
16M Americans will vote on hackable paperless machines - rbanffy
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/614148/16-million-americans-will-vote-on-hackable-paperless-voting-machines/
======
tzs
It's not just the vote itself we need to worry about.

In the 2016 Presidential election, a lot of people in North Carolina had
trouble due to problems with the electronic poll books they used to keep track
of who registered and who already voted.

People would show up at their polling place and either be told, incorrectly,
that they had never registered, or be told, incorrectly, that they had already
voted.

Oddly, they only had trouble with these systems in Durham County, a heavily
blue county, and these same devices in other states are known to have been
targeted by foreign hackers--but it wasn't until this year that DHS finally
agreed to actually do a proper forensic examination of the equipment to see if
anything shady was going on [1].

[1] [https://www.npr.org/2019/06/05/729920147/federal-
government-...](https://www.npr.org/2019/06/05/729920147/federal-government-
to-inspect-north-carolina-election-equipment-over-hacking-fea)

~~~
smt88
Georgia also only had problems in heavily blue districts. They "forgot" power
cables, left machines unused in warehouses, and rejected thousands of early
votes due to "glitches".

There is nothing odd or mysterious about it. It's the logical conclusion of
being a political minority clinging to power and it's been happening for
decades both openly and less openly.

~~~
specialist
The state of Georgia was a basket case when I was still active (10 years ago).
Per my friends who are still in the fight, it's still a basket case.

As Andrew Gumbel wrote in Steal This Vote [2005], America experiences
recurring amnesia.

[https://www.amazon.com/Steal-This-Vote-Elections-
Democracy/d...](https://www.amazon.com/Steal-This-Vote-Elections-
Democracy/dp/1560256761)

As a burned out election integrity activist, I've really struggled with the
recurring incredulity.

My local newspaper called me a "sweaty paranoid kook", because I dared to
explain how our jurisdiction's central count actually worked (per their
procedures manual).

And all the risks we identified and tried to mitigate? It all happened. All of
it. (Where's my parade?)

\--

Some free, unsolicited, hard earned advice from a recovering activist:

Focus on "errors", instead of "fraud". Just because. The moment there's a hint
of partisanship, the conversation is over. And really, at the end of the day,
fraud is indistinguishable from errors. So just grit your teeth, for the
greater good.

Focus on appropriations, aka follow the money. The very minor victories I've
had were argued from a framing of good governance. Transparency,
accountability, anti-waste, etc.

~~~
aoeusnth1
Thanks for your comment. This is good advice about keeping efforts to improve
the system non-partisan - it's the only practical way to get people who
disagree with each other to both agree to a fairer system.

------
Shank
Disclaimer: I served as an election judge in the 2012 general election in
Arapahoe County, CO.

I'm so sick and tired of stories like this framing the issue of election
security as a software issue or hardware issue. You can mitigate software
flaws with chains of custody, tamper proof seals, bipartisan poll watchers,
bipartisan election judges, and enough transparency. Most election systems in
the United States employ all of these controls, which is why you have few
stories of legitimate votes being discarded due to software failure or
tampering.

If your argument is that paper ballots are more auditable or harder to hack,
they are not. The same access controls above can be applied to paper, and
paper is always susceptible to being destroyed, lost, or conveniently found in
a clutch race. In Russia, cameras were provided at many election booths in a
recent race and caught multiple instances of suspected ballot stuffing [0].
Paper products can be created at will and the requirement for ballots to be
anonymous often prevents measures to prevent double voting or outright forging
of votes.

Hackable machines are a problem, but they are not the only problem.
Ultimately, it's easier to influence an election by discarding legitimate
voters from voter registration systems, selectively failing to notify voters
of elections, and other indirect interference campaigns that have been known
to happen. Not only are hackable machines not the biggest issue, but they turn
the camera away from bigger issues like these, which decreases scrutiny on the
most vulnerable parts of the system.

Ultimately, if you vote in an election system, you must have something you
trust in the system. You need to be able to trust the body running the
election, the individuals that makeup the body, or the system elements itself.
If you trust the government then you can be certain that collection processes
happen correctly. If you can't trust the government, why do you think trusting
the terminals that collect votes is any better? It's like trusting your child
to bring home important documents from the school about their discipline.
Sure, the paper might be tamper proof or tamper evident, but if your child
throws it away it's pointless [note 1].

[0]:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pH7uXZQsyHI](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pH7uXZQsyHI)

[note 1] The analogy breaks down if you talk about electronic records, and
assumes that the child is the "higher authority" bringing the documents to
you. The point is to demonstrate that tampering with reporting is much easier
than tampering with the record collection.

