5 ms·

The Dangers of Moving All of Democracy Online

61 points by ajaviaad 7y ago

jordanpg 7y ago
> easy to destabilize public confidence in voting outcomes The last few years of politics in the US has highlighted for me how brittle electoral democracy really is, and how important the public's presumption of fair elections is to the system functioning. Those of us who work in the software industry and know how the sausage is made should consider using our voices and experience to share with family and friends just how buggy software is in the real world, and how inevitable problems are, both due to malice and simple mistakes.
BostonFern 7y ago
"Until we can secure digital voting systems, we shouldn't use them." Someone, please remind me again, why do we need digital voting systems? For the convenience of getting the results a couple of hours earlier? To save the climate? To eliminate recounts? Because using paper ballots feels too archaic for our high-tech modern society? People tend to speak about electronic voting as a settled matter. I must have missed the debate.
- felipemnoa 7y ago
  >>Someone, please remind me again, why do we need digital voting systems? We don't. Mail-In ballots are pretty good in my opinion. Plus it doesn't have the risk of a single hacker corrupting the outcome. You can always just recount them.
  - Buttons840 7y ago
    A good voting system isn't only resistant to "hacking", it's also understood and trusted by the people. It's easy to imagine how a society that trusts a computer voting system they don't understand can go bad, even if that voting system is initially good.
- alistairSH 7y ago
  Agreed. I think a lot of people assume that digital voting will obviously lead to re-enfranchisement of certain groups and better turn out from other groups of potential voters. It's a noble goal, but dangerous to assume that outcome is likely. I'm all for easier access to the polls. I've heard great things about Oregon and a few other states that make broad use of vote-by-mail (with a paper ballot). Yes, that has it's own issues, but my understanding is those issues pale in comparison to the upside of easy access. Failing that, I'd love to see voting day made a holiday or moved to a weekend. And I loathe efforts from certain groups within the US to make voting more difficult. Removing polling places, reduced hours, voter ID laws (lacking substantial proof that fraud is a problem).
  - taborj 7y ago
    Despite our vote-by-mail ability (which is nice, don't get me wrong), our voter turnout for primary elections has hovered around 50% or lower since the 1960s [0], with a few exceptions of course. General elections see much higher turnout [1], often hitting into 80% or more, but generally staying in the 70s. [0] https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter-Turnout-History-Primary.pdf https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter-Turnout-His... [1] https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter_Turnout_History_General_Election.pdf https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter_Turnout_His...
    - Tagbert 7y ago
      The fact that voter turnout is greater for high profile elections and lower otherwise suggests that turnout is not limited by the method of voting but more by voter engagement. Switching to online voting would not change that.
- quicklime 7y ago
  Because it would increase turnout! I'm against digital voting systems for security reasons too, but hypothetically if that problem were solved, the increased turnout would be a good thing.
  - JulianMorrison 7y ago
    Would it? The groups that have trouble turning out - because they're poor, working two jobs, got no car, got poor public transport because they live in the bad side of town, they speak a minority language - those are the same groups that are likely to find digital stuff inaccessible.
    - lallysingh 7y ago
      Will they find a basic (/old/cheap) smartphone more inaccessible than voting in person? A smartphone is pretty necessary these days, and basic ones are often free on cheap plans.
    - buttersbrian 7y ago
      If you could vote through any 'device', the transportation, time, and money (depending on how the device aspect works) arguments would largely be moot. Define minority language people? Spanish (primary) speakers in the US are more tech savvy than maybe we're giving them credit for.
    - quicklime 7y ago
      I don't think it would solve the problem for everyone in those groups, but it would for some. I'd be very surprised if it didn't move the needle. Also, there's another group that seems to have trouble turning out, and finds digital stuff perfectly accessible: young people.
      - BostonFern 7y ago
