you can prove that your vote was included in the total, but you cannot prove what the vote was.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 9:55 UTC (Wed) by MKesper (subscriber, #38539) [Link]
Even being able to prove THAT you voted is problematic.
Eg in "german democratic republic" you were forced to vote.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 11:05 UTC (Wed) by cesarb (subscriber, #6266) [Link]
> Even being able to prove THAT you voted is problematic.
In locales where voting is obligatory (like here in Brazil), proving that you voted is not a problem, since it does not give much information. In fact, here you already can prove that you voted (you get a paper ticket after you vote).
Even in locales where voting is not obligatory, I fail to see the problem in being able to prove that you voted.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 11:58 UTC (Wed) by andreasb (subscriber, #80258) [Link]
> Even being able to prove THAT you voted is problematic.
You have to prove that you haven't already voted in order to vote. I don't think it's practically possible to prevent proving the opposite in that case.
Compulsory voting Posted Aug 7, 2013 12:25 UTC (Wed) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link]
In Argentina, voting is compulsory. If you are over 500Km from your registered place of residence, you have to prove it, and you are exempt from voting. The feeling is in general supportive of that measure, as it gives legitimacy (a real mandate) to the governments.
Compulsory voting Posted Aug 7, 2013 17:08 UTC (Wed) by debacle (subscriber, #7114) [Link]
Yes, I'm in favour of the obligation to vote, BUT there must be a field for people who do not like any of the options (NOTA = none of the above) and the number of parlament seats equivalent to the number of "NOTA" would remain empty.
I'm skeptical about any electronic voting system, free or not. I'm EE with a strong IT background and even some security knowledge. I would not be able to audit any electronic voting process that respects both secrecy of the ballot (nobody can tell who voted for whom) and pressure-free vote (i.e. not via internet where you can't be sure somebody is pointing a gun at the head of the voter).
Classical paper voting can be audited by most well-educated people, they do not even need any kind of academical degree. If most people would not be able to audit the voting process, there is no point in voting at all.
Compulsory voting Posted Aug 7, 2013 17:34 UTC (Wed) by mathstuf (subscriber, #69389) [Link]
> and the number of parlament seats equivalent to the number of "NOTA" would remain empty.
As long as quorum, percentage requirements, etc. are still counted based on the number of available seats and not those filled. That's a very important detail with this setup. Also s/equivalent/proportional/ :) .
I think filling those seats with eligible candidates from the entire population wouldn't be the worst idea (think of it as conscription for the legislative branch).
Compulsory voting Posted Aug 7, 2013 21:56 UTC (Wed) by zlynx (subscriber, #2285) [Link]
I sort of want a political party that does that in the US, because it would be awesome.
Just use a random system to select from all the eligible citizens a number of candidates. Then do some research on their backgrounds and have the party officials vote, with reasons provided, to exclude any potential candidates that are too messed up.
Then have a party caucus to select one candidate for each position.
Then run them in the main election.
And do all this without asking them.
"Congratulations, you've been elected as Governor!"
Compulsory voting Posted Aug 8, 2013 0:39 UTC (Thu) by mathstuf (subscriber, #69389) [Link]
I think something like the Athenian[1] way would be interesting. It seems that you had to nominate yourself still, but getting into office wasn't about votes, but drawing names from a hat. One thing that I see in that section is that those in office were held very strictly to "are they actually serving the people?". I'd like to see Congress do some self-reflection every year at least. Of course, with elections of 90% of Congress not happening under this system, maybe there'd be actual time for getting shit done. For those who are elected, I see that there was "a death penalty for 'inadequate performance' while in office" and any embezzlement is recovered from the estate of the elected official. There did seem to be issues with it, but I wonder if we could take some of the more…juicy details and port them over to the Constitution…
[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Athenian_democracy#Officeho...
Very OT: Compulsory voting Posted Aug 8, 2013 7:57 UTC (Thu) by debacle (subscriber, #7114) [Link]
> I think filling those seats with eligible candidates from the entire population wouldn't be the worst idea (think of it as conscription for the legislative branch).
I love this idea! "Congratulations! You have been drawn MP for the next four years!" This would shake up democracy for good.
Compulsory voting Posted Aug 7, 2013 22:50 UTC (Wed) by Arker (guest, #14205) [Link]
I have been registering myself, and marching down to the polling station, and generally doing my part in the civil religion of democracy, despite having no real faith in it, ever since I turned 18.
But I am still deeply uncomfortable with the idea of making attendance at such a ceremony legally obligatory. That is deeply problematic from a point of view of basic rights.
Very OT: Compulsory voting Posted Aug 8, 2013 7:54 UTC (Thu) by debacle (subscriber, #7114) [Link]
> But I am still deeply uncomfortable with the idea of making attendance at such a ceremony legally obligatory. That is deeply problematic from a point of view of basic rights.
It is problematic, indeed. It's a weighting of basic rights and the freedom to stay at home against the functioning of democracy. After all, the obligation would be a vote every three, four, five, six years (or to pay a fine, which could be e.g. one percent of the monthly income of the non-voter). This is not much compared to e.g. national service which exists in many countries, compulsary lay judge etc.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 12:31 UTC (Wed) by gdt (guest, #6284) [Link] We have compulsory voting here in Australia. You wait in a short queue, walk into the hall between 8am and 6pm on the Saturday, state your name, the official ticks you off the electoral roll, and gives you the ballot papers. You go into the booth and do with the papers what you please. On your way out you put the ballot paper into the ballot box. Polling places are local schools and the like, and the school or a community group will be selling BBQ food to raise money. At the close of the poll the ballot boxes are serial numbered, signed and sealed. They are then taken to the tally room, checked and counted by hand, the totals of each box being entered into a computer. The box is then re-sealed. It is destroyed (sealed and intact) after the interval for requesting a recount has passed. Political parties and other interested people can, and do, "scrutineer" the process from the sealing through to the national totals (and later, view the destruction). By about 10pm we usually know the result with one candidate "claiming victory" and the others "conceeding defeat", based on the value of the ongoing tally and their parties' projections of the final result. The formal declaration occurs about a week later. A single federal government agency runs the ballot, with a huge amount of volunteer assistance. There's quite a "grand day out" atmosphere. After the election the marked electoral rolls are run through a computer. If you weren't marked off any of the rolls then you get a fine. If you were marked off multiple rolls then an election official or the Federal Police visit. Australians see compulsory voting as more democratic than optional voting -- everyone is responsible for the result. We frankly don't understand comments like yours which claim the requirement is totalitarian. We rather look at the US schemes which prevent people from voting as showing a rottenness at the core of US politics: a willingness to undermine democracy to achieve power. The system is highly manual, but the huge amount of volunteer labour keeps the cost down (and don't confuse volunteer with inexpert). Lots of people see volunteering as an official as a democratic duty, so the AEC get good people volunteering, and then train them well.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 12:41 UTC (Wed) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] We rather look at the US schemes which prevent people from voting as showing a rottenness at the core of US politics: a willingness to undermine democracy to achieve power. Actually, it's worse than that. Americans (it seems to me) are willing to undermine democracy for convenience. Those who want electronic voting machines are throwing away democracy because they think it's too much work to count paper ballots.
