In The Netherlands we've been using an Electronic Voting System for some years now. And one thing always bothered me. I press a button and the display says my vote is registered. But then the display goes blank. And with it any real physical proof of my vote disappears in the machine. Though the law requires there should be ways to do a recount, no recount is really possible. The machine won't come up with a different result. So what if the machine malfunctions? And now the Irish Government tested the same system we use in The Netherlands to determine if they could use it for the upcoming European election. Guess what: The Commission on Electronic Voting have said that they are "unable to recommend the use of the proposed system at the local and European elections".
Read the full report here.
Some of the findings:
“Certain of the tests performed at the request of the Commission identified an error in the count software which could lead to incorrect distributions of surpluses; there is a possibility that further testing will uncover further software errors”
WTF, a voting computer that doesn't count right? Who programmed that software?
“experts retained by the Commission found it very easy to bypass electronic security measures and gain complete control of the “hardened” PC, overwrite the software, and thereby in theory to gain complete control over the count in a given constituency”
Before you know it some German script-kiddy is elected as the new Dutch prime-minister.
“the system does not have a voter-verifiable audit trail (VVAT)”
he! where did my vote go!
Very intresting, especially since we have to vote again really soon!
Nice journal...greeting from Singapore