You still have to verify that the people counting the ballots aren't altering them somehow.
I remember hearing a story in France where it was found that people doing the count had bits of pencil lead tucked under their nails. They would open each ballot, and if it was for the "wrong" candidate, they would discretely mark another name and the ballot would be counted as invalid since it had two names circled. Not sure if it's a true story or not (can't be bothered to check) - but seems like a good illustrations of the problems that are faced.
> They would open each ballot, and if it was for the "wrong" candidate, they would discretely mark another name
That's impossible. You don't write on French ballot.
We use a card of a standardized format on which the name of the candidate (or the list of names) is printed which you directly put in the envelope. Cards are both sent to you by post and available at the polling station. Anything written on a ballot makes it void.
> They would open each ballot, and if it was for the "wrong" candidate, they would discretely mark another name
Ballots are open in public. The person in charge of opening the envelope does so in front of the room and with two assessors watching. They remove the ballot, read it aloud and display it to the room. It would be very difficult to read and alter a ballot without anyone noticing. A different person updates the tally on a board when the name is read.
The same on the other side of the Alps, plus local representatives of all parties use to roam between voting places and check that ballots are counted fairly.
As a software developer I trust the traditional method much more than any innovation involving machines and software.
This is one of the important parts. Every party wants itself to win, every ballot-counter also has a position, but if everyone can force a recount at any time, there's a much bigger motivation to count fairly. Multiple redundant counts is also part of that.
> Not sure if it's a true story or not (can't be bothered to check) - but seems like a good illustrations of the problems that are faced.
This exact sentiment -- that the truth of some tidbit of anecdata is not only unverified, but it's verification is irrelevent and should be treated as backing up a larger position regardless -- is one of the core problems with the current discourse.
As other commenters point out, not only is it not true, but such fraud is accounted for and mitigated in the existing procedure. So this is a bad illustration, it should seem like a bad illustration on the face of it because it hasn't been verified or contextualized, and in general we should all be suspicious of simple, pat little anecdotes that validate our assumptions about how the world is or ought to be.
Sorry for the rant, but I'm going to downvote this lazy thinking every time I see it. I hope we all aspire to better analytical thinking about the world, given that most of us here have to write software that interfaces with it.
I have participated in the operations of a voting station in France, and the method you describe would be incredibly risky, unless all the voting station is in (which you can not guarantee).
Also even then, one group never opens more than a few hundred ballots, so the corruption would be limited to a couple ballots or become super obvious.
I remember hearing a story in France where it was found that people doing the count had bits of pencil lead tucked under their nails. They would open each ballot, and if it was for the "wrong" candidate, they would discretely mark another name and the ballot would be counted as invalid since it had two names circled. Not sure if it's a true story or not (can't be bothered to check) - but seems like a good illustrations of the problems that are faced.