[Cialug] voting think tank comment

[Jeff Davis]

It depends on how accurate and tamper-proof you need it to be.

A while back there was thread on one of
securityfocus mailing lists on this topic.

Some of the problems/issues were:
  One of the biggest issues was that if
  you have 1 machine running a program that
  just displays the ballot and keeps a count
  of the votes, there is no paper trail to
  verify the results.  There are many scenarios
  where a verifiable paper trail is needed.

  The software needs to be open source for
  several reasons, including ensuring that
  the software developers didn't add in any
  mechanisms for altering the vote count.

  There needs to be a process in place to verify just prior
  to voting that neither the hardware nor software has
  been compromised.

  You'll need at least a UPS and possibly a generator.

  How will you handle a hardware failure?

  Physical security:
   If you have more than one machine in the set up, then
   you have introduced a network connection which brings
   the possibility of the vote being compromised.

   How is the actual vote recorded? Via touch screen?
   You don't want a voter alone in a booth with your
   voting machine, a mouse, and keyboard.


-Jeff




Tom Poe wrote:
> Hi, All:  Over at:
> http://www.bbvforums.org/cgi-bin/forums/discus.cgi
> if you click on the link for Think Tank, there's a huge international 
> discussion going on about voting, electronic and paper, stuff.
> 
> The question is, can there be a simple computer program that displays 
> the ballot, records the vote, and prints out the raw data for up to 1000 
> votes in a precinct.  The other requirement is it prints out a ballot to 
> serve as a paper ballot record.  That's the scope.  The idea is to put a 
> computer in a precinct, and conduct the vote for up to 1000 people.  No 
> network connection, internet connection, just the computer performing 
> those tasks.  Maybe there has to be two computers.  One for generating a 
> ballot.  And, one to receive the vote count.  Seems like it should only 
> be one computer to me.
> 
> Anyone have a quick fix on what would be needed?  We don't want to go 
> beyond what it takes to do more.  Oh, and it has to be GPL, not 
> proprietary.  For all I know, there's a calculator in Engineering that 
> already does that.  Is it GPL'd?  :)
> Tom
> 
> 
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