Why American elections are messy Posted Aug 7, 2013 14:22 UTC (Wed) by cypherpunks (guest, #1288) [Link]
The problem is that American elections put so much shit on the ballot. In addition to voting for everything from judges to dog catchers, many states have a handful of odd "ballot propositions".
To so this properly with paper ballots would require ballots that could be broken into a dozen or more pieces, and the right pieces deposited in each of a dozen boxes, which would be counted separately.
That makes it more complicated. I still think it would be a a good idea, but that's the difference between American elections and more sane countries.
Why American elections are messy Posted Aug 8, 2013 9:07 UTC (Thu) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] I don't want to sound too extreme, but people have died in defense of democracy. Is it too much to ask people to cope with "complicated" ballots? Or to wait a few hours for the counts to be available after the polls close?
Why American elections are messy Posted Aug 8, 2013 10:36 UTC (Thu) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
Now, this is a nice argument, one that I can fully support (seriously).
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:17 UTC (Wed) by ledow (guest, #11753) [Link]
It depends on your definition of democratic, really.
Personally, being forced to vote for one of a bunch of people that I *DO NOT* want to vote for is quite the opposite of democracy. Either I'm forced to choose the lesser of two evils, or vote randomly, but I certainly don't get the vote for the person I want. And in both cases, I'm being asked to lie on an official form as to the answer I give.
In a true democracy, I could vote for anyone. As it stands, I can't vote for me. I can't vote for the guy across the road. In fact, the reality is that I can't vote for anyone who doesn't have a huge political party with lots of money behind them (I believe even independent candidates have to register and have some expenditure in order to appear on the ballot papers). To paraphrase Rowan Atkinson in The Thin Blue Line: I think that anyone who WANTS to be a politician is EXACTLY the kind of person we shouldn't be letting become one.
Disagree with me? Democracy in action, again, if my opinion suddenly counts for less because you disagree. Far-fetched? Not really. I've never voted, precisely BECAUSE of this, except in one vote which was a question on "Do we need to change the way we vote?", basically. And even that wasn't what I actually WANTED but it was at least pointing in the right direction.
Forcing people to vote is not a positive thing. It only ever comes about when turnout is so drastically low anyway (which suggests that NOBODY wants ANY of the candidates that badly enough to even bother to vote at all, which is telling in itself!) and, when enforced, does not aid democracy the least bit.
All it does is suck up a huge percentage of people's time to make them answer a question where - FOR ANY OF THE POSSIBLE ANSWERS - they have absolutely no interest in the outcome going that way.
Let me vote for ANYONE, including a possibility of "I do not wish to vote for any of the above", and make that compulsory and then we can talk. That way you guarantee turnout, and you find out if most of the country actually DOES NOT WANT any of the options given to them. I've yet to hear of a political system that has such an option.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:33 UTC (Wed) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link]
Different electoral systems solve this problem in different ways: Either allowing you to write-in the candidate's name or by offering a "blank" ("none of the above") option, or both. Or, of course, you can nullify your ballot (by filling it without marking a specific option, or just writing your political manifesto on it if you are so inclined).
Blank votes are counted, nulls are just reported. And yes, it's very hard to make them count for *anything* — But as an example, in 1963, following a military government, the very popular leader Juan Domingo Perón (who was a president on three periods between the 1940s and 1970s, but was twice deposed by the military, and died holding the office) was forbidden to be a candidate. 19% of the casted ballots were marked as blank (while 25% were marked for Arturo Illia, who won the presidency). Of course, Illia *had* to lift the ban on Perón.
Yes, only extraordinary circumstances lead to the blank votes being worth anything. However, all non-extraordinary circumstances do have politicians in all of the power positions, so you would not be much better off ;-)
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:35 UTC (Wed) by yann.morin.1998 (subscriber, #54333) [Link]
> being forced to vote for one of a bunch of people
Here in France, voting is not compulsory. But if you go voting, you have the option of casting a 'blank' ballot, ie. one for which the enveloppe is empty. In this way, I believe one is able to express his/her interest in the vote itself, while at the same time saying "none of the proposed choices interest me".
You also have the option to stuff the envelope with anything (that fits in and is not dangerous, of course). In this case, the enveloppe is considered a 'null' ballot, and is discarded in the results.
Not to say this is the best system either, or that it is exempt of problems.
Nowadays, french officials are pushing for electronic (and internet) voting, and there have been a quite a few cases where there was doubts about the results, that were dismissed by lack of proof. And that is exactly the problem with electronic voting: it is impossible to prove there was fraud, or malfunction.
Cheers,
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:40 UTC (Wed) by Priscus (subscriber, #72409) [Link]
While voting is not mandatory in France, I have seen blank papers, ripped-off official ballots, cartoons, disparaging jokes and the like during the counting. Heck, someone even kept (and later used) ballots from elections ages past...
Voting could be made mandatory without problem: nothing forces you to vote for somebody you do not want, as the enveloppe protects the confidentiality of your choice. I really doubt we are the only country where elections works that way.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 14:15 UTC (Wed) by cypherpunks (guest, #1288) [Link]
You're not required to vote FOR anyone. You can write whatever you like on the ballot paper, and a blank or otherwise spoiled ballot is fine. Indeed, anything else would violate the secrecy of the secret ballot. The requirement is that you go to the trouble of showing up.
I agree that a Debian-like requirement for a "none of the above" option on all ballots would definitely produce some enlightening results.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 14:42 UTC (Wed) by mpr22 (subscriber, #60784) [Link] To appear on the ballot paper for a Parliamentary election in the United Kingdom, you need to secure the nomination of ten registered electors residing in the constituency you wish to stand in, and to pay a £500 deposit (which you get back if you get 5% of the valid votes cast). (Incidentally, political systems that allow you to vote for "anyone" do exist, mostly in the USA. The term of art is "write-in candidate", though at least some of those systems require prospective write-ins to be registered before polling day.)
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 11, 2013 4:00 UTC (Sun) by neilbrown (subscriber, #359) [Link]
My current perspectively (based largely on ignorance it must be admitted) is that compulsory voting affects the political parties very differently to optional voting.
In Australia the two political parties seem to have both drifted steadily towards the middle as they both try to get a larger share of the total vote. The more politically extreme parties usually don't do very well. The exception is the "Greens" which I suspect poll enough to be noticed not because of their ideology or policies, but simply because there are different to the main two.
If we had optional voting in Australia I suspect a lot of people wouldn't bother because there isn't really that much difference between Labour and Liberal. So the votes actually cast would be from the party-faithful or for the minor parties. This would effectively inflate the vote for the minor extremist parties.
I get a vague feeling that is what is happening in the USA. Rather than drifting together the parties are drifting apart. They need to encourage people to be bothered to vote, so they need to clearly differentiate themselves from the other mob. The goal here is not just to get their fair share of votes, but to get their supporters to bother to vote at all.
So I think optional voting encourages extremism in party policy which I don't think it a healthy thing. I wonder if there is any truth is that.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 11, 2013 4:13 UTC (Sun) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
I think your analysis is substantially correct. Voting, like jury duty and potentially military service, is a civic duty that should be enjoyed by all citizens. You don't have to vote for the popular party candidate but you do have to participate or you have no reason to complain if the result is not to your liking.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 11, 2013 21:02 UTC (Sun) by nybble41 (subscriber, #55106) [Link]
> You don't have to vote for the popular party candidate but you do have to participate or you have no reason to complain if the result is not to your liking.