~~~
suprfnk
> Hackable machines are a problem, but they are not the only problem.

They might not be the biggest problem, but they're definitely an _extra_
problem. I don't see what problems they take away, in exchange for bringing
this extra problem.

With a paper ballot, I can go to the polling booth, see my vote being counted,
and see whether any other funky stuff happens, right there. It's all in the
open. This in turn gives you extra trust in the system.

With an electronic system, how do I know what happens behind those layers of
abstraction between the user interface and the hardware? How can I in any way
verify that my vote has been counted?

~~~
alistairSH
In VA (or, at least in Fairfax County), we fill in a paper ballot which is
scanned by a machine. The vote counting is done by the
scanners/electronically, but there is a paper trail for audits. Seems like the
best of both worlds (when implemented properly).

Like you, I would have zero faith in an electronic voting booth that simply
said "Yup, you pushed a button." I have no idea what actually gets "written to
disk".

~~~
codedokode
With scanning machines there still is a problem that they can be tampered with
and even if you see that the outcome doesn't match exit polls, you don't have
any solid proofs to require the manual re-counting of paper ballots.

~~~
beat
In most states, if the election is within a certain degree of closeness (like
half a percent), it triggers an automatic recount. And that will catch
mismatches between the machine counts and the contents of their ballot boxes,
unless you also carefully rig the manual recount - at scale.

And altering the count more than a percent or so is a LOT of alteration.

------
amatecha
Why this stuff is even an issue is mind-boggling to me.

In Canada we vote completely anonymously on a piece of paper. ID is verified
at the entrance to the voting area, but your identity is _in no way_
associated with the piece of paper you mark your vote on. The ballots are
counted by hand with numerous bystanders/observers of whatever affiliation. It
just works. We have no need for digital (aka hackable/tamperable/buggy) voting
system.

Global News has a decent article outlining why the system is so impervious to
abuse: [https://globalnews.ca/news/4049932/canada-2019-election-
hack...](https://globalnews.ca/news/4049932/canada-2019-election-hacking/)

~~~
the_snooze
It's complicated in the US because it's the states that administer elections
and IDs. Everyone does it differently, with different equipment, ID
requirements, and allocation of election resources.

Voter ID, for example, is contentious because a state can influence election
turnout through decisions on where ID offices are located and when they're
open.

Edit: I always find it ironic that the Republican party--the party of limited
government--wants people to have to go to the bastion of efficiency known as
the DMV (!!!) in order to vote.

~~~
WillPostForFood
_I always find it ironic that the Republican party--the party of limited
government--wants people to have to go to the bastion of efficiency known as
the DMV (!!!) in order to vote._

Is it ironic? Republicans aren't calling for the abolishment of the DMV for
driver's licenses. Requiring ID to vote is inline with requiring ID to drive.

I find it interesting the Democrats seem to idolize European governance,
except for the part where requiring ID to vote is the norm.

edit: fixed typo - requiring id to vote is inline with requiring id to _drive_

~~~
rectang
Make IDs free and mandatory for all citizens — like in those European
countries — and there's no problem.

Until then, IDs are a poll tax — and to put it mildly, that's a problem.

~~~
ghaff
>Make IDs free

Sure.

>and mandatory for all citizens

And what are the consequences if you don't get this now mandatory (federal?)
ID? Presumably some sort of passport card like thing that doesn't actually let
you travel across borders. What if you don't have the documentation you need?
What if you don't have the time to go to the offices that provide these IDs?

For a lot of people, the cost of getting the Equivalent ID to a driver's
license isn't the big issue. All the other things are.

~~~
rectang
I would accept those sets of problems if the voter ID serves as voter
registration.

~~~
ghaff
I would assume that if someone went to the trouble of getting an ID primarily
just for voting, also registering wouldn't be a big burden.

