9 ms·

For giving a guiding vote from the citizens to assist in parliamentary or local decisions, yes. For electing state officials, no. A voting scheme needs to be d

by yason 10y ago

For giving a guiding vote from the citizens to assist in parliamentary or local decisions, yes. For electing state officials, no. A voting scheme needs to be designed for the worst possible circumstances which practically means a bordering civil war, and where trust between voters is zero at best. Voting allows revolution to take place peacefully. Therefore the method of voting needs to be understood, carried over, and be verifiable by the common (wo)man. No electronic scheme can do that: anything that runs in software means that the correctness of the system depends on the experts' word only, and that word is likely to mean nothing when half the population is already collecting arms.

devoply 10y ago
You could do it this way: Two or more block chains. Each run by different parties. And a need for the same vote to show up on multiple blockchains to count. The voters would visit multiple websites to cast their votes which would then be verified between the various block chains, potentially by software that anyone can run on their own computer or vps. Every single person does not have to vote on multiple platform. Just enough that you can validate the voting.
- endisukaj 10y ago
  Or you can just use a piece of paper, pencil and a plastic box to collect the votes.
  - devoply 10y ago
    Yes and how do you, as a citizen, verify that it's not been tampered with. In the US in the past few elections at least there has been accusations of fraud. And also having this sort of thing makes it possible to do research on the data afterwards... for anyone to do research on the data as it's public. No so with any other system.
    - slasaus 10y ago
      If you take the time to enter the voting booth when it opens and verify that the ballot boxes are empty at the start, and stay in the voting booth until it closes, you can verify yourself if everyone put at most one ballot in the ballot box. Later on you can double check if indeed every ballot is counted correctly and can thus conclude that at least your own ballot is counted correctly and exactly once without having to let anyone know what you voted.
      - exit 10y ago
        nice. election day isn't even a holiday in america.
        toyg 10y ago
        I would hope there is some way for political parties to observe all voting and counting procedures. That's how it's done in most countries.
        huac 10y ago
        There are procedures for this, everybody calls the observers of their opposing party 'thugs' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Black_Panther_Party_voter_intimidation_case https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Black_Panther_Party_voter_... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/05/election-day-violence-donald-trump-poll-watchers https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/05/election-day...
        Karunamon 10y ago
        Usually because there's a fine line between "poll watching" and "poll intimidation" and people generally aren't quite civilized, thoughtful, or well-mannered enough to stay on the good side. That includes "shouting racial slurs" in your first link.
        tdb7893 10y ago
        That's more worries about them harassing voters or legitimate election officials than not liking oversight.
- slasaus 10y ago
  How anonymous is your vote in the blockchain(s)? And how can you still verify the vote is counted correctly and exactly once while lacking hard proof to others about what you voted?
  - devoply 10y ago
    Perhaps all voting should be public. All voting 100% public. 0% funding from any source other than individual citizens. And even that should be heavily capped. So each individual citizen over 18 can give say $100 dollars and that's it.
    - slasaus 10y ago
      Knowing what one voted opens the door for coercion. Think of family members wanting you to vote a certain way. If you vote anonymously you can never prove to them what you voted, which protects the voter from any social, religious or other external pressure one might feel.
      - devoply 10y ago
        Well apparently it has a long history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_ballot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_ballot So I guess ballots should be anonymous. So how to do that with a blockchain. Well simply by assigning some random number or hash to the voters that no one else knows.
        burkaman 10y ago
        That doesn't help. If there is any way to prove your vote, then you can easily sell your vote.
        logfromblammo 10y ago
        Selling votes is not a problem. Secretly selling votes is the problem. Perhaps it would be better to turn the vote-selling market into a publicly verifiable open market? If I say that it would cost a buyer $10k more for me to vote yes than the highest open bid for me to vote no, that is a strong quantifiable indication of the magnitude of my opposition. I'm sure the vote-pricing data would be a gold mine for statisticians. Of course, this would make the plutocratic oligarchy operate out in the open, officially, rather than behind the scenes with lobbying, campaign contributions, and speaking fees. Some people might find that objectionable: both those who do not want a plutocracy and those who do not want their money influence on politics to be openly known.