On the contrary, you have every reason to complain if someone else harms you, whether or not they asked your opinion beforehand. A lack of response is not the same as granting permission. In fact, participating (by choice) in the vote can be taken as an endorsement of the process leading up to the harm even if the result is the opposite of what you wanted. Participation is essentially a statement that it is legitimate for _someone_ to have extraordinary powers by virtue of winning the election, when in fact the powers do not legitimately belong to anyone regardless of the vote.
I sometimes wonder if this (unfortunately popular) sentiment is some strange variant on Stockholm syndrome... few people ever agree with most of what the government does, and yet every few years they line up at the polls praising democracy and thinking that _this_ time will somehow be different. It's time to give up on government (non-)solutions and find voluntary ways to solve our social problems.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 11, 2013 22:29 UTC (Sun) by Cyberax (✭ supporter ✭, #52523) [Link]
>few people ever agree with most of what the government does
That's not true. Government approval ratings are much higher in NZ and Australia than in the US.
I'd argue that US is atypical in that a significant part of its population has a visceral hatred of anything related to government.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 12, 2013 5:32 UTC (Mon) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
> Participation is essentially a statement that it is legitimate for _someone_ to have extraordinary powers by virtue of winning the election, when in fact the powers do not legitimately belong to anyone regardless of the vote.
Ahh, a dyed in the wool anarchist. I think we are going to disagree at such a fundamental level as to make the rest of the conversation a meaningless series of misunderstanding. Good luck to you.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 14, 2013 11:15 UTC (Wed) by sorpigal (subscriber, #36106) [Link]
I'm an American citizen and I do not vote and I do complain about the results, which are not of my liking.
I will happily participate in an election when a candidate I like is made available to me. The telling fact is that this has never happened. I would also participate in an election if I believed the outcome would be fair, regardless of whether I liked any of the candidates. The system we use in the USA is fundamentally unfair.
I refuse to support a broken system, just as I refuse to run broken software or buy from companies whose practices are abhorrent to me. That does not invalidate my opinions regarding those governments, software or companies. I would thank you and everyone of your ilk to note assume that lack of voting equates to apathy or silent consent.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 14, 2013 12:02 UTC (Wed) by jwakely (subscriber, #60262) [Link]
> I would thank you and everyone of your ilk to note assume that lack of voting equates to apathy or silent consent.
But that's exactly what it says.
If you don't want to support the system them spoil your ballot (the more imaginatively the better) or vote "none of the above". That actually registers an objection, without aiding any candidate any more than not voting does.
Imagine if everyone who doesn't vote actually got to the polling station and wrote "screw this for a game of soldiers" or drew a cock and balls on the ballot. You don't think that 40% of the electorate voting for a drawing of a penis would have more influence and potentially lead to more change than 40% appearing to be too lazy to turn up?
Just not turning up means you don't even care enough to say you object to the system. That can only be interpreted as laziness or apathy.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 14, 2013 19:35 UTC (Wed) by sorpigal (subscriber, #36106) [Link]
> If you don't want to support the system them spoil your ballot (the more imaginatively the better) or vote "none of the above".
None of the above is not an option.
> That actually registers an objection, without aiding any candidate any more than not voting does.
> Just not turning up means you don't even care enough to say you object to the system
The four boxes of Liberty Posted Aug 14, 2013 21:54 UTC (Wed) by dlang (✭ supporter ✭, #313) [Link]
The Soap Box (publicly try to convince people)
The Ballot Box (change the laws) The Jury Box (affect how the laws are enforced) The Cartridge Box (Armed Revolt)
Please use in that order.
If you are willing to accept any government, then you can vote for change to that government.
If you believe that somehow everyone will just get along with no government, then the rest of us know to ignore you. Even in the smallest groups. Humans organize and develop some sort of governance, even if it's just the strongman style of governance.
The four boxes of Liberty Posted Aug 14, 2013 22:50 UTC (Wed) by sorpigal (subscriber, #36106) [Link]
> Please use in that order.
I use mostly the first and doubt the effectiveness of the middle two. The last, while effective, seems unlikely to lead to anything I'd like.
> If you are willing to accept any government, then you can vote for change to that government.
> If you believe that somehow everyone will just get along with no government
We're getting a bit far afield. My objection is the equation which says voting == participation and thus !vote == !participation. There are many ways to attempt to improve government and society that don't require you to buy in to brokenness first. Voting is not a function of caring and to attempt to say so is offensive. To shut down reasonable arguments made by dissatisfied people with "You didn't vote, so shut up" is wrong.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 18:57 UTC (Wed) by lieb (subscriber, #42749) [Link]
I second this. I've voted in California since 1968 and have seen the mess first hand. We recently visited AU (Sydney and Canberra) on holiday and got to see how it works there first hand. I suggest folks check out http://www.aec.gov.au. I believe the tally software in AU is also open source or at least open to scrutiny/review. Check out the videos,esp the one describing preferential voting.
As for compulsory voting (they consider it the same as jury duty), the fine is $20AUD, $50AUD if as stated, you have been AWOL... By comparison, a sixpack of beer is $16-18AUD...
As for forcing me to vote for "somebody", you can file an "informal" ballot by defacing it, aka, "None of the above". This is apparently rare given preferential voting. They've got a bucket full of parties so I'm sure you can vote for the Silly Walk Party if you want. I know they have one set up by a mining tycoon for his own self promotion. Oh, NO!, not the Donald Trump party!! ;)
AU has had 90+% participation since 1928, and "informal" votes are very low in practice. We in the U.S. seem to have settled for something > 50% and yes, political strategists plan for this and actively discourage voting because they can't win any other way.
Oh, the AEC also does *all* apportionment independent of all parties (they get voice but no vote/veto). California finally does that now to good effect.
The part I really like is the BBQ etc. at the polling places (school fundraisers). Aussies drive on the wrong side of the road and talk funny but they get more than a few things right, esp here.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 10, 2013 11:08 UTC (Sat) by elvis_ (subscriber, #63935) [Link]
No, some Australians see compulsory voting as a good thing, please don't talk as though you were speaking for all Australians.
There is a lot of indoctrination from primary school upwards about how our system is "better", but looking through the eyes of an educated adult I have completely changed views. I can now see all the vested interests who have a stake in having everyone vote and how they don't want the status quo changed.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 16:59 UTC (Wed) by epa (subscriber, #39769) [Link]
As long as 'abstain' is a valid option, I don't see the problem with being able to prove that you voted. In Australia voting is compulsory, for example.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 7:32 UTC (Wed) by nmav (subscriber, #34036) [Link]
> Umh, I don't know... Electronic voting solutions are *all* flawed, and they cannot be trusted, be they based on free software or otherwise.
I don't think the question was ever choosing between perfect manual voting and perfect electronic voting. Manual voting is far from being perfect either. Aside from that there are other important and unanswered questions such as what is life, what are we doing here etc. These however don't prevent us from creating things that make life easier.