~~~
rectang
Yeah, but the crux is making it _impossible to rescind_ that registration a la
voter purges!

~~~
sgc
But it is an easy fix. I agree that there should be universal voter
registration, and see no reason why we can't issue voter registration cards
with a photo on them, which then serve as a valid form of identification for
whatever information we choose to make publicly available on them.

------
calibas
What if there was a remarkable amount of evidence abuse has already occurred?

[https://www.theroot.com/exclusive-thousands-of-black-
votes-i...](https://www.theroot.com/exclusive-thousands-of-black-votes-in-
georgia-disappea-1832472558)

Or how about a federal district court ruling?

[https://electionlawblog.org/wp-content/uploads/georgia-
dre-d...](https://electionlawblog.org/wp-content/uploads/georgia-dre-
decision.pdf)

~~~
cjslep
Bev Haris' grassroots watchdog movement Black Box Voting also has documented a
lot of sketchy behavior as well, such as throwing away paper records of votes.

[https://blackboxvoting.org/](https://blackboxvoting.org/)

------
pmoriarty
Electronic voting and vote counting machines pose one of the greatest threats
to democracy.

We should really just go back to paper ballots, which are not perfect but are
a lots less hackable at scale and are much more trackable than electronic
machines are.

~~~
skrowl
Paper ballot tied to a voter via a strong voter ID + electronic counting is
the best of both worlds.

You get the speed of automation with a paper trail in case you have to go back
and audit.

EDIT for those replying that you feel voting should be anonymous. With
anonymous voting, how do you stop the "hey we just found this box of filled in
ballots" ala Broward County Florida every election? If you can't tie a ballot
back to a voter, how do you know the ballot is legitimate?

~~~
JasonFruit
I don't want anyone to be able to look at my vote and know who did it. That's
a powerful tool for thugs and tyrants.

~~~
umvi
How do you prevent duplicate voting, then (i.e. me casting 100 votes for
Trump)?

~~~
cryptoz
I think lots of countries will stamp your wrist and check for a stamp before
allowing a vote to happen. I could be mistaken, but something akin to this is
possible.

~~~
rootusrootus
Just mark it down on a list. Whether someone has voted is not a secret.

------
mikeash
Is there any other technology in such widespread use with such universal
condemnation from experts? Essentially every expert on computerized voting
systems says, “don’t do this, it’s insane.” Imagine if every expert on
aerospace engineering said that jet engines were too dangerous but everyone
ignored them and kept finding more and more places to use jets.

~~~
berbec
Non-TLS HTTP.

~~~
mikeash
Not at all the same. Most people are pushing hard for TLS, with just some
fringe elements resisting it.

If it was like voting machines, you’d have massive initiatives to run
everything on plain HTTP and any suggestion that we should all use HTTPS is
completely ignored.

------
sbuccini
I've been working on this issue in North Carolina over the past several weeks.

North Carolina currently is facing two issues:

1) the state Board of Elections will vote on Thursday to increase the
standards for certification which will hopefully lead to hand-marked paper
ballots for all (except those with disabilities).

2) HB 19, which will delay decertification for insecure voting machines that
roughly 1/3 North Carolinians use. This bill passed unanimously in the House.

If you live in North Carolina and care about this issue, please email Damon
Circosta (damon.circosta.board@ncsbe.gov) with your viewpoints as he is the
new, tie-braking vote on the board.

Additionally, call your state Senator and tell them to oppose HB 19. The
bittersweet news is that it doesn't look like it will get taken up this year
because of the budget standoff, but it's better to start fighting this battle
now.

------
noodlesUK
The voting system here in Oregon seems to be pretty nice. I’ve experienced it
in both the UK and here, and voting in the UK is very easy when you’re
actually present where the council expects you to be on the day, and is very
hard otherwise. I was unable to vote in the EU referendum because my council
just wouldn’t send me a postal ballot, I called them multiple times, they said
they’d sent it each time, I got the ballot a few weeks after the results were
announced. As I recall the thing was postmarked after the deadline.

I strongly believe using the postal system for everyone’s votes is an ideal
solution. It’s distributed, already exists, is convenient, etc. Oregon’s
voting is great.

------
cj
I like the idea of a hybrid approach.

10 years ago when I was in school, we took standardized tests using Scantron
forms ([https://www.scantron.com/](https://www.scantron.com/)). It's basically
a piece of paper that can be run through a machine so the results of the test
can be measured.

Something like this would still retain the benefits of an electronic system,
while also leaving behind a paper receipt that can be stored separately from
the electronic results in case votes need to be audited / recounted, etc.

Paper ballots (with electronic tallying) is also not susceptible to things
like power outages, networking issues, software bugs, etc, since you'd always
be able to fallback to the paper ballots if a component of the electronic
system fails.

Side note: if I had to guess, the biggest risk with paperless machines is the
possibility of software bugs that skew the results in unexpected ways. I would
love to know what kind of quality checks + testing goes in to voting machine
software... can't imagine how to test a system that's only used at full
capacity on 1 day every 4 years.

