Electronic Voting
Presentation by Christine McElroy
What is Electronic Voting?
• Also known as e-voting
• Not the same as Internet voting or I-voting
• Involves paper-based and electronic voting systems
Paper-Based Voting Systems
According to Wikipedia:“A paper-based voting system records
votes, counts votes, and produces a tabulation of the vote count
from votes cast on paper cards or sheets.”
• Includes:
–Marksense a.k.a. optical scan
systems
• where an individual marks their vote directly on the
ballot with a pencil next it is processed by a scanner that
electronically records the result.
• “There have been cases of these scanners malfunctioning
and recording the election as a victory for the wrong
candidate. In theory the ballot papers can always be
counted by hand if a result is disputed. Astonishingly,
however, some officials have simply run the same papers
through the same machines, so if the machine is faulty in a
consistent way the original result will be confirmed
(Luntz, 2004, Punchcards and Optical Scanners section,¶ 1).
And . . .
– Punch card ballot systems
• Currently being phased out the U.S. as a
direct result of problems incurred in the
2002 Presidential election i.e. hanging chads
• Voters punch holes in their ballots next to
the candidate they support, and machines
tally the number of holes.
• The system runs into trouble when the punch
fails to fully remove the bit of paper,
leaving a "hanging chad". In Florida in 2000
a suspicious number of overcounts and
undercounts were observed where voters
appeared either to have voted for more than
one candidate, or for none at all” (Luntz, 2004,
Punchcards and Optical Scanners section,¶ 1).
Electronic Voting
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Is being introduced in many
American states.
“Voters turn up to a polling place
but, instead of being given a paper
ballot, they are given a card or
password that allows them to access
a computerized system on which
they vote” (Luntz, 2004, Electronic and Internet
Voting Section, ¶1).
Direct-Recording Electronic Voting System (DRE)

According to Wikipedia:

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“Records votes by means of a ballot display provided with mechanical
or electro-optical components that can be activated by the voter.”
“Process data by means of a computer program.”
“Records voting data and images in memory components” while
producing “a tabulation of the voting data stored in a removable
memory component and as printed copy.”
Federal Help America Vote Act

Problems in the 2000 election led directly its enactment in October 2002
...

“A major purpose of HAVA was to provide money for
counties that wanted to "upgrade" their voting systems.
The total amount approved was $3.9 billion and much of
that was for the states to improve their election systems.
[average of $80Milper state]” (Thiesen, 2005, A Little Background
section, ¶1).

“In addition to providing funding for improvements, HAVA
mandated some requirements for all voting systems used
in federal elections. One of those — the most widely
publicized — is the requirement that all jurisdictions
provide a method by which disabled individuals can vote
unassisted” (Thiesen, 2005, A Little Background section, ¶1).
Advantages of E-Voting
• Provides a faster method than hand counting for
•
•
delivering election results
Limits cost by limiting need for specially printed ballots
Machines can be equipped in ways that allow full
accessibility for persons with disabilities
– Optical scan and marksense voting systems are not fully
accessible by the visually impaired and blind
– Those with limited mobility and strength may have
difficultly operating lever machines
• Machines can be programmed to display ballots in a
diversity of languages
– Especially helpful in counties where demographics require
under U.S. federal election law that ballots are available
in different languages i.e. King County Washington ballots
must be provided in Chinese
Opposition to
..
Electronic Voting: Theoretical Problems .
According to Rebecca Mercuri a leading expert electoral fraud is the
biggest concern . . .
•
•
"Any programmer can write code that displays one thing on a screen, records something else and prints yet another result."
"There is no known way to ensure that this is not happening inside of a voting system," because hackers might get into a
particular machine and change the votes recorded.
• "Electronic balloting and tabulation makes the tasks performed by poll workers, challengers and election officials purely
procedural, and removes any opportunity to perform bipartisan checks," Mercuri says. "Any computerized election process is
thus entrusted to the small group of individuals who program, construct and maintain the machines."
• Three companies provide testing services for the machines, but have confidentiality agreements with the manufacturers.
This means that they won't reveal their testing methods or whether any machines failed the tests, only that they have
approved certain machines.”
(Luntz, 2004, Electronic and Internet Voting section, ¶ 1-3).
Opposition to Electronic Voting: Observed
Problems . . .
• Privatization of manufacturers and software code prohibits outside auditors from
•
•
truly accessing security risks
Lack of paper trail on some machines is very concerning . . . Resulting in difficulties
in the re-count of votes to verify that the hardware/software involved performed
its task correctly.
Report published by Harri Hursti in conjunction w/ blackbox.org outlining
problems with Diebold’s TSx DRE noted problems from machines being
unplugged to internal printers jamming to memory discrepancies (Hurtsi, 2006)
My Opinion
There is a lot to be worked out when it
comes to e-voting . . .
• I prefer to vote with paper and pencil
• All DREs must be equipped with a working voter
verified paper trail audit system “Attaching printers to
Touchscreen or DRE electronic voting machines, which print paper receipts and store
these with the machine. Such designs usually present the receipt to the voter behind
a glass screen (known as the "Mercuri method"), so that the voter can verify that the
receipt matches the vote” (Wikipedia, 2006)
• Code must be publicly available for inspection if
not open source voting machine software
A surprising statistic . . .
A recent ITAA survey showed that 77
percent of registered voters are
unconcerned about the security of e-voting
systems (Rothke, 2004)
• Are you concerned with issues of security?
• How do you feel about electronic voting? To the risks out way the
benefits?
Source List
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Miller, H. (2004, September 13). E-Voting Does Work. Retrieved May 13, 2006, from
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,1645028,00.asp
Carlson , C. (2004, July 19). Opposition Grows to Paperless Voting . Retrieved May 1, 2006, from
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1624297,00.asp
Rothke, B. (2004, August 23). E-Voting: It's Security, Stupid. Retrieved May 15, 2006, from
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1895,1638619,00.asp
Hursti, H. (2006, May 22). Diebold TSx Evaluation . Retrieved May 28, 2006, from
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/BBVtsxstudy-supp.pdf
Levy, S. (2006, May 29). Should We Trust Electronic Voting? Newsweek. Retrieved May 29, 2006,
retrieved from ProQuest database (Document ID: 1040737721).
Luntz, S. (2004, October). THE PERILS of ELECTRONIC VOTING. Australian Science, 25(9), 14-18. Retrieved April
21, 2006, from ABI/INFORM Global Database. (Document ID: 655360611).
Theisen , E. (2005, June 18). The Privatization of United States Elections . Retrieved May 8, 2006,
from http://www.votersunite.org/info/PrivatizationOfElections.pdf
Wikipedia (n.d.). Voter Verified Paper Trail . Retrieved March 21, 2006, from
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Voter_Verified_Paper_Audit_Trail