About the fully auditable process that you mention, you have to also consider that manual voting consists of humans, and as far as I known the brain of a human is far less understood than the average trojan.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 8:27 UTC (Wed) by MKesper (subscriber, #38539) [Link]
It's simple to recount votes if they're on paper. Try to do that with electronically put votes.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 9:59 UTC (Wed) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
It is SIMPLER to stuff ballot boxes with phony votes than to alter an electronic ballot.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 10:20 UTC (Wed) by GhePeU (subscriber, #56133) [Link]
Did you ever actually participated in the process? Because having done so a few times (here in Italy), I can assure you that if you have the means to subvert all the people who can notice and stop your physical vote tampering, you don't really need to do it, cause you've got enough power that it's easier to ignore the count and announce to the public the electoral results you like.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 2:23 UTC (Thu) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
Yes I did participate in the electoral process, in many roles, since I was of voting age almost thirty years ago... :D
Almost ten years ago, in this very same site, I pondered the following two posts. Take in consideration that, at that time the present incumbent party (PT) just won the presidential election, from the last incumbent (PSDB).
( commenting to https://lwn.net/Articles/98671/ )
BEGIN QUOTE
I live in Brasil. We have had voting machines in the last 12-14 years (yes, twelve to fourteen -- it depends the size of the city you are in). Brazilians here: the first election here in Belo Horizonte to use the machines were the mayoral (and city council, state representation, governor, house and senate) before FHC was elected (as I count it, 2 years + 8 years + 1 1/2 = 11,5 years). I know it, because I was "mesário" (election "table" official? election "clerk"? what is a good English translation?) in the previous election, and in the two subsequent elections). IIRC, there were electronic ballot boxes in Rio and Sao Paulo in the election before that (the only two cities larger than Belo Horizonte).
END FIRST QUOTE
BEGIN QUOTE
With mechanical voting, there are the following possible frauds:
END SECOND QUOTE
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 12:34 UTC (Wed) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link]
When you stuff a paper ballot box, the total will be altered: You are not substracting a vote against your preference for each vote you enter. If the total ballots emitted does not match the total voters that attended, depending on the details of your electoral code, the booth can be canceled or rescheduled.
When you "stuff" an electronic booth via a hack (or algorithmically as the programmer, or whatnot), you can perfectly substract a vote for every vote you add. Besides, if you are a *very* successful attacker in a moderately guarded election, you can insert... Three, four papers without being noticed, in a booth that usually receives 300-700 voters. That is, you can push the results for that particular booth by ~1% tops. If you get the needed access to hack an electronic booth, you can do... whatever you feel like in just the same time. Finally, when your party decides to get you to stuff ballots, you can only alter results in one booth. If you are a particularly determined and skillful crook, you can go to a couple of booths and rig an election at various points. But pushing the whole election requires a real army of crooks. With e-voting, you need just a very small team at a very privileged position (say, programmers centrally altering the software before it's deployed, or intercepting the communications while they are transfered to the central authority, as it was done in Brazil last year) to get much stronger results.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 2:30 UTC (Thu) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
You can also perfectly switch the legitimate box with one containing the necessary number of votes. Or make a "Gangs of New York" move and make "shadow" boxes appear from "shadow" districts. Or pull a "Good Wife" move and stuff a box for some district you know your opponent is winning, to cast suspicion on that box and remove some of your opponent's votes.
Look my other answer, above. There are really many, many ways of hacking mechanical voting, including compromising the paper ballots and the voting pens' ink. It is not the mechanic nature of the election that makes it become magically reliable.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 3:53 UTC (Thu) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
> It is not the mechanic nature of the election that makes it become magically reliable.
The reliability difference isn't magical indeed, it's due to the nature and ability to mitigate the various risks. The techniques to mitigate risk and audit electronic calculations just aren't at the same level of sophistication or reliability as methods for paper. You can put your own auditors to watch every step of the process which can defeat the risks you highlight, and many others processes which can defeat methods of attack you haven't thought of yet.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 9, 2013 0:00 UTC (Fri) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] It is not the mechanic nature of the election that makes it become magically reliable. Actually, it is. To mount a small-scale attack on a well-designed paper ballot system is about as easy as mounting a small-scale attack on a well-designed e-voting system. However, mounting a large-scale attack on paper ballots is hard and expensive, while mounting a large-scale attack on an e-voting system is very likely to be almost as cheap as a small-scale attack. It is this lack of scaling of difficulty of attack that is the Achilles Heel of all e-voting systems. Let me give you an analogy: The average door lock has maybe four pins with maybe 10 different distinguishable pin sizes, meaning there are at most about 10 000 possible keys for a given lock. The reason 10^4 combinations is perfectly acceptable for a house lock is because of the physical nature of the lock. You can't quickly try lots of combinations. You can't remotely attack door locks. On the Internet, however, restricting an encryption key to 10^4 possibilities is insane because it would be broken in milliseconds. The ability to rapidly and remotely attack electronic systems means there's a huge qualitative different between mechanical and electronic systems.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 2:38 UTC (Thu) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
> say, programmers centrally altering the software before it's deployed, or intercepting the communications while they are transfered to the central authority, as it was done in Brazil last year
Do you have any references to this? Because I live in Brasil, and I didn't see any news about it (*). We do have a system (as I mentioned above) that does make this kind of scam hard to pull, if the various people in charge don't drop the ball.
(*) it's not to say our system is perfect; I know of attempted frauds in municipal elections in 2008 and 2004, but I don't know of any *successful* outrageous fraud, and I dare say if there were any, people would pull the same frauds with the paper ballots.
That said, I *do* support every party claim for more transparency and accountability in our voting machines. I just don't see the paper ballots being intrinsically more secure.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 16:19 UTC (Thu) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link]
> Do you have any references to this? Because I live in Brasil, and I didn't
> see any news about it (*).
Of course:
http://pdt.org.br/index.php/noticias/voto-eletronico-hack...
For people who don't understand Portuguese: This text, published last December, talks about how a 19-year-old hacker modified the results during the data transmission phase. This hacker says his action benefited Paulo Melo (PMDB) from the Rio de Janeiro state.
And yes, it's worrying that you heard no news about it. Of course, it's consistent with the official policy: "Our system is hacker-proof" gets chanted as a mantra, never to be challenged.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 21:09 UTC (Thu) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
Oh, I remember this case! It does not have anything to do with digital voting, because the fraud was commited in the digital tallying or summing... The electronic ballot boxes weren't compromised, the datapath between them and the tallying computer was.
Do you know if/how they pulled it off with the parties' representatives doing their own summing? Or there were no opposition parties fiscalization to start with?
I repeat myself: a big part of what makes our digital system "good" (I never said "perfect") is the transparency of the tallying...
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 21:52 UTC (Thu) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link]
The issue is that more and more aspects of the election are left in the "hands" of the electronic booths, and the booths are trusted as if they were incorruptible.
If the entities in charge of the transmission are the electronic booths, then there is no real need of the table authorities to have a locally-printed (or locally-hand-written) record.
Think about this scenario/progression: Why not leave the machines do their work? After all, they are much better at arithmetics than humans, and will not produce the errors derived of unclearly written numbers, right? So, people should now just take care of supervising the voters proceed as they should. Would that be preferable? Of course, people would argue that vote totals are transmitted encrypted in an unbreakable, secure fashion — Attacks such as this one are highly unfeasible and not likely to happen, are they? Well, guess what — They do happen.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 9, 2013 1:22 UTC (Fri) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
You did notice that each one of the arguments you rethorically asked is a slippery slope fallacy? Just don't buy into fallacies. The voting machines are IMNSHO better than the paper ballots IF AND ONLY IF: each voting machine is scrutinized, used, fiscalized, tested, dismantled, prepared, checked and rechecked lots of times before and after the election AND if the parties' representatives check each of the machines' results and the tallying at election day. Now, if one thinks it's just plug-and-play, then they're gonna have a bad time...