~~~
Ancalagon
Pretty sure this is the current system...

~~~
mszkoda
It depends on the state; some have this system. Some are fully electronic.
Others are all paper and hand count.

------
ricardobeat
> Selling a paperless voting machine is like selling a car without brakes

This is comical FUD.

What makes people think paper is safer? The paper copy you have is worthless
since you can counterfeit it, and the one in storage can be replaced or
falsified just the same. A secure system can be designed regardless of the
storage media - i.e. a digital one can be as safe or safer than paper. Brazil
has used electronic voting for decades now, and despite accusations (by the
winning party!) there has been no proof of tampering or exploitable security
flaws.

~~~
beat
How Minnesota does it: Blank ballots arrive in sealed packages. Ballots,
whether blank or marked, sealed or unsealed, may only be handled in the
presence of election judges from at least two different political parties.
Counts are kept, by those groups. And ballots, either blank or marked, are
generally kept under lock and key.

Attempts to insert extra ballots will be detected by the count. Attempts to
substitute ballots would have to match counts exactly, and somehow be done
without being seen in a room with multiple other judges and other people.

------
peeters
I feel like nobody is bringing up one of the core challenges that the U.S. has
that many countries don't. You just vote for way too much fucking stuff at
once. In Canada, our ballots are literally just a list of candidates for a
single seat. Very occasionally, there will be a single referendum question
attached to it. That's it. I've never voted and been asked for more than two
choices except for municipal elections. I searched for "sample 2016" ballot
and the first result (Sumter County, Florida) had--I shit you not--26 separate
votes on it.

I bring this up not to criticize, but to put those who think that paper
ballets are impractical in a bit of context. Of course you'll be begging for
electronic systems when all of your voting is done on a single day and you
vote for who gets to be the janitor.

~~~
rhcom2
Part of that is if you split it up, fewer and fewer people vote. Outside
national elections many people do not bother to vote.

------
the_snooze
For anyone interested in how elections are actually run, please volunteer to
serve as a poll worker. It's a great way to serve your community and learn
about actual challenges on the ground.

------
asabjorn
Simple solution: each voter is given a receipt of their choices and a unique
signature for it, and an online website where they can check that their
signature was taken into account in the final tally.

With that a fraudsters model have to deal with random checks by any voter.

~~~
PeterisP
This is a horrible idea that breaks the idea of secret ballot and opens up all
sorts of vote buying, coercion and intimidation.

It's absolutely imperative that after you leave the ballot box, noone has the
ability to verify what your particular vote was, and you don't have the
ability to prove to someone else that you really voted that way, or that
ability will be abused on scale, by local "influencers", employers, etc
requiring the people to demonstrate that they voted "correctly". The mixing up
of ballots in the ballot box is a very important feature for the elections.

~~~
htns
Or is it? It seems to me simply outlawing both asking and disclosing would
deter these problems well enough.

~~~
ApolloFortyNine
It would be pretty hard to stop. Many elections come down to under 50k votes,
which will lead to either candidates or their supporters buying votes for cash
(with 30% of voters not even bothering to vote, $10 a vote would probably be
plenty to entice people), or each side finding a handful of cases where this
did happen and claiming it happened on a larger scale. It would call the whole
election into doubt.

------
LinuxBender
For as long as I can remember, I have been able to get a receipt from every
fuel pump that tells me where I was, how much fuel I purchased, what kind of
fuel, what pump I was on, how much I was charged, how much tax was added and
the time of day. This has been the case throughout every part of the U.S. I
have driven. The fuel companies can also verify everything that is on the
receipt.

