Designing a New E-Voting Machine
With all the problems and flaws in electronic voting machines being exposed over the past couple months, I'd like to know why there hasn't been any effort in designing a new voting system from scratch. What does an electronic voting machine need to be secure and reliable? The effort almost seems to simple:
- A paper trail with no edit-ability. Perhaps design a system that will punch, cut and read a ticket that the voter can then instantly verify before it is dropped into a locked ballot box
- Eliminate removable memory cards.. How can we reprogram the machine after the election for the next one? There still needs to be something removable and some tamper-evident stickers and alarms in place.
- The more simple the code is, the less bugs and security flaws it will contain
- Have software check itself using checksums, and perhaps implement microchips to take on the task as well.
- Provide source code to the public. This would give the entire nation a chance to review the code, and/or audit running code whenever they feel is necessary
- Random audits and machine checks before the booths open
- Hand count paper ballots and compare with electronic tallies
Then arises the issue of how can a voter know for sure their vote was counted correctly? I'm still pondering the idea as well... and it seems there might not be a simple solution. Anyone have any ideas?
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