Despite serious problems in other countries, the UK will
hold electronic voting pilots in 14 local authorities during the
May 2007 elections. I believe e-voting threatens the integrity of
our elections, as current e-voting systems cannot deliver secure,
trusted election results
The Department for Constitutional Affairs has
announced a series of electoral modernisation pilots which include
telephone voting, internet voting and electronic vote counting.
Around the world, nations are learning that expensive e-voting
technologies are not as secure, accurate or reliable as promised by
suppliers. Systems fail on election day, software bugs prevent
votes being recorded, voters find the interfaces difficult to use,
and recounts are not possible. These problems occur even when
authorities have implemented testing, certification and audit
processes for the systems.
An unsafe system
Despite having had ample opportunity to learn from experiences
both abroad and at home, the government has chosen once again to
run e-voting pilots without any systematic audit, testing and
certification processes in place.
Nor will there be any meaningful oversight by technically
competent bodies. The government has ignored calls from The
Electoral Commission and from suppliers to allow more time for
system implementation.
I am surprised the government has chosen to focus its e-voting
strategy on expensive telephone and internet voting methods. Such
systems open the door to voter coercion and vote buying, as well as
potential electronic attack. They rely on commercial
confidentiality, rather than explicit and accepted computer
protocols to maintain voter privacy. And they do not allow for
meaningful vote audits and recounts.
As computer security expert Bruce Schneier said, "A secure
internet voting system is theoretically possible, but it would be
the first secured networked application ever created in the history
of computers."
A successful e-voting system must ensure people are allowed to
vote and that they have not voted already, and make it impossible
for anyone to find out who they voted for. It must also allow for
auditing and recounting of votes without compromising voter
anonymity.
Part of modernisation?
Why is e-voting being foisted onto our democratic process? The
government believes e-voting should be an integral part of its
modernisation programme. Ministers also believe that it will
increase engagement by making voting easier: the 2007 pilot
prospectus argues that e-voting could stem declining turnout. But
this is not the case. In fact, turnout fell during the government's
2003 pilots.
Voting is a unique problem for computer science. This is why
Italy has ruled out e-voting, Ireland has a moratorium on it, the
Netherlands has withdrawn one machine model for its elections, the
Canadian province of Quebec has cancelled future e-voting, and the
US election system is in turmoil over e-voting problems.
Jason Kitcat is e-voting campaign coordinator for the Open
Rights Group
Source code key to absentee ballot
system
Have your say
Do you agree with Jason Kitcat's views? If you have an opinion
about this or any article in Computer Weekly, e-mail
computer.weekly@rbi.c.uk