I am not suggesting we vote on fuel pumps. I am simply pointing out that this
appears to be an artificially created problem and not a technical problem.

~~~
codedokode
Giving a comfirmation that person has voted for a specific candidate
simplifies buying votes. Also, an employer might require employees to bring
such a confirmation to prove that they support corporate values.

~~~
olooney
The point isn't to get a receipt that I personally voted. The receipt analogy
isn't that exact. The point is create a verifiable paper trail for the event
that _some_ registered voter voted a certain way. Paper ballots do that. He's
just pointing out how ridiculous it is to argue that it's somehow too
expensive or onerous to create a paper trail when every parking lot, every
coffee shop, every store is able to create a more extensive paper trail even
for the most inconsequential transactions.

------
beat
For those proposing solutions to problems that may not actually exist, here's
an idealized paper ballot chain of custody, in story form...

A ballot is printed. It is then packaged, along with many of its siblings, in
a stack. That stack of ballots is placed in a sealed package, and that package
is given a serial number.

The state election officials receive this sealed package from the printer and
record its serial number. It is then put in locked storage.

At election time, the package is taken from the warehouse and delivered to a
polling place. At the polling place, at least two election judges, from
different political parties, accept the package and sign for it.

The package is taken to a table staffed by at least two election judges, along
with folders, pens, and "I voted" stickers. It is opened, the contents
validated, and custody signed off by those judges.

Another table has printed rolls of all registered voters for the precinct, and
at least two judges. When a voter arrives, they give their name (no id
needed), and the judges look them up. They sign their name next to their
registration, and go to the ballot table. Meanwhile, the judges increment the
count of how many voters have signed in.

At the ballot table, our ballot (remember our individual ballot?) is handed to
the voter in a folder, along with a pen and a sticker. The ballot is now in
the custody of the voter, who signed for it in the registration book.

The voter goes to a booth, fills in their ballot, and inserts it in a ballot
box. (This may be a Scantron-type machine that also reads the ballot.)
Assuming automation, the box reads the ballot, tallies the results, and drops
the ballot itself in a locked internal box.

At the end of the day, the judges write down the total number of ballots in
the machines. They compare this to the number of voters who signed the
registration. If these numbers do not match, these results are hand-counted
again.

Assuming everything matches, the judges report the preliminary results from
the machines (or if they are not machines, the judges count the results of the
ballots). The locked ballot boxes are removed from the machines by at least
two judges, and signed off.

Unused blank ballots, both opened and sealed, are also counted.

The locked ballot boxes are then delivered to state election officials, who
sign off on receipt.

In case of an audit or a recount, each box can be traced to the individual
machine and compared to the machine count.

So... what security problems do you see with this model? And what solution do
you propose for the problem you see?

------
badsavage
As an eastern european, I see the case a bit different. Corrupt governments
and cheating locals were always able to "hack" voting. I would rather trust a
blockchain based -fully transparent and real-time- voting system than the
actual one.

------
astura
I miss the really old lever machines - they were incredibly satisfying to use.

[https://www.thedailybeast.com/rip-lever-voting-
machines](https://www.thedailybeast.com/rip-lever-voting-machines)

------
twodave
1\. Check in the voters as usual, but issue them a paper ID for the ballot
they can take with them (either a printed receipt or a tab they can tear off
the ballot maybe?).

2\. Publish results to the public Internet using the ID as an anonymizer.

3\. Anyone who wishes to report that their vote was improperly counted or not
counted at all can simply present their receipt to verify their identity.

Why is this hard?

Edit: obviously there are complexities when it comes to people who either
misremember their selections, but I also see no reason you couldn't also have
a copy of your ballot emailed or printed out for you from the voting precinct.

~~~
alexis_fr
Because votes could be sold. E.g.: “Show me your receipt to prove how you’ve
voted for, and we’ll give you $50”

~~~
twodave
Can't people already do this with a smartphone?

~~~
sampleinajar
In the US, it depends on the state. Many states have policies or laws about
taking pictures in the voting booth. There's quite a few articles about this
from the 2018 election.

------
sbmthakur
In India, Electronic Voting Machines(EVM) have something called _Voter
Verifiable Paper Audit Trail_ (VVPAT) linked with them[1]. When you press the
button, you get to see a slip which shows the symbol of the candidate you
voted for. If there's a mismatch between both, you can report it to the
election official.

1\. [https://jagranjosh.com/current-affairs/what-is-vvpat-
machine...](https://jagranjosh.com/current-affairs/what-is-vvpat-machine-with-
evm-how-does-vvpat-work-1555312059-1)

~~~
ahnick
What happens if the vote is altered after the voter has received their piece
of paper?

