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One way hash with secret salt would work. You enter a secret password as a salt and get a hash code from all your votes so you have a provable record your vote
by zbowling 14y ago
One way hash with secret salt would work. You enter a secret password as a salt and get a hash code from all your votes so you have a provable record your vote got counted that you can verify but no body can reverse to know it's you.
Then stick all the votes up on a server somewhere. Let us go and check our votes are in the list. We could then have informal verification and audits of the counts.
- eli 14y agoNo dice. One of the goals is that you can't prove how you voted (i.e. so you can't sell your vote).
- zbowling 14y agoNo one can prove I voted with a one way hash either. That's the point. Only I can verify myself.
- davej 14y agoYes, you can prove which way you voted. That could potentially commoditise votes.
- jcampbell1 14y agoYou are still missing the point. Voters can't be given a receipt for how they voted, because then they can sell their vote.
- erichocean 14y agoVoters can sell their vote with or without a receipt. Furthermore, they can sell with a reasonable degree of certainty (if the buyer demanded it) already by submitting to a lie detector test. There is no valid reason, moral or technical, for preventing voters from verifying their votes were accurately counted, and verification does not enable any new crimes – but it does prevent the current crime where someone's vote is either miscounted or not counted at all.
- polymatter 14y agoIf voters are given a receipt, buyers of votes can demand to see said receipt to verify they voted the correct way. boss/abusive family member/mafia can demand to see the vote receipt on threat of your job/safety/family returning safely tonight. The potential for a vote receipt means that these 3rd parties can reward/punish you based on the way you voted. Without it, they have no way of knowing if their coercion/blackmail worked or not. Personally, I would like to have a receipt because I think the danger of my vote not having been recorded is greater than the danger of someone demanding my vote receipt off me.
- erichocean 14y agoWithout it, they have no way of knowing if their coercion/blackmail worked or not. Sure they do: use a lie detector and ask them. Honestly, the situation you describe is the problem, not the presence or absence of verifiable voting. If you've got the mafia threatening your family, voting is the least of your problems.
- Confusion 14y agoWhat is this mythical lie detector you speak of? No trustworthy lie detector exists. If you disagree: does yours work for all mental variations (psychopaths, autism, retardedness, ...) and physical variations (Down syndrome, a score of other genetic abnormalities, ...)? Have you actually verified the research or trust someone who did?
- lmm 14y agoNo lie detector exists that is effective to the standards we demand in a court of law, but that doesn't mean there isn't one effective enough for the purposes of an organized crime syndicate looking to buy votes.
- webXL 14y agoMake the receipt optional for each voter. Assholes will still be assholes regardless of the existence of receipts. If someone is extorting you to vote a certain way, I doubt the outcome of an election will affect your life very much. You have bigger problems.
- pbhjpbhj 14y ago>you can't prove how you voted (i.e. so you can't sell your vote). // I assumed that if anything it was to prevent people being pressured in to voting a particular way (eg an abusive spouse) - what' wrong with selling your vote, surely that's still democratic: you've chosen to accept a particular candidate based on the outcome for you.
- MartinCron 14y agowhat's wrong with selling your vote, surely that's still democratic Besides just being distasteful, just handing over powerful positions in our society to the highest bidder seems like a formula for brazen abuse.
- pbhjpbhj 14y agoBut it would only be handed over to the highest bidder if the individuals chose to hand it over ... which is how democracy is supposed to work isnt it? Arguably the current system favours a cadre of the super-rich already. People now can vote for whichever party will make them individually richer. It just seems to me like a logical extension of capitalist economics.
- gordonguthrie 14y agoVote buying is not about a voluntary market in a tradeable commodity - it is about your boss not being able to say 'prove you vote my way or I will sack you' or your landlord saying 'prove you vote may way or I will evict you'.
- erichocean 14y agoNonsense. Existing laws protecting employees from employer retribution (e.g. for sexual orientation, or religion, or...) are still enforceable (and the judgments for plaintiffs are large, too). There is no reason to prevent someone from verifying that their vote was counted -- not vote buying (or the presumed ease thereof), not vote tampering or stuffing (really?), not potential outside coercion of any kind. Laws exist for all of these things already, and would not suddenly become unenforceable or ineffective in the presence of vote verification.
- deleted 14y ago[deleted]
- gordonguthrie 14y agoTotal nonsense. What happens when I stuff the ballot box with a million non-existent votes? Oh, so you voted correctly and you can prove it. Whoopy do! > Let us go and check our votes are in the list. We could then have informal verification and audits of the counts. You have the square root of bugger all - the integrity of the total count is what counts - not the individual votes. Vote stealing and ballot rigging is a well understood human phenomenon - it is a solved problem. Sprinkling some poorly thought out computer pixie dust on it is not even the beginning of an answer.