        Strengthening voter enfranchisement is a commendable cause, but moving from accessible to effortless in order to cater to people reasonably able but insufficiently motivated is an awful reason to jeopardize the stakes of not just electronic but outright online voting.
- z3phyr 7y ago
  Reason we use electronic voting machines since the 90s in India: (1) The problem of booth capturing. In a massive population, law and order is a unique challenge that most of the western countries do not face. Local goons used easily get hold of a lot of ballots and mass vote in 5 minutes and then run away before the law arrived. EVMs are made in such a way that every button press needs about 45 seconds to a minute after which you can vote again. (2) The problem of illegal votes. Button based voting is precise. No chance of illegal votes. (3) The problem of counting votes correctly from such a massive population. The chance of making mistakes is a lot higher and this is a unique problem that the west have never handled. > The convenience of getting results a couple of hours earlier Its actually a matter of many days here. The window for corruption is too high. And there are too many human vectors who can be compromised by bribes. EVMs just throw all of that out of the window. (4) I will just mention environmental factors, although its not my main point. More population = more paper. We have 1 National Election, about 29 State Elections (28 states, 1 NCT), 1000s of municipal elections, and 10s of thousands Village headman elections! This means some kind of elections all year round are always ongoing!
  - BostonFern 7y ago
    There's a lot to unpack in your comment. I disagree that the western world either hasn't faced or isn't currently facing the above issues. Conventional efforts to strengthen voter enfranchisement address many of the points without the added stakes. I don't see how the threats of underlying issues of crime and corruption are mitigated by making voting electronic. If thugs prey on voting stations and voters, it seems there are more apparent options available sans the added inherent risks to the voting system itself.
    - z3phyr 7y ago
      India faced a lot of instances of booth capturing, where the lines of the police and security services were spread too thin by the sheer population count that was voting. About 1,00,00,00,000 people voting together between thousands of political parties and candidates! I am not wrong when I say that the west has never faced this. Why not have a machine then, which could make this task scalable and easier to manage?
jerkstate 7y ago
In-person and mail-in voting, at least in the USA, is already quite insecure. Its amazing to me that with all the consternation about Russian bots influencing our elections we would even consider moving them online without strongly bolstering the level of identity verification. However, the argument has been that authenticating voter identity is racist and disenfranchises poor voters. I dont see how these two thoughts can possibly be resolved in a way that gives everyone confidence in the election outcome, so trying to do seems like a recipe for violent protests. I am not looking forward to the aftermath of this election if the voting mechanisms are changed.
- snarf21 7y ago
  Yes, in person and main in voting are insecure. The thing they are though is secure at SCALE. If you hack a digital system, it is trivial to cast thousands or millions of votes. If is very very hard to mobilize the same number of humans and go to the polls with someone else's name. Especially, if they have already voted. The same with paper; the scheme is revealed quickly when 10K mail in votes show up for voters who already voted and in one big batch of mail. It is easy to detect. Digitally, you can hide behind VPNs, etc. and we'd have to build systems to detect fraud here that we don't have. Additionally, it is easier to hack the backend and just manipulate the database for some system that was likely outsourced to a company on a government kickback.
  - jerkstate 7y ago
    If you had 20 agents each in 20 cities, dropping off, say, 20 ballots per day each in 20 different mailboxes for 20 days, thats 20^5 or 3.2 million votes with 400 agents. That certainly seems plausable for a state actor or large NGO and seems difficult to detect. The difficulty would be either "harvesting" the unfilled ballots undetected or reproducing ones with the correct digital signature (I assume the barcodes on the mail-in ballots are unique, securely generated, and authenticate the recipient), which again would not be implausable for a state actor or large NGO with agents in the right place, the biggest saving grace being that different states have different systems. However, with national popular vote, you just need to crack 1 state system to skew the popular vote.

