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There's a bunch of academic research in this area -- how to build an encrypted ballot box that lets you audit that your vote was counted correctly, but prevents

There's a bunch of academic research in this area -- how to build an encrypted ballot box that lets you audit that your vote was counted correctly, but prevents anyone else from seeing what your vote was. However, a fundamental problem with any kind of online voting is that it doesn't prevent your vote from being coerced: https://freedom-to-tinker.com/2006/12/12/erosion-secret-ballot/ https://freedom-to-tinker.com/2006/12/12/erosion-secret-ball... The best known way to do that is to make you walk into a secure area, secretly make your vote on a piece of paper, and put it in a common ballot box. That's the system most countries already have! E-voting also fails to solve voter suppression problems -- how do you decide who gets a voting ID? Finally, this kind of thing just isn't needed right now. Is anybody claiming that fraudulent voting was a significant problem in this election, or in any recent US election? Where's the evidence? The current highly decentralized system is already pretty robust against widespread fraud (though slightly less so as electronic voting machines become more popular). There are far more important problems to solve, like voter suppression and the extreme polarization of politics.

nickff 10y ago
There is little evidence of voter fraud because nobody who wants to look for fraud is able to do so (due to many measures put in place to keep voting private, make it easy, and keep it simple), and as Feynman said "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence". Evidence of fraud does exist, but it is difficult to discern whether it is the tip of an iceberg, or just an ice-cube.[1][2] Given the fact that presidential candidates are spending $5-$200+ per vote, it seems like voting fraud would be cost effective, and is likely done at some scale. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_B._Johnson#Contested_1948_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_B._Johnson#Contested_19... [2] http://ktla.com/2016/11/03/possible-voter-fraud-being-investigated-in-san-pedro-after-83-ballots-are-mysteriously-delivered-to-one-womans-apartment/ http://ktla.com/2016/11/03/possible-voter-fraud-being-invest...
- m-p-3 10y ago
  Agreed. The best way to avoid fraud is to ensure it can't be done, and cryptography might be a valuable tool to enfore that.
- iainmerrick 10y ago
  [1] is from 1948, but [2] is definitely worth looking into. 83 ballots isn't widespread fraud unless it's happening a lot, everywhere. Maybe it is! But it would require a massive and very disciplined conspiracy working at many levels across the country. To me, the burden of proof lies on anyone claiming there is such a conspiracy. (Trump complained of a vote-rigging conspiracy, of course, but unsurprisingly he shut up once he actually won. He changes his position too often to be credible.)
  - nickff 10y ago
    I am not saying there is a vast voter-fraud conspiracy, and those two links are not meant to be an exhaustive list; I included the Johnson link because it is so famous, and the more recent link to show that the phenomenon seems to persist. If there is widespread voter fraud, I would guess that it exists as a (large) number of relatively small operations, probably emanating from 'get-out-the-vote' campaigns. I am not a 'team player' for any party, and take all allegations by candidates with a heaping mound of salt.
    - iainmerrick 10y ago
      I didn't mean to imply you had an agenda, sorry! Trump is just the most recent example of someone making vote-rigging claims. As people have commented elsewhere in this discussion, an online voting system would probably be more vulnerable to fraud, given what we know of the methods and capabilities of the NSA and other organisations. I agree that there's probably petty fraud going on here and there but I don't see the need for sweeping and risky changes to try to fix it.
Findeton 10y ago
> a fundamental problem with any kind of online voting is that it doesn't prevent your vote from being coerced That's not exactly true. In many countries the vote is not strictly secret, in the sense that the secrecy of the vote is not enforced: you can show what you are going to put in the ballot to others before casting your vote... and therefore your vote can be coerced or bought as others can verify that you voted as they wanted. In electronic/online elections, vote coercion is not generally solved BUT the situation is better: normally you can cast your vote as many times as you want and only your last vote will count. Therefore you can vote in presence of your boss, for example, and vote whatever you actually want afterwards.
- iainmerrick 10y ago
  Ah, I didn't know that! I'm only familiar with the UK and US systems, where you cast a secret ballot and you have no way afterwards to prove how you voted (unless you used mail-in voting). And that's a good point about being able to change your vote.

nickff 10y ago

There is little evidence of voter fraud because nobody who wants to look for fraud is able to do so (due to many measures put in place to keep voting private, make it easy, and keep it simple), and as Feynman said "absence of evidence is not evidence of absence". Evidence of fraud does exist, but it is difficult to discern whether it is the tip of an iceberg, or just an ice-cube.[1][2] Given the fact that presidential candidates are spending $5-$200+ per vote, it seems like voting fraud would be cost effective, and is likely done at some scale. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_B._Johnson#Contested_1948_election https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyndon_B._Johnson#Contested_19... [2] http://ktla.com/2016/11/03/possible-voter-fraud-being-investigated-in-san-pedro-after-83-ballots-are-mysteriously-delivered-to-one-womans-apartment/ http://ktla.com/2016/11/03/possible-voter-fraud-being-invest...

m-p-3 10y ago
Agreed. The best way to avoid fraud is to ensure it can't be done, and cryptography might be a valuable tool to enfore that.
iainmerrick 10y ago
[1] is from 1948, but [2] is definitely worth looking into. 83 ballots isn't widespread fraud unless it's happening a lot, everywhere. Maybe it is! But it would require a massive and very disciplined conspiracy working at many levels across the country. To me, the burden of proof lies on anyone claiming there is such a conspiracy. (Trump complained of a vote-rigging conspiracy, of course, but unsurprisingly he shut up once he actually won. He changes his position too often to be credible.)
- nickff 10y ago
  I am not saying there is a vast voter-fraud conspiracy, and those two links are not meant to be an exhaustive list; I included the Johnson link because it is so famous, and the more recent link to show that the phenomenon seems to persist. If there is widespread voter fraud, I would guess that it exists as a (large) number of relatively small operations, probably emanating from 'get-out-the-vote' campaigns. I am not a 'team player' for any party, and take all allegations by candidates with a heaping mound of salt.
  - iainmerrick 10y ago
    I didn't mean to imply you had an agenda, sorry! Trump is just the most recent example of someone making vote-rigging claims. As people have commented elsewhere in this discussion, an online voting system would probably be more vulnerable to fraud, given what we know of the methods and capabilities of the NSA and other organisations. I agree that there's probably petty fraud going on here and there but I don't see the need for sweeping and risky changes to try to fix it.

Findeton 10y ago

> a fundamental problem with any kind of online voting is that it doesn't prevent your vote from being coerced That's not exactly true. In many countries the vote is not strictly secret, in the sense that the secrecy of the vote is not enforced: you can show what you are going to put in the ballot to others before casting your vote... and therefore your vote can be coerced or bought as others can verify that you voted as they wanted. In electronic/online elections, vote coercion is not generally solved BUT the situation is better: normally you can cast your vote as many times as you want and only your last vote will count. Therefore you can vote in presence of your boss, for example, and vote whatever you actually want afterwards.

iainmerrick 10y ago
Ah, I didn't know that! I'm only familiar with the UK and US systems, where you cast a secret ballot and you have no way afterwards to prove how you voted (unless you used mail-in voting). And that's a good point about being able to change your vote.