------
ulkesh
I live and vote in Georgia. It is insanely atrocious here using 20 year old
voting machines with absolutely no paper trail.

We had a Secretary of State, whose job it is to secure and maintain the
integrity of voting, run for governor but never stepped down from his office
due to an obvious conflict of interest, insisted everything was fine, and of
course he won.

How can we even remotely trust voting in my state when the impropriety is so
thick, we can’t breathe. To this day, I do not trust his election or any in
Georgia.

------
stretchwithme
There never was a need to record and transmit votes electronically. All that
we really needed was improvement in how the paper ballots were encoded.

We could have done that with PCs and punch card machines, which have been
around forever. No network required.

But companies wanted to make money and elected officials needed campaign
contributions. So they decided on over-complicated solutions that we don't
need.

------
frankzen
We have public key encryption and digital signatures but no one wants to put
them to good use. Seems by design to me...

------
jrobn
"16M Americans will vote on hackable paperless machines" just they way _they_
want it.

Who are _they_? I'm not the one for deep state conspiracy or "our corporate
overlords" stuff...but what is wrong with paper ballots? What is going on in
American democracy?

Is it because it cost more money? It's a f _cking election. One of the most
important events in a_ functioning* democracy. Spend. The. Money.

Unfortunately, the US is _NOT_ a functioning democracy in any sense of the
word.

    
    
      * Disgusting party gerrymandering
      * Packed politicalized court system (esp. the Supreme Court)
      * A broken voting system
      * A broken Senate
      * No limit corporate donations
      * Anonymous super PACS
    

That's a long and hard list to fix. I doubt we will do it.

------
Fej
Obligatory video from Computerphile and Tom Scott on why electronic voting is
a _terrible_ idea:

[https://youtu.be/w3_0x6oaDmI](https://youtu.be/w3_0x6oaDmI)

------
aussieguy1234
Anything can be hacked given enough resources and the temptation to meddle in
US elections would simply be too strong for a foreign adversary to resist.

Paper is the only way to do secure elections.

------
motohagiography
Electronic voting is simulated voting. It's that simple.

------
MichaelMoser123
Did someone study the Usability problems of these machines? I would also worry
about discarded votes due to some people not being able to use the UI.

------
Legogris
I'm a bit surprised by many of the arguments posted here trying to
problematize paper votes. This is how it is done in Sweden - I don't want to
imply that it's without issues, but it should illustrate how all of the
"issues" with paper ballots are resolvable.

* Prior to election, all registered voters get a personal "voting card" sent to their home address. The letter also tells you which polling station you have been assigned.

* On election day, each voter goes to the polling station they have been assigned. You need your ID but not necessarily your voting card.

* Staff verify your ID and you go behind a blind where you put paper ballots (with the option to vote for a party, and, optionally, for a candidate in that party) in sealed envelopes, one for each level you are voting on.

* You go back to the staff with your sealed envelopes, staff mark you as having voted and put the envelopes in boxes.

* At the closing of election day, doors are closed, boxes are opened and ballots are counted at the location with multiple people overseeing each step in the process. The results of this counting is announced the day after as a preliminary result.

* Ballots then get put in tamper-proof bags and transported (again, with oversight) to a hub per district where counting is done again. Final results are announced about 10 days after election.

* Voters who can't vote on their assigned location on election day can vote in advance at any location. The process works the same, except the sealed envelopes are put in another envelope, together with the voter card mentioned above. These ballots are saved for election day, when they are counted together with the normal votes.

* There are also mechanisms for voting via mail (arguably less secure) or at embassies in foreign countries. The process is similar as for advance votes.

* The public is invited to be physically present to monitor the counting of votes.

There's zero machinery involved. The votes are anonymous, yet double-voting is
prevented. Counting is done more than once by default. I understand from here
that the U.S. is exceptional in that you can't expect registered voters to
have a strong ID. I am sure some kind of strong voter IDs could be issued (for
free, obviously) that can accommodate for that.