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 9, 2013 2:59 UTC (Fri) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
> IF AND ONLY IF: each voting machine is scrutinized
Your stated opinion is pretty much indistinguishable from agreement that DRE voting is a generally bad idea because voting machines definitely are not scrutinized in any meaningful way. The only real audit of voting machine security that I've seen was done on the sly by academics against the wishes of the manufacturer and election officials. The security and audit requirements demanded of voting machines is far far below that which is commonly done with slot machines and other gambling devices. Most don't even bother to have a printed audit trail of any kind.
The actual practice of running paper elections is just much more advanced and has more and better fraud risk mitigation techniques available than electronic voting at this time.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 9, 2013 17:04 UTC (Fri) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] each voting machine is scrutinized, used, fiscalized, tested, dismantled, prepared, checked and rechecked lots of times before and after the election I'm a professional software developer. IMO, it is impossible for anyone, no matter how expert, to scrutinize electronic voting machines to the required level of confidence. It is certainly impossible to convince someone who is not an expert in the field of the reliability of e-voting machines. Do you remember the Debian OpenSSL fiasco? A Debian maintainer made a change to the OpenSSL libraries in order to fix (what he thought was) a defect that had been found by an automated tool. I have no reason to believe that the Debian maintainer was careless or incompetent. It's just that the software was so complex and the change so subtle that it was missed. See the security announcement. On the other hand, anyone with a grade 8 education and some common sense can readily understand and trust the various security measures put in place for paper voting. You don't need to be an expert and you certainly don't need to examine highly complex systems for potential flaws.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 12:38 UTC (Wed) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] It is SIMPLER to stuff ballot boxes with phony votes than to alter an electronic ballot. You have obviously never participated in an election in a country such as Canada which has both strong democratic institutions and paper voting. I think you'd find it orders of magnitudes easier to subvert an electronic voting system than Canada's paper ballot system. Even the recent "robocall" event in Canada was geographically-limited and most likely had no material effect on the outcome of the election, yet was still massively scandalous. Think how much easier it would have been for the perpetrators to quietly subvert an electronic voting system.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 2:33 UTC (Thu) by hummassa (subscriber, #307) [Link]
Unfortunately, I don't live in Canada... But I am a good software developer, do you have any positions open? :-D
Now, seriously. Read my other answer, above... the reason an election is difficult to rig in Canada is not the paper ballot, but the well-established democratic institutions...
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 10:04 UTC (Wed) by ballombe (subscriber, #9523) [Link]
Counting vote is a very important experience that give faith in the election.
I suggest everyone should do it once in their life if they are allowed. Of course error are made but less than the errors people do when voting.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:03 UTC (Wed) by martin.langhoff (subscriber, #61417) [Link]
> Counting vote is a very important experience that give faith in the election.
+100! And a big nod to the posts in this thread from Australians and Canadians.
Paper votes are very hard to tamper with, given the procedures and people involved.
The general participation in the process by everyone give people understanding and faith in the process. This happens through volunteering or being appointed.
And compulsory voting forces even the most cynics to participate and see how it all works, so they can't dismiss the results without ignoring something that they have seen up close.
Overall paper voting and compulsory voting are good old things that we should keep and encourage.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:57 UTC (Wed) by cesarb (subscriber, #6266) [Link]
I remember hearing of a specific attack on paper ballots, many years ago, back when Brazil did not use voting machines yet (Brazilian voting machines completely avoid this particular attack).
From what I recall, the attack went like this:
First, the attacker obtained a blank ballot for a voting section (IIRC, all blank ballots were signed by some of the people working on the voting section, so blank ballots from somewhere else would not work). The attacker went outside the voting section (without depositing the blank ballot in the urn), and filled the ballot with the attacker's chosen candidate.
When a voter came in, the attacker gave the voter the filled ballot, and the voter had to bring back the blank ballot the voter received within the voting section (which means that what went inside the urn was the pre-filled ballot). The attacker then filled the new blank ballot, and repeated the process with the next voter.
This attack allows the attacker to be sure the voter either voted for a particular candidate, or cast a null vote by overwriting the attacker's choices. It allows vote buying.
How is this attack avoided in places which currently use paper voting?
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 14:14 UTC (Wed) by yann.morin.1998 (subscriber, #54333) [Link]
> How is this attack avoided in places which currently use paper voting?
Everybody receives at home a sealed envelope that contains an empty envelope, and one bulletin for each candidate.
At the voting place (usually a school or some such), there are piles of bulletin, one pile per candidates, plus a pile of empty envelopes.
Then, when getting into the voting place, you can either bring your pre-filled enveloppe with you, or you have to take exactly one envelope, *and* exactly one bulletin for each candidates.
Then you walk in to the voting booth, where drapes prevents anyone seeing what you are doing, and you do whatever you want with the envelope and the bulletins.
You walk out, present your ID and voting card, the people there (all volunteers) check you are registered at this voting place, check your ID, cast your vote in the ballot box, sign the register roll, and walk out.
For those voting where you can write names on the ballot, there are also 'blank' bulletins, which you have to take exactly one as for the candidates bulletins. A pencil is in the voting booth (or you can bring your own). And the process is the same.
The ballot boxes are transparent, so anyone can check they are empty at the start of the vote, and that voters only drop a single envelope at a time.
Regards,
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 14:27 UTC (Wed) by jjs (guest, #10315) [Link]
First, note that they subverted the electoral system itself (they got signed blank ballots). Second, while this will work in one polling place, to do it across the board requires an army of people to subvert multiple polling places (at least 2 / polling place (1 to sign, one to be outside). Third, all it takes is for a voter to hand the signed ballot to the person registering them, then take the blank ballot and vote (i.e. not use the presigned ballot and not give a blank ballot out).
To prevent it, you prevent blank ballots from leaving the polling place. easiest it to enable several people (from different parties) to scrutinize the people leaving.
The strength of paper ballots rests in the fact that EVERYONE can see what's going on - including those of opposite parties/stances. Where I used to vote, the votes were counted by three people, and all counts had to agree. Anyone could stand in the room and watch the counts - and all the political parties had folks standing there to watch for any hanky-panky. When the state announced results, those political folks knew exactly what the count was from our community - so if it differed they could protest and force a recount. And since the paper ballots still existed, you could really do a recount (unlike a "recount" that is rerun the tally on the machine that you don't trust).
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 14:48 UTC (Wed) by martin.langhoff (subscriber, #61417) [Link]
I generally agree about the transparency and civic participation being the key.
About the mechanics you describe, I disagree. The ballots aren't tracked closely at all, in any elections I have witnessed. It is the _envelopes_ that matter.
This has been thought through and refined over a couple centuries. While nothing is ever perfect, this is pretty damn well thought out to be obviously transparent...
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 21:25 UTC (Wed) by Wol (guest, #4433) [Link]
Except in the UK we don't have envelopes!
We are given a blank ballot, which we take into a booth (three walls, the voter's back to the room so everybody can see in, but can't see anything because the voter is shielding their paper...)
Once the ballot is filled in (or not) we fold it, and walk back to the table next to the officials, where we post it into a PADLOCKED ballot box.