- cesnja 10y ago
  No, in your proposed case, a single blockchain would be better than many. If one party controls the whole blockchain, it's "easy" to forge data in it [1]. On the other hand, distrust between involved parties makes it hard to forge and deny actions on a single blockchain (though it'd still be possible with a 2-party system). Btw, I wonder how and why people want to implement blockchain for use in government or banks - since they are big monoliths, 51% attack is a real possibility. [1] http://www.investopedia.com/terms/1/51-attack.asp http://www.investopedia.com/terms/1/51-attack.asp
- amalcon 10y ago
  Why involve a blockchain when there's no coordination problem? The only benefit of a blockchain over a log is that multiple, uncoordinated parties can agree on an order of events, but order doesn't matter here.
chadscira 10y ago
I don't know if I agree with this. Even with paper ballot we still have to trust the people/devices counting the votes. As an American citizen theres no website I can go to and check my vote. How do I know it was even counted, or properly registered.
- salvadors 10y ago
  > theres no website I can go to and check my vote If such a site existed, vote buying and/or coercion would be a lot more prevalent.
- tathougies 10y ago
  There is a vote checking system in California to see if your vote by mail ballot was counted
andrepd 10y ago
> No electronic scheme can do that: anything that runs in software means that the correctness of the system depends on the experts' word only. No paper ballot in box scheme can do that: anything that is run by officials means that the correctness of the system depends on the officials' word only.
- specialist 10y ago
  What is truth? What is reality? Turtles all the way down? Please sign up and observe your local elections. The Australian Ballot system (private voting, public counting) is time proven, battle hardened. Paper ballots cast at precincts counted when the polls close is the gold standard. It works because opposing belligerents agree on the outcome. Trust forged from mutual distrust. Paper ballots permit guaranteeing the physical chain of custody. You should show up and help keep that guarantee.
  - smokeyj 10y ago
    But how do you verify that each voter is authorized to vote, and that only one vote was cast? It seems if you involve a digital system you're kicking the trust bucket down the road. The security of a digital systems is "good enough" IMO, especially if there's a public cryptographically verifiable ledger. We bank online where the banks essentially only hold cash in the form of a database entry. The benefits of digital voting means we can have more granular input in our government's operations. I don't see paper ever scaling to meet that demand.
    - nabla9 10y ago
      Yes, IMO. Remember that your IMO is not what the consensus among security experts is. There are many things that you and me missed. The worst problem with electronic internet voting is that depending on country, something like 5-40 percent of voters loses the secret ballot and the opportunity to vote independently without coercion. Husband, brother or other family member will be behind their back to watch how they vote. Here in Finland I have a friend who has been election official and he says that it's not uncommon common for family member trying to squeeze into ballot box or try get behind. Especially if the ballot has been cast in post office with small space.
patcon 10y ago
I see what you're saying, but would it help if we just make the whole "build" of the election scaffolding and process deterministic? Looking at the architecture, it seems that there's a whole "generation" phase where the election is initialized from certain data. I wonder if this could happen in a Gitian-like [1] environment, that any technical citizen could re-run and verify against some sort of validity hash stored in public [ledger]. [1]: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/gitian-building.md https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/gitian-bu...
- yk 10y ago
  The problem is, that the average citizen does not understand what 'deterministic build' means. One aspect of an election is as a ritual to legitimize the government, and this legitimization currently rests on the argument that in principle every voter could verify the election process. (It is a ritual because no average voter does something like that.) So technology will not help, unless you can change the perception of the function of elections.
asurty 10y ago
The beauty of having an open source solution is smart and rational people from across the political spectrum can work together on something that everyone agrees is a 'correct' voting system.
dreistdreist 10y ago
Most people in Switzerland vote by mail.
elif 10y ago
Your argument does not account for the widespread deference to closed source electronic voting which already exists, and fails to account for any of the value of open sourcing to assuage the very fear you are identifying as the problem.