I can not imagine that doing manual recounting of votes and ensuring integrity
with manual labor is significantly more costly than the contracts with voting
machine suppliers. If it is, it's worth it. In my opinion, provably fair, free
and anonymous voting is the killer app for blockchain. It is still a
theoretically unsolved problem, however, and until we get there (if we ever
do), machine-less paper voting is strictly better than both electronic voting
and electronic counting of votes. If anything, the manual counting can be
_supplemented_ by electronic counting machines.

You think the U.S. is unique and this won't work because of federalization? We
still somehow manage to pull off voting for European Parliament.

More info for the curious here: [https://www.val.se/servicelankar/other-
languages/english-eng...](https://www.val.se/servicelankar/other-
languages/english-engelska/voting-cards.html)

------
quocble
Not sure if anyone saw Dr. Robert Epstein testimony. It was scary to hear that
Google not only introduced bias into search that could affect 15M voters, and
Facebook could send selective "Go vote" to one voting class or another. I'm
encouraged to see that Epstein's team has been building monitoring systems for
these scenarios.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMU2Vo6_CEQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMU2Vo6_CEQ)

------
jakedub4d2
If all sides have equivalent hacking power, my gut would say balance would
exist; it would continue to be a fair vote. But I don't think that's the case.
Not sure why we can't rely on SSN to uniquely AND securely identify all
eligible (living) voters. #gildedAge #foodForThought
#redditDoesntUseTagsDoThey

------
mkrazzledazzle
EVM with Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail(VVPAT). Worked in India, at scale.

------
daveheq
Hopefully someone will hack the machines so you can only vote No.

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taurath
In the most contested counties and states, one assumes.

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YeahSureWhyNot
bush proved paper machines can be falsified too.

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operatorequals
Actual democracy was never this system's cup of tea anyway

------
ck2
why hack the machines which will be watched for, just turn off the power in
any city you can, machines won't work and people won't go out and vote

remember it's not a popularity contest, it's electoral college

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argo_
A ten year old technology named Blockchain could solve this problem.

~~~
michaelmrose
I'll wait while you explain this. This only works if you are OK with an
immutable record of how you voted which the US officially isn't.

------
jorblumesea
Why the GOP so against election security? It seems insane that any group would
be against your vote counting properly.

Of course they're also pro gerrymandering and disenfranchisement, so it does
make sense...

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avocado4
If we've managed to move the entire commerce and financial sector online we
should be able to security digitize voting too with proper authn/z.

~~~
RcouF1uZ4gsC
The big difference is with commerce and finance, we want to keep track of who
moved what where. With voting, we deliberately want to keep votes secret, so
no one can figure out who voted for which candidate, and only know the total
votes each candidate got. To minimize coercion, we also want to make sure that
a voter can only prove they voted, but not which candidate they voted for.
These constraints make electronic voting at least an order of magnitude
harder.

~~~
ahnick
This seems like the perfect application for zk-snarks. (i.e. prove that a
valid vote occurred, but not where the vote came from).

------
sergiotapia
We should be more worried about voter id. I still don't understand how you can
vote without a legal id. I mean look at California, they require zero proof of
your identity to vote according to Wikipedia. That's bonkers to me.

In my home country Bolivia, we are required to present a valid national ID to
vote.

~~~
lightbyte
In the US elections are run by the states, and unfortunately a certain
consistent set of them are well known for making it extremely difficult for
certain groups of people to vote. Since voter ids would be given by the
states, there is historical evidence to suggest those specific states can not
be trusted to not use said ids as a way to discriminate against those they do
not want to vote.

~~~
sergiotapia
This sounds like bullshit presented as a butter croissant.

------
cheeky78
If we are so interested in fair results, why not have voter ID laws? Instead
of fighting these laws, why not make it easier for everyone to get an ID?

~~~
burkaman
Because the average activist has absolutely no way of forcing state
legislatures to allocate funds and draw up plans for something they have no
interest in. Voter ID laws do not currently solve a big problem, are not
implemented in good faith, and fighting them is much more effective and
realistic than asking for something that will not happen.