In one election I remember (a European election, iirc), the ballots were A4 sheets meant to be computer scanned. I think we had to slide them, unfolded but face down, into the ballot box.
Whatever, everybody could see what was going on, but what you could NOT do was see what the vote was (unless the voter flaunted it) because everything is done in the open with no-one near you. The officials stay at their tables, and the observers aren't allowed anywhere near the tables, the booths, etc.
Cheers,
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 23:12 UTC (Wed) by yann.morin.1998 (subscriber, #54333) [Link]
> what you could NOT do was see what the vote was (unless the voter flaunted it)
IIRC, this is forbidden in France: vote must be secret. One can 'tell' people who you voted for, but can't show them.
When one walks out of the booth, his envelope must be sealed (well, not really 'sealed', but closed by folding the flap inside the envelope).
Regards,
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 23:14 UTC (Wed) by yann.morin.1998 (subscriber, #54333) [Link]
> One can 'tell' people who you voted for
s/you/he/
Sigh...
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 14:44 UTC (Wed) by martin.langhoff (subscriber, #61417) [Link]
From my experience in voting booths (which is a great civic learning experience!),
1 - there is one "table" committee with each ballot box. These are 3 volunteer citizens, one of them is "president of the table" but that's a formalism, any significant dispute between the three calls in monitors. Additionally, there are "floating monitors" provided by the state and by political parties.
This description is based on procedures in Argentina. NZ has a fairly different scheme; again the envelope is given to you when you arrive; you cannot use your own -- the reasons are very different, as the envelope has a unique serial number.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 15:10 UTC (Wed) by cesarb (subscriber, #6266) [Link]
> How is this attack avoided in places which currently use paper voting?
Thanks all for your answers.
I never thought about envelopes; the paper voting here in Brazil, as I recall it, did not use envelopes. Instead, the ballot was folded (the votes on the inside, IIRC the signatures on the outside since they were on the reverse side of the paper), and inserted directly into the (opaque) urn. Each voter received a single blank signed ballot.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 18:32 UTC (Wed) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] How is this attack avoided in places which currently use paper voting? When I vote in a Canadian election, if some random person gave me a ballot outside the voting place, I would get extremely suspicious. I'd report it to the election officials. Here's how it works in Canada. You go to your poll and an election worker asks for your name. You give it. The election worker consults her list and if your name is there, crosses it off and gives you a blank ballot. You go behind a screen, mark the ballot and fold it. You then give it back to the election worker and watch as she deposits it in the ballot box. (If your name is not on the list, there are various procedures for voting; you have to make a statutory declaration that you're eligible to vote and presumably they can check later and punish you if you lied.) For your attack to succeed, it would take collusion among many election workers and voters.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 18:44 UTC (Wed) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link]
<sigh> It seems you live in a country that has grown so used to fair, orderly elections you don't even feel like cheating is possible ;-)
> When I vote in a Canadian election, if some random person gave me a ballot
Right, it would not be a random person outside the premises. It would be somebody that agreed to do this beforehand with you — And potentially, with as many voters from the area as possible.
Why would you agree? Because this person would have given you something — Money, some goods... Or the happiness of no being beaten or robbed. Or the threat to stop all benefits you get from a given government program.
I see that many electoral systems do not even require a strong proof of ID — Ours (Mexico) does, so does every system I know of in Latin America (might there be a correlation there with the many electoral frauds in the past? Hmmm...) *That* is amazing IMO. Just by stating your name? If I know you will be out of town, can I just show up and vote in your place with no further questions asked?
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 19:03 UTC (Wed) by cesarb (subscriber, #6266) [Link]
> I see that many electoral systems do not even require a strong proof of ID — Ours (Mexico) does, so does every system I know of in Latin America (might there be a correlation there with the many electoral frauds in the past? Hmmm...)
We (Brazil) are even going biometric (only a few cities for now).
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 19:10 UTC (Wed) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
> *That* is amazing IMO. Just by stating your name? If I know you will be out of town, can I just show up and vote in your place with no further questions asked?
That seems possible but not something that could be done at a scale which would make any difference. Many of these kinds of attacks are very difficult to do undetectably, if someone shows up early and votes as you, you will notice when you find your name already crossed off. If there is mandatory voting then there is also paperwork to file if you are going to be out of town so that you don't get fined, if someone votes as you after you declared your absence that would be detectable.
It seems pretty hard to have massive fraud in a well-run paper voting system without also requiring massive collusion of the election workers and monitors, and the secrecy of anything which requires massive collusion is inherently fragile.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 22:11 UTC (Wed) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Right, it would not be a random person outside the premises. It would be somebody that agreed to do this beforehand with you — And potentially, with as many voters from the area as possible. That is a pretty expensive attack if you want to materially affect the outcome of a national election. An electronic attack would be far cheaper and far harder to detect. Just by stating your name? It used to work that way. Now you are required to show government-issued ID.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 17:32 UTC (Thu) by paulj (subscriber, #341) [Link]
The attack you describe is not solely an attack on the paper voting system, but also on the electorate. It requires buying or intimidating a significant proportion of the electorate. Thus, the success of this attack is in direct proportion to the amount of the electorate involved, and whom it is visible to.
Electronic voting would not fix it either - the attacker could just as easily give the voter a small video camera (e.g. a cheap mobile phone) and require them to record what they do in the booth.
With electronic voting, the problem is that a small (e.g. potentially just one) number of people can subvert the entire voting system, *without* anyone else knowing. This is simply impossible with paper voting and distributed counting.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:36 UTC (Wed) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
> Umh, I don't know... Electronic voting solutions are *all* flawed, and they cannot be trusted, be they based on free software or otherwise.
Neither can paper ballots. Everything is subject to manipulation or subterfuge.
> There have been known cases (i.e. Diebold in California, 2004) where the operating software has been audited and approved, but the machines were shipped with an different software.
Don't believe anything coming out of California.
The way California works is that they find some mistake their contractors make, sue them for it, and then settle out of court in order to get free hardware and services. This is just, very simply, how the government does business in that state. Seen it multiple times.
The whole point of the court case isn't that Diebold is bad and that California wanted to get their money back. The entire point was that California wanted free shit from Diebold. The lawsuit was specifically created so that California could continue to use Diebold.
> How can we really, really trust that not only the reviewed code is free of trojans, but also that the whole framework it uses is? And that the compiler is as well? And the operating system?
Same way we can trust electronic banking or electronic-anything... by accounting and verification.
Since in the USA it is 100% illegal to track ballots by any means because it may be possible to identify the voter using the ballot then it's impossible for anybody to ever know if their ballots even got counted, much less counted correctly. This means no serial numbers or anything. You can't even have the ability to verify how many ballots have been printed or anything of that nature.
Very simple, any sort of deterministic accounting and verification of ballots or votes is impossible using the USA-style of voting.
Also all cases of real voter fraud that I've seen is not carried out by any voting machine company, but by the local governments actually running the elections. If you can't trust the people who collect and count the ballots and you have zero possibility of having voters check to see if they were counted correctly, and it's impossible for third parties validate the votes then your fucked no matter the method used to count votes.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 17:13 UTC (Wed) by k8to (subscriber, #15413) [Link]
The issue isn't that paper ballots are incredibly secure, it's that it's not very practical to tamper with them at scale, while it's definitely practical to tamper with electronic votes at scale.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 17:51 UTC (Wed) by gwolf (subscriber, #14632) [Link]
> Don't believe anything coming out of California.