by yason 10y ago

devoply 10y ago

You could do it this way: Two or more block chains. Each run by different parties. And a need for the same vote to show up on multiple blockchains to count. The voters would visit multiple websites to cast their votes which would then be verified between the various block chains, potentially by software that anyone can run on their own computer or vps. Every single person does not have to vote on multiple platform. Just enough that you can validate the voting.

endisukaj 10y ago
Or you can just use a piece of paper, pencil and a plastic box to collect the votes.
- devoply 10y ago
  Yes and how do you, as a citizen, verify that it's not been tampered with. In the US in the past few elections at least there has been accusations of fraud. And also having this sort of thing makes it possible to do research on the data afterwards... for anyone to do research on the data as it's public. No so with any other system.
  - slasaus 10y ago
    If you take the time to enter the voting booth when it opens and verify that the ballot boxes are empty at the start, and stay in the voting booth until it closes, you can verify yourself if everyone put at most one ballot in the ballot box. Later on you can double check if indeed every ballot is counted correctly and can thus conclude that at least your own ballot is counted correctly and exactly once without having to let anyone know what you voted.
    - exit 10y ago
      nice. election day isn't even a holiday in america.
      - toyg 10y ago
        I would hope there is some way for political parties to observe all voting and counting procedures. That's how it's done in most countries.
        huac 10y ago
        There are procedures for this, everybody calls the observers of their opposing party 'thugs' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Black_Panther_Party_voter_intimidation_case https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Black_Panther_Party_voter_... https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/05/election-day-violence-donald-trump-poll-watchers https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/nov/05/election-day...
        Karunamon 10y ago
        Usually because there's a fine line between "poll watching" and "poll intimidation" and people generally aren't quite civilized, thoughtful, or well-mannered enough to stay on the good side. That includes "shouting racial slurs" in your first link.
        tdb7893 10y ago
        That's more worries about them harassing voters or legitimate election officials than not liking oversight.
slasaus 10y ago
How anonymous is your vote in the blockchain(s)? And how can you still verify the vote is counted correctly and exactly once while lacking hard proof to others about what you voted?
- devoply 10y ago
  Perhaps all voting should be public. All voting 100% public. 0% funding from any source other than individual citizens. And even that should be heavily capped. So each individual citizen over 18 can give say $100 dollars and that's it.
  - slasaus 10y ago
    Knowing what one voted opens the door for coercion. Think of family members wanting you to vote a certain way. If you vote anonymously you can never prove to them what you voted, which protects the voter from any social, religious or other external pressure one might feel.
    - devoply 10y ago
      Well apparently it has a long history: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_ballot https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Secret_ballot So I guess ballots should be anonymous. So how to do that with a blockchain. Well simply by assigning some random number or hash to the voters that no one else knows.
      - burkaman 10y ago
        That doesn't help. If there is any way to prove your vote, then you can easily sell your vote.
        logfromblammo 10y ago
        Selling votes is not a problem. Secretly selling votes is the problem. Perhaps it would be better to turn the vote-selling market into a publicly verifiable open market? If I say that it would cost a buyer $10k more for me to vote yes than the highest open bid for me to vote no, that is a strong quantifiable indication of the magnitude of my opposition. I'm sure the vote-pricing data would be a gold mine for statisticians. Of course, this would make the plutocratic oligarchy operate out in the open, officially, rather than behind the scenes with lobbying, campaign contributions, and speaking fees. Some people might find that objectionable: both those who do not want a plutocracy and those who do not want their money influence on politics to be openly known.
cesnja 10y ago
No, in your proposed case, a single blockchain would be better than many. If one party controls the whole blockchain, it's "easy" to forge data in it [1]. On the other hand, distrust between involved parties makes it hard to forge and deny actions on a single blockchain (though it'd still be possible with a 2-party system). Btw, I wonder how and why people want to implement blockchain for use in government or banks - since they are big monoliths, 51% attack is a real possibility. [1] http://www.investopedia.com/terms/1/51-attack.asp http://www.investopedia.com/terms/1/51-attack.asp
amalcon 10y ago
Why involve a blockchain when there's no coordination problem? The only benefit of a blockchain over a log is that multiple, uncoordinated parties can agree on an order of events, but order doesn't matter here.