If we want voter ID laws, why not make it easier for everyone to get an ID
first, and then enforce voter ID once that effort has succeeded?

~~~
cheeky78
Exactly point point. My problem is that certain political groups are pushing
for no voter ID laws, which just makes it easier to fake votes.

Why would anyone be for this if not to subvert our Democracy?

~~~
standardUser
Vote-faking is not a problem. Elderly people who have extreme difficulty
obtaining an ID (that they otherwise do not need) is an actual, real life
problem.

I find it odd you are so concerned about a non-problem but not concerned about
the actual problem of eligible voters being actually disenfranchised.

~~~
cheeky78
So back to my first point: instead of making it easier for entities like the
Russian government to subvert our Democracy, why not just make it easier for
the Elderly to get IDs?

I also don't think that there are that many people that don't have IDs. I have
seen absolutely no statistics on the topic, but I have seen multiple groups
survey different parts of various cities and nobody had issues getting an ID.
It's pretty much needed in almost any aspect of life.

You can't even get welfare or government assistance without some form of ID,
so you can't tell me you can't get one to vote.

My point still stands.

~~~
standardUser
I don't know where to start. Your knowledge of these systems may not be broad
enough to draw meaningful conclusions. For example, you can apply for and
receive government services with only a Social Security card. A state-issued
ID is not needed.

Millions of eligible voters do not have state-issued ID. Estimates put it at
10-20 million Americans. The primary utility of a state-issued ID is to drive
on public roads and there are 10's of millions of Americans who do not drive
on a regular basis.

The suggestion you make, that we should make it easier for people to get IDs,
falls apart when we recognize that every state sets up their own system of
issuing IDs. It would take a _very_ strong federal law to bring states in line
to the point where we could have confidence that every eligible voter in
America could obtain an ID for free and regardless of individual
circumstances.

As for Russia "subverting our Democracy", there is zero evidence that Russia
or any other foreign entity used the lack of voter ID laws in some states to
influence any elections.

------
0000011111
Voting could be digitized with blockchain technology. No need to waist the
paper.

1\. Create a blockchain app that runs as a web app. 2\. Tie it to a persons
Social Security Number. 3\. Allow folks to download the app. Prove citizenship
through a set of questions and cast a vote.

~~~
w0de
My god. You've solved voting! We've been waiting so long. Call the New York
Times!

------
cryptoz
> Senator Ron Wyden, a leading Capitol Hill voice on election security, has
> persistently pushed legislation that would federally mandate paper ballots,
> among other security measures. The legislation has been blocked by the
> Republican Senate majority leader, Mitch McConnell.

It's pretty clear what is happening. Given the obvious international attacks
on US democracy in the last elections, it seems like a no-brainer that we'd
have a bi-partisan effort to secure our elections. But we don't, and the side
that doesn't want better election security is also the side that "won" the
last election, _while_ it was being hacked by foreign adversaries and _while_
publicly asking the very same adversaries for assistance in hacking the
Democrat's emails.

It's beyond suspicious.

~~~
munk-a
The beautiful thing with paper ballots is that the case is clear cut and
strong enough without even dredging any of that up... it's just that partisan
politics has become so entrenched that even mutually beneficial bills need to
be passed with concessions to the less interested party.

I'm fine with a debate on the specifics but paperless voting machines have no
place in the world. What you're giving up far outweighs the marginal benefits.

~~~
SimbaOnSteroids
The problem is that it isn't mutually beneficial in terms of the next election
cycle.

~~~
munk-a
It absolutely is, while the winner may be influenced by the lack of a paper
trail the real cost to society is the erosion of trust, there is a not
insignificant portion of the country that currently believes our last election
was no democratic[1]. If the Dems win in 2020 and the GOP similarly questions
the legitimacy of the election - whether legitimately or not (say if Trump
were to refuse to leave until a recount could be conducted) then that
proportion will grow. There is a level that proportion of mistrust can reach
where the US will devolve into anarchy, then everyone loses the game forever.

Just to note, please don't read politics into this, I've attached my own
leanings clearly in case anyone thinks I favor one side or the other but I am
trying to state this without it being partisan in nature.

1\. And while I'm a progressive, I'm _not_ in this camp.

~~~
davidw
There are actors, who were involved in that election, who see discord, chaos,
and a weakened US as a bonus, no matter who the winner.