> > The way California works is that they find some mistake their contractors > make, sue them for it, and then settle out of court in order to get free > hardware and services. This is just, very simply, how the government does > business in that state. Seen it multiple times. > > The whole point of the court case isn't that Diebold is bad and that > California wanted to get their money back. The entire point was that > California wanted free shit from Diebold. The lawsuit was specifically > created so that California could continue to use Diebold.
Right. Maybe there was no ill attempt from the part of Diebold. But this case does show that this is prone to happen: Maybe only the litigation-happy state of California proceeded with this review — Anyway, to run a real election, any contractors/suppliers might have different revisions of the same model of any given e-booth. Maybe a bug resides only in 10% of the booths, with a different BIOS or whatever. The full audit was done in a fixed machine — And the supplier still provides some broken machines. That can perfectly happen in a realistic setting.
Of course, even worse would be to *purposefully* hide any kind of malware in some of the machines, without it being clearly noticeable from a "regular" use. It is perfectly doable.
> Same way we can trust electronic banking or electronic-anything... by
When you trust e-banking, there is bidirectional accountability: When you transfer money to my account, both your account shrinks and mine grows. That is, by looking at either your or my data, we can make sure the transaction was carried out effectively. When you vote, there must remain proof of your vote in the side of the voting authority, but on your side there must remain no proof of the vote (if anything, just a mark on your ID card stating you did vote — some jurisdictions do it, some don't).
So, no, there is no way to parallel the trust in my e-banking to the trust in e-voting. Three months ago I was double-billed by the bank while paying a hotel. By looking at the bits in between, it was ruled that the mistake was done by the bank (not by me nor the hotel staff), so I was reimbursed. I trust my voting system *not* to remember who *I* voted for (but to also *not* mess with the vote I emitted, respecting my choice) — And for that, paper is better than electrons.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 19:41 UTC (Wed) by drag (subscriber, #31333) [Link]
> Maybe only the litigation-happy state of California proceeded with this review
There is no maybe. The courts are used to reduce the cost of contracting services. This is S.O.P.
> Anyway, to run a real election, any contractors/suppliers might have different revisions of the same model of any given e-booth.
I've helped run real elections. With paper ballots and with voting machines. I have first hand experience. The contractors use whatever the local government required. Whatever firmware revision or hardware revision or whatnot. It isn't like the hardware is dropped off for the election in some van and then collected up again by the e-voting company.
Hell voting machine companies are not even legally allowed to compile their own software and firmwares. The source code is registered and audited by a third party and compiled by government representatives.
Also BTW:
In the USA you are required by law to have electronic voting machines because of need to support disabled people. Not everybody has ability to view or fill in circles on paper ballots.
Remember nobody is allowed to know your vote. So if you can't see or read or move your arms or legs you still have to have the ability vote all by yourself.
Typically 'electronic voting machines' in the USA just print out things on paper ballots.
This is how it works:
* You go up to your electronic voting machine. You fill out your ballot on the touch screen, audio headphones-with-paddle interface, sip-n-puff interface or something like that.
The paper stuff makes people feel better, which is why it is done. Doesn't really ensure nearly as much as people believe it does.
> When you trust e-banking, there is bidirectional accountability
Yes. This is what I am saying. This is why it works.
> When you vote, there must remain proof of your vote in the side of the voting authority,
You will possibly have your name recorded that you shown up to vote, but that is it.
It's illegal for anybody to track your ballot or know which ballot it yours. It is impossible and would be illegal for you to be able to track and verify your own vote, because then others could do also.
> So, no, there is no way to parallel the trust in my e-banking to the trust in e-voting.
Yes.
Exactly. That is exactly what I was saying in my post. And the same exact problem exists for paper ballots.
It's impossible for you to know that your paper ballot wasn't tampered with or anything like that. For example: The people that you have to worry about tampering with votes are the same regardless of whether or not you are using electronic or paper voting. A person travelling with your paper to the central counting station could just drop them off at the side of the road and pick up a entire new box of paper ballots. It happens. All it takes is a dark corner of the road and 2 minutes.
Like I said before the people who are in a position to do voter fraud are the people running the elections. Which is the local government entity. That is were the threat lives and were fraud happens. And it can happen regardless of paper or electronic.
If you don't trust the people that run your elections then you can't know if your ballot is counted or not. It's the same if you are using electronic or paper ballots.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 20:25 UTC (Wed) by raven667 (subscriber, #5198) [Link]
> If you don't trust the people that run your elections then you can't know if your ballot is counted or not. It's the same if you are using electronic or paper ballots.
You shouldn't have to blindly trust any individual running the election, that's why anyone can monitor the whole process and there are usually multiple, antagonistic monitors who can verify that no such fraud is taking place. With all the security measures that should be in place for paper ballots it should require collusion of a large number of election officials and independent monitors to create any significant level of fraud. And large amounts of collusion are hard to keep secret.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 20:53 UTC (Wed) by Creideiki (subscriber, #38747) [Link]
> A person travelling with your paper to the central counting station could just drop them off at the side of the road and pick up a entire new box of paper ballots. It happens. All it takes is a dark corner of the road and 2 minutes.
Here in Sweden, that box would have been counted (preliminary, but still reported and published) in the voting hall before it was sent off for the official count. All counts are public, so the fraud depends on nobody bothering to come to observe the preliminary count, or the observers not bothering to cross-check the results, or them not raising a stink about it. Still, all this gets you is the ability to change 1k votes out of 9M voters. But not too much, since that will look suspicious to the newspapers, who usually look through the lowest-level final counts and report any oddities.
I believe a big part of the solution is that we do proportional representation, not first past the post, so changing a few votes gets you a very small benefit for a very large risk.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 21:36 UTC (Wed) by Wol (guest, #4433) [Link]
> Remember nobody is allowed to know your vote. So if you can't see or read or move your arms or legs you still have to have the ability vote all by yourself.
HOW!?
I fail to see how an electronic voting machine is any better than a piece of paper at helping people to vote. If you can't use your arms or legs how are you supposed to use the machine?
Cheers,
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 9, 2013 10:39 UTC (Fri) by jezuch (subscriber, #52988) [Link]
>> Remember nobody is allowed to know your vote. So if you can't see or read or move your arms or legs you still have to have the ability vote all by yourself.
>HOW!?
That's the American Way ;) They will go to absurd measures to protect their perceived "democratic values" while there are gaping holes elsewhere that everyone tries very hard to ignore.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 7, 2013 23:02 UTC (Wed) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] If you don't trust the people that run your elections then you can't know if your ballot is counted or not. It's the same if you are using electronic or paper ballots. Well of course. But that doesn't mean that if you do trust the people that run your elections that paper and electronic ballots are equally secure. To trust the election you need a number of things: (1) You need a counting system that anyone with a grade 8 education can understand. (2) You need representatives from all political parties as well as disinterested parties to supervise the counting and agree on the counts, which must be made public. (3) You need a free and open press so that if a political party thinks the vote-counting is wrong, they can take their complaints to the public. I can think of many ways to subvert paper ballots. You could stuff ballot boxes. You could hire magicians to do the counting and use sleight-of-hand to fool the scrutineers. The point is that none of these attacks scale cheaply. The huge manpower involved in paper counting is what makes it secure: You'd have to subvert an awful lot of people to subvert the system. Attacks on electronic voting, on the other hand, scale as O(1). It's about as cheap to compromise an entire national election as it is to compromise a single voting machine's software. That's the real killer. I bet that for $50 million, an attacker could compromise any real-world electronic voting system, open-source or not. That's probably about 5% of the typical US election campaign spending, so you can imagine the temptation...
