[kwlug-disc] Lower voter turnout?

[Raul Suarez]

On Tue, Apr 05, 2011 at 07:21:39AM -0400, Russell McOrmond wrote:
>   What do KWLug folks think about online voting?  It was included in
> the Liberal platform as a "solution" to low voter turnout.


Unworkable (See my next comment)

>   Do you feel voting has the same security threat model as banking,
> and thus simple point-to-point encryption solves the problem?  What is
> the threat model for voting, and is only third parties we don't trust
> (IE: do we trust the voter and the body calculating the votes).


In banking the trust comes from the system identifying that you are you.


Voting is secret. Of course you identify that you are you, but there is no way 
to relate that to your actual vote. On an online system it is impossible not to 
know how you voted. We can choose to ignore this data, but the fact that the 
data exists defeats the secret vote.

Unless we agree that vote shouldn't be secret, online voting will be unworkable
>   Do we trust the individuals/companies that write the software for
> these voting systems?


No

Raul Suarez


Technology consultant
Software, Hardware and Practices
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