chadscira 10y ago

I don't know if I agree with this. Even with paper ballot we still have to trust the people/devices counting the votes. As an American citizen theres no website I can go to and check my vote. How do I know it was even counted, or properly registered.

salvadors 10y ago
> theres no website I can go to and check my vote If such a site existed, vote buying and/or coercion would be a lot more prevalent.
tathougies 10y ago
There is a vote checking system in California to see if your vote by mail ballot was counted

andrepd 10y ago

> No electronic scheme can do that: anything that runs in software means that the correctness of the system depends on the experts' word only. No paper ballot in box scheme can do that: anything that is run by officials means that the correctness of the system depends on the officials' word only.

specialist 10y ago
What is truth? What is reality? Turtles all the way down? Please sign up and observe your local elections. The Australian Ballot system (private voting, public counting) is time proven, battle hardened. Paper ballots cast at precincts counted when the polls close is the gold standard. It works because opposing belligerents agree on the outcome. Trust forged from mutual distrust. Paper ballots permit guaranteeing the physical chain of custody. You should show up and help keep that guarantee.
- smokeyj 10y ago
  But how do you verify that each voter is authorized to vote, and that only one vote was cast? It seems if you involve a digital system you're kicking the trust bucket down the road. The security of a digital systems is "good enough" IMO, especially if there's a public cryptographically verifiable ledger. We bank online where the banks essentially only hold cash in the form of a database entry. The benefits of digital voting means we can have more granular input in our government's operations. I don't see paper ever scaling to meet that demand.
  - nabla9 10y ago
    Yes, IMO. Remember that your IMO is not what the consensus among security experts is. There are many things that you and me missed. The worst problem with electronic internet voting is that depending on country, something like 5-40 percent of voters loses the secret ballot and the opportunity to vote independently without coercion. Husband, brother or other family member will be behind their back to watch how they vote. Here in Finland I have a friend who has been election official and he says that it's not uncommon common for family member trying to squeeze into ballot box or try get behind. Especially if the ballot has been cast in post office with small space.

patcon 10y ago

I see what you're saying, but would it help if we just make the whole "build" of the election scaffolding and process deterministic? Looking at the architecture, it seems that there's a whole "generation" phase where the election is initialized from certain data. I wonder if this could happen in a Gitian-like [1] environment, that any technical citizen could re-run and verify against some sort of validity hash stored in public [ledger]. [1]: https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/gitian-building.md https://github.com/bitcoin/bitcoin/blob/master/doc/gitian-bu...

yk 10y ago
The problem is, that the average citizen does not understand what 'deterministic build' means. One aspect of an election is as a ritual to legitimize the government, and this legitimization currently rests on the argument that in principle every voter could verify the election process. (It is a ritual because no average voter does something like that.) So technology will not help, unless you can change the perception of the function of elections.

asurty 10y ago

The beauty of having an open source solution is smart and rational people from across the political spectrum can work together on something that everyone agrees is a 'correct' voting system.

dreistdreist 10y ago

Most people in Switzerland vote by mail.

elif 10y ago

Your argument does not account for the widespread deference to closed source electronic voting which already exists, and fails to account for any of the value of open sourcing to assuage the very fear you are identifying as the problem.