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That only solves one part of a large problem. You still have solve * How to stop someone from coercing your vote by being there while you vote * How to distr

by IanCal 12y ago

That only solves one part of a large problem. You still have solve * How to stop someone from coercing your vote by being there while you vote * How to distribute the coins evenly * How to ensure that the vote was cast by the person you gave the coin to * How to ensure that nobody can find out who you voted for afterwards

dmvaldman 12y ago
Many cryptocurrencies have your last two points as part of their design. For the first one, I see the value in going to a centralized place that has taken measures to make sure there is no coercing involved. Someone with a gun could indeed come to your home, and make you vote for a certain candidate. I don't have a good answer for this, but I do feel that it would be a difficult strategy to pull off, as citizens can vote at any time, from any place. For your second point, this is indeed the hard part. It can be rephrased as: how can you be sure no one was given 2 coins? I also don't have an answer here that doesn't make you associate an SSN or another unique identifier with a wallet address, which would ruin the anonymity feature. Maybe someone else reading has some good ideas to add?
- hga 12y ago
  "but I do feel that it would be a difficult strategy to pull off, as citizens can vote at any time, from any place" The coercion could and would take the effect of requiring you to vote while the coercier was watching you. If you voted before then, you'd suffer the consequences. This is an absolute bar to on-line voting as far as I'm concerned; in the US it would likely spark the hot civil war we're sliding towards.
  - mattkrisiloff 12y ago
    Is there a difference with absentee ballots?
    - hga 12y ago
      Nope, which is one of the reasons they're the target of many if not most current US voting scams.
  - IanCal 12y ago
    > The coercion could and would take the effect of requiring you to vote while the coercier was watching you. If you voted before then, you'd suffer the consequences. Yes, and it's not the "gun to the head" type scenario but voting with family, partners, friends that would be more typical. Or voting at work, knowing your boss is right next to you and hates party X that you want in... Voting on paper in a booth is antiquated and low-tech, but it works. It's simple, pretty easy for interested parties to watch for misconduct, understandable by everyone. It's hard to fake on a large scale, too.
- infogulch 12y ago
  I think we need some kind of Zero-knowledge proof[1]: "a method by which one party (the prover) can prove to another party (the verifier) that a given statement is true, without conveying any information apart from the fact that the statement is indeed true." In the case of voting, we want to be able to prove that a person voted, with no knowledge of the actual vote. If you can count the number of votes cast that should be enough to be confident in the result. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof

by IanCal 12y ago

dmvaldman 12y ago

Many cryptocurrencies have your last two points as part of their design. For the first one, I see the value in going to a centralized place that has taken measures to make sure there is no coercing involved. Someone with a gun could indeed come to your home, and make you vote for a certain candidate. I don't have a good answer for this, but I do feel that it would be a difficult strategy to pull off, as citizens can vote at any time, from any place. For your second point, this is indeed the hard part. It can be rephrased as: how can you be sure no one was given 2 coins? I also don't have an answer here that doesn't make you associate an SSN or another unique identifier with a wallet address, which would ruin the anonymity feature. Maybe someone else reading has some good ideas to add?

hga 12y ago
"but I do feel that it would be a difficult strategy to pull off, as citizens can vote at any time, from any place" The coercion could and would take the effect of requiring you to vote while the coercier was watching you. If you voted before then, you'd suffer the consequences. This is an absolute bar to on-line voting as far as I'm concerned; in the US it would likely spark the hot civil war we're sliding towards.
- mattkrisiloff 12y ago
  Is there a difference with absentee ballots?
  - hga 12y ago
    Nope, which is one of the reasons they're the target of many if not most current US voting scams.
- IanCal 12y ago
  > The coercion could and would take the effect of requiring you to vote while the coercier was watching you. If you voted before then, you'd suffer the consequences. Yes, and it's not the "gun to the head" type scenario but voting with family, partners, friends that would be more typical. Or voting at work, knowing your boss is right next to you and hates party X that you want in... Voting on paper in a booth is antiquated and low-tech, but it works. It's simple, pretty easy for interested parties to watch for misconduct, understandable by everyone. It's hard to fake on a large scale, too.
infogulch 12y ago
I think we need some kind of Zero-knowledge proof[1]: "a method by which one party (the prover) can prove to another party (the verifier) that a given statement is true, without conveying any information apart from the fact that the statement is indeed true." In the case of voting, we want to be able to prove that a person voted, with no knowledge of the actual vote. If you can count the number of votes cast that should be enough to be confident in the result. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zero-knowledge_proof