3 ms·

What fascinates me in the electronic voting is not the economical benefits of it or computers being involved, but the guarrantees provided by the cryptography.

by ph14nix 10y ago

What fascinates me in the electronic voting is not the economical benefits of it or computers being involved, but the guarrantees provided by the cryptography. Not the paper itself, but the handritten signatures are driving me crazy. Of course, the particilar implementation of an electronic voting protocol can be hacked. Also, some cryptographic algorithms are not proven to be completely secure, so there is a chance that someone will learn to break them. We should take those facts into consideration and be aware. What about paper elections? Aren't they fundamentally broken because of their protocol? I go to the election, sign a ballot paper and drop it into a box. Then some people from the government report me the voting result. Why should I trust it? Because I trust all the people who were involved in collecting the ballots, counting them and so on? Why should I trust people at all if the cryptography allows me to verify their actions? You are afraid of voting machines being hacked? No problem, let's use paper. I'm OK with paper certifying my vote as long as my digital signature is printed on it (in hex, QR-code or whatever). Alternatively, the government can publish an open protocol of internet voting so that everyone can use an implementation that he accepts to be secure. Should be noted that I am not very proficient at cryptography. All I know is based on a couple of books and a university course.

pedrocr 10y ago
You trust paper voting because voting booths are operated by representatives of the different candidates. When it comes time to count no one will let their opponent steal votes for themselves. And the reason you can't add your digital signature to your vote is that you could then prove to someone you had voted for candidate X and collect your bribe. People that want to propose complex electronic voting systems need to first understand the requirements of an election and how the paper voting achieves them. There's quite a lot of well thought-out systems thinking in paper voting that people just don't know about.
- ph14nix 10y ago
  > And the reason you can't add your digital signature to your vote is that you could then prove to someone you had voted for candidate X and collect your bribe. I was arguing against treating a blot on a paper as a certification of one's opinion rather than proposing a real electronic voting protocol. Of course, simple digital signature doesn't solve all the problems, it only certifies with known assumptions that I and only I have signed the document.

by ph14nix 10y ago

pedrocr 10y ago

You trust paper voting because voting booths are operated by representatives of the different candidates. When it comes time to count no one will let their opponent steal votes for themselves. And the reason you can't add your digital signature to your vote is that you could then prove to someone you had voted for candidate X and collect your bribe. People that want to propose complex electronic voting systems need to first understand the requirements of an election and how the paper voting achieves them. There's quite a lot of well thought-out systems thinking in paper voting that people just don't know about.

ph14nix 10y ago
> And the reason you can't add your digital signature to your vote is that you could then prove to someone you had voted for candidate X and collect your bribe. I was arguing against treating a blot on a paper as a certification of one's opinion rather than proposing a real electronic voting protocol. Of course, simple digital signature doesn't solve all the problems, it only certifies with known assumptions that I and only I have signed the document.