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 1:55 UTC (Thu) by jjs (guest, #10315) [Link]
> I've helped run real elections. With paper ballots and with voting machines. I have first hand experience. The contractors use whatever the local government required. Whatever firmware revision or hardware revision or whatnot. It isn't like the hardware is dropped off for the election in some van and then collected up again by the e-voting company.
Hell voting machine companies are not even legally allowed to compile their own software and firmwares. The source code is registered and audited by a third party and compiled by government representatives.
that very much depends on jurisdiction - it is NOT a federal requirement. More than one story has been about the firmware in the voting machines NOT matching the audited code. And how do you verify the code that is audited and compiled is on the machines?
> Also BTW:
False. New Hampshire, for one, does NOT use electronic voting machines, but provides full support to disabled people. http://sos.nh.gov/VotersDisabilityFAQs.aspx
> Remember nobody is allowed to know your vote. So if you can't see or read or move your arms or legs you still have to have the ability vote all by yourself.
That does not require an electronic voting machine
> Typically 'electronic voting machines' in the USA just print out things on paper ballots.
No, they electronically record the votes. Recently, thanks to the loud noise made about verification, many of them will print off a paper copy - but not all. And in some cases, the paper copy doesn't print, but the vote is recorded anyway.
> This is how it works:
Here's where you depart reality. Some of them print ballots. Almost all of them record the votes directly into memory. This memory is read.
* You walk it over to a lock box and drop the ballot off there.
Ideally this would happen - but no guarantee.
* Then the lock box is taken to a central location and then the ballots are read into a electronic ballot counting machine. Sometimes they are counted locally.
And sometimes they just pull the counts out of the voting machines. This last election there were news items about missing votes that couldn't be verified - because the electronic systems didn't work, and were not recording votes, even though they printed paper. At least one jurisdiction reported more votes than population on their electronic system.
* The the results are transmitted, electronically, to some state or federal entity were they are collected and eventually published.
The Federal Government in the US is NOT involved in voting at all, contrary to belief. Voting is a state issue. In the two states I've been in, the publication happens in multiple phases - At the polling station, it's published as soon as the counts are done. Then the central office in the local community publishes the totals by polling station - which should match the local polling reporting. Finally the state reports the community polling - which should match phase II reporting.
* Even in situations were you have 100% electronic voting machines (which are typically ancient and shitty) with no paper proxy then typically you have paper reals in the machine that still provide the same level of paper records you get with a paper ballot.
Paper ballots can be counted by someone with a 5th grade education - and can be verified by witnesses with a 5th grade education standing there watching the count. The count, in the two states I've voted in, are done at the polling place right after closing. The totals are kept there, provided to the press, and transmitted to the central counting place. If the total is mis-reported by the state in the final count, someone will call for a recount, because it doesn't match the count done at the polling station. One check is that the count is held by the state officials, the local officials, the press, and members of both major political parties (along with anyone else who wanted to witness the counting). That makes cheating above the polling place hard. The witnessed hand counts at the polling place make cheating there difficult. Not impossible, but hard. You might convince a few people to go along with the cheating, but when you have multiple, competing interests (both major political parties, as many minor parties as are interested) involved, you're not going to be able to buy them all off.
You're missing the point. With e-banking, BOTH sides of the transaction are recorded. My account is deducted, your account is increased. However, with ballots you want anonymity AND verifiability. Very different.
> It's impossible for you to know that your paper ballot wasn't tampered with or anything like that. For example: The people that you have to worry about tampering with votes are the same regardless of whether or not you are using electronic or paper voting.
Read above about counting - paper ballots I have to worry about faking out a lot of people, many of whom I can't buy off. With electronic, the easiest way is to subvert the electronic counts - and it only takes a few people.
> A person travelling with your paper to the central counting station could just drop them off at the side of the road and pick up a entire new box of paper ballots. It happens. All it takes is a dark corner of the road and 2 minutes.
Which is why the count is done at the polling place to start with. Now if they change the counts at the central office, it WILL be known. Why? Because a lot of people are watching - and they don't need special skills.
> Like I said before the people who are in a position to do voter fraud are the people running the elections. Which is the local government entity. That is were the threat lives and were fraud happens. And it can happen regardless of paper or electronic.
No, as pointed out, with paper ballots a lot of people WHO ARE NOT LOCAL GOVERNMENT are involved in watching. Many of them are HOPING to catch the local government cheating. Is int impossible to cheat? No - but it is hard, and it's even harder to do on a large scale. With electronic, the easiest is to subvert the electronic database count at the central office. Or you have all the machines programmed to flip, say, 10% of the votes for X to Y. And the check is to rerun the process that I think is in error.
> If you don't trust the people that run your elections then you can't know if your ballot is counted or not.
Sure I can. The box was sealed in front of witnesses. It was opened in front of witnesses. The number of ballots in the box match the number of votes cast. Multiple disinterested parties watching the count help ensure it's straight. the count is done locally and given to many people before transmitting to the central location.
> It's the same if you are using electronic or paper ballots.
Not at all. Oh, and paper ballot counting scales - need more counters? Get more volunteers.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 8, 2013 9:15 UTC (Thu) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] A person travelling with your paper to the central counting station could just drop them off at the side of the road and pick up a entire new box of paper ballots. It happens. Except that the votes must be counted at the polling station with scrutineers from all of the political parties before the ballot box is sent off. Like I said before the people who are in a position to do voter fraud are the people running the elections. Which is why you have scrutineers watching the count, with no count being acceptable without unanimous agreement from all involved parties.
Is it better because it is FOSS or whatever? Posted Aug 9, 2013 10:36 UTC (Fri) by jezuch (subscriber, #52988) [Link]
>> When you trust e-banking, there is bidirectional accountability
>Yes. This is what I am saying. This is why it works.
Except that it "works". If election fraud was as common as e-banking fraud[1], we'd all be toast.
[1] Usually it's not even fraud. Just plain old incompetence.
When will people learn? Posted Aug 7, 2013 12:35 UTC (Wed) by dskoll (subscriber, #1630) [Link] Electronic voting is impossible to secure and makes widespread fraud easy and undetectable. Countless Ph.D's are wasting years of research chasing a mirage. Paper ballots can be tampered with and have quite a few problems of their own, but it's very difficult to perpetrate widespread fraud without either being detected of having massive amounts of collaboration from thousands of different vote counters. Just say no to electronic voting.
Such an "open source voting machine" would likely be unlawful in germany as well! Posted Aug 7, 2013 13:41 UTC (Wed) by giggls (subscriber, #48434) [Link]
In 2009 the german constitutional court demanded voting machines to comply with the following:
"determination of the result must be able to be examined by the citizen reliably and without any specialist knowledge of the subject."
I think this was a preety good ruling and I doubt that there will ever be a technology (regardless of being proprietary or open), which will fulfill this requirement.
Sven
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