61 points by ajaviaad 7y ago

> easy to destabilize public confidence in voting outcomes The last few years of politics in the US has highlighted for me how brittle electoral democracy really is, and how important the public's presumption of fair elections is to the system functioning. Those of us who work in the software industry and know how the sausage is made should consider using our voices and experience to share with family and friends just how buggy software is in the real world, and how inevitable problems are, both due to malice and simple mistakes.

BostonFern 7y ago

"Until we can secure digital voting systems, we shouldn't use them." Someone, please remind me again, why do we need digital voting systems? For the convenience of getting the results a couple of hours earlier? To save the climate? To eliminate recounts? Because using paper ballots feels too archaic for our high-tech modern society? People tend to speak about electronic voting as a settled matter. I must have missed the debate.

felipemnoa 7y ago
>>Someone, please remind me again, why do we need digital voting systems? We don't. Mail-In ballots are pretty good in my opinion. Plus it doesn't have the risk of a single hacker corrupting the outcome. You can always just recount them.
- Buttons840 7y ago
  A good voting system isn't only resistant to "hacking", it's also understood and trusted by the people. It's easy to imagine how a society that trusts a computer voting system they don't understand can go bad, even if that voting system is initially good.
alistairSH 7y ago
Agreed. I think a lot of people assume that digital voting will obviously lead to re-enfranchisement of certain groups and better turn out from other groups of potential voters. It's a noble goal, but dangerous to assume that outcome is likely. I'm all for easier access to the polls. I've heard great things about Oregon and a few other states that make broad use of vote-by-mail (with a paper ballot). Yes, that has it's own issues, but my understanding is those issues pale in comparison to the upside of easy access. Failing that, I'd love to see voting day made a holiday or moved to a weekend. And I loathe efforts from certain groups within the US to make voting more difficult. Removing polling places, reduced hours, voter ID laws (lacking substantial proof that fraud is a problem).
- taborj 7y ago
  Despite our vote-by-mail ability (which is nice, don't get me wrong), our voter turnout for primary elections has hovered around 50% or lower since the 1960s [0], with a few exceptions of course. General elections see much higher turnout [1], often hitting into 80% or more, but generally staying in the 70s. [0] https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter-Turnout-History-Primary.pdf https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter-Turnout-His... [1] https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter_Turnout_History_General_Election.pdf https://sos.oregon.gov/elections/Documents/Voter_Turnout_His...
  - Tagbert 7y ago
    The fact that voter turnout is greater for high profile elections and lower otherwise suggests that turnout is not limited by the method of voting but more by voter engagement. Switching to online voting would not change that.
quicklime 7y ago
Because it would increase turnout! I'm against digital voting systems for security reasons too, but hypothetically if that problem were solved, the increased turnout would be a good thing.
- JulianMorrison 7y ago
  Would it? The groups that have trouble turning out - because they're poor, working two jobs, got no car, got poor public transport because they live in the bad side of town, they speak a minority language - those are the same groups that are likely to find digital stuff inaccessible.
  - lallysingh 7y ago
    Will they find a basic (/old/cheap) smartphone more inaccessible than voting in person? A smartphone is pretty necessary these days, and basic ones are often free on cheap plans.
  - buttersbrian 7y ago
    If you could vote through any 'device', the transportation, time, and money (depending on how the device aspect works) arguments would largely be moot. Define minority language people? Spanish (primary) speakers in the US are more tech savvy than maybe we're giving them credit for.
  - quicklime 7y ago
    I don't think it would solve the problem for everyone in those groups, but it would for some. I'd be very surprised if it didn't move the needle. Also, there's another group that seems to have trouble turning out, and finds digital stuff perfectly accessible: young people.
    - BostonFern 7y ago
      Strengthening voter enfranchisement is a commendable cause, but moving from accessible to effortless in order to cater to people reasonably able but insufficiently motivated is an awful reason to jeopardize the stakes of not just electronic but outright online voting.
z3phyr 7y ago
Reason we use electronic voting machines since the 90s in India: (1) The problem of booth capturing. In a massive population, law and order is a unique challenge that most of the western countries do not face. Local goons used easily get hold of a lot of ballots and mass vote in 5 minutes and then run away before the law arrived. EVMs are made in such a way that every button press needs about 45 seconds to a minute after which you can vote again. (2) The problem of illegal votes. Button based voting is precise. No chance of illegal votes. (3) The problem of counting votes correctly from such a massive population. The chance of making mistakes is a lot higher and this is a unique problem that the west have never handled. > The convenience of getting results a couple of hours earlier Its actually a matter of many days here. The window for corruption is too high. And there are too many human vectors who can be compromised by bribes. EVMs just throw all of that out of the window. (4) I will just mention environmental factors, although its not my main point. More population = more paper. We have 1 National Election, about 29 State Elections (28 states, 1 NCT), 1000s of municipal elections, and 10s of thousands Village headman elections! This means some kind of elections all year round are always ongoing!
- BostonFern 7y ago
  There's a lot to unpack in your comment. I disagree that the western world either hasn't faced or isn't currently facing the above issues. Conventional efforts to strengthen voter enfranchisement address many of the points without the added stakes. I don't see how the threats of underlying issues of crime and corruption are mitigated by making voting electronic. If thugs prey on voting stations and voters, it seems there are more apparent options available sans the added inherent risks to the voting system itself.
  - z3phyr 7y ago
    India faced a lot of instances of booth capturing, where the lines of the police and security services were spread too thin by the sheer population count that was voting. About 1,00,00,00,000 people voting together between thousands of political parties and candidates! I am not wrong when I say that the west has never faced this. Why not have a machine then, which could make this task scalable and easier to manage?

jerkstate 7y ago

In-person and mail-in voting, at least in the USA, is already quite insecure. Its amazing to me that with all the consternation about Russian bots influencing our elections we would even consider moving them online without strongly bolstering the level of identity verification. However, the argument has been that authenticating voter identity is racist and disenfranchises poor voters. I dont see how these two thoughts can possibly be resolved in a way that gives everyone confidence in the election outcome, so trying to do seems like a recipe for violent protests. I am not looking forward to the aftermath of this election if the voting mechanisms are changed.

snarf21 7y ago
Yes, in person and main in voting are insecure. The thing they are though is secure at SCALE. If you hack a digital system, it is trivial to cast thousands or millions of votes. If is very very hard to mobilize the same number of humans and go to the polls with someone else's name. Especially, if they have already voted. The same with paper; the scheme is revealed quickly when 10K mail in votes show up for voters who already voted and in one big batch of mail. It is easy to detect. Digitally, you can hide behind VPNs, etc. and we'd have to build systems to detect fraud here that we don't have. Additionally, it is easier to hack the backend and just manipulate the database for some system that was likely outsourced to a company on a government kickback.
- jerkstate 7y ago
  If you had 20 agents each in 20 cities, dropping off, say, 20 ballots per day each in 20 different mailboxes for 20 days, thats 20^5 or 3.2 million votes with 400 agents. That certainly seems plausable for a state actor or large NGO and seems difficult to detect. The difficulty would be either "harvesting" the unfilled ballots undetected or reproducing ones with the correct digital signature (I assume the barcodes on the mail-in ballots are unique, securely generated, and authenticate the recipient), which again would not be implausable for a state actor or large NGO with agents in the right place, the biggest saving grace being that different states have different systems. However, with national popular vote, you just need to crack 1 state system to skew the popular vote.