7 reasons why online voting isn’t a solution

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Online voting is being waved around again as a means to increase participation.  Here are the 7 reasons why I think online voting is a bad idea.

1 – 21% of those asked why theory didn’t vote in 2011 gave ‘didn’t get round to it, forgot or were not interested’ as their reason. Online voting hardly seems to be the solution to that statistic. The 20% who weren’t enrolled is where we should be speeding up the online process, not the actual voting.

2 – There is a certain bonding that occurs between people who are physically forced to line up and vote together. This proximity is an important part of the process, it is a unique event occurring once every three years that requires more respect than a click on a keyboard.

3 – Online voting is horrifically easy to hack.

4 – Our current regulation over the intelligence apparatus is woefully inadequate and the risk they would start tampering with results could never be ruled out.

5 – When NZ has 7 servers based here for a security hacking corporation and Australia only has 4, online voting is open to tampering.

6 – The Snowden revelations tell us that the NSA ability to intercept and manipulate data means very few online systems are safe.

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7 – There are better ways of lifting participation rates: lowering voting age to 16, making the election a statutory holiday, allow prisoners to vote, allow easier enrolment onto the non-published roll.

48 COMMENTS

  1. Absolutely agree with you Martyn. GCSB, 5 eyes, TISA, TPPA, and the loss of net neutrality are enough reasons to turf the idea of online voting out the window. Don’t they also want 70% of all transactions between the public and government agencies to occur online also? If facebook has made a habit of manipulating online FB statuses, those in power may get free reign to do as they please online also. One word – rort.

  2. On the topic of voting machines. There is an old Wizard of Id cartoon about the king’s new voting machine. Is especially relevant for reason number 3, “horrifically easy to hack”. See the cartoon and you will understand.
    But seriously, how can we trust electronic and on-line voting when you read about how it has been used and abused in USA? And who seems to be the most enthusiastic about on-line voting? The political right, of course! I wonder why?

    • Are you unable to tell the difference between “electronic voting” and “online voting” ?
      Are you seriously unable to tell the difference between a US republican sponsored black box machine which is subject to tampering and your own internet device or computer which you have full access to, and can even lend to your housebound grandma, rather than force her to use her walker to get to the school hall ?

      Are you sure you’ve got democracy in mind when you want to restrict voting to the able bodied and organised majority ?

  3. The NSA and their local puppets here would LOVE online voting. It’s a wonder National aren’t pushing harder for it.

    • National would hate online voting as it makes it so much easier to do referendums. It would, quite simply, be nothing more than typing in the question and putting it online. Couple of hundred dollars at most.

      This means two things:

      1. They wouldn’t be able to whinge at the cost of the referendum as they did over the Asset Sales Referendum thus removing their ability to paint referenda as a waste of money and
      2. People would have a say. What the electorate wants would be known near instantly and thus the pressure would be on for the government to do what the people want rather than what National’s owners want.

      In other words, we’d be able to get better democracy and National really hates democracy.

  4. 1 – 21% of those asked why theory didn’t vote in 2011 gave ‘didn’t get round to it, forgot or were not interested’ as their reason. Online voting hardly seems to be the solution to that statistic.

    That seems to be just as good a reason as targeting the 20% that didn’t enroll.

    2 – There is a certain bonding that occurs between people who are physically forced to line up and vote together.

    Absolute rubbish. You go in, you vote, you leave – no bonding involved. This seems to be more how you wish things to be rather than how they are.

    3 – Online voting is horrifically easy to hack.

    Voting machines are not online voting. Please educate yourself.

    4 – Our current regulation over the intelligence apparatus is woefully inadequate and the risk they would start tampering with results could never be ruled out.

    Not specific to online voting. It doesn’t really apply to online voting as it needs to be addressed anyway.

    5 – When NZ has 7 servers based here for a security hacking corporation and Australia only has 4, online voting is open to tampering.

    That article you linked to is so badly written I’ve still no idea what you’re talking about in it. I suspect that this stems from the fact that you have no idea what you’re talking about. They have 7 servers specifically designed to hack into so as to test present security systems? Sounds good to me as it will allow us to increase security to prevent breaches.

    6 – The Snowden revelations tell us that the NSA ability to intercept and manipulate data means very few online systems are safe.

    That’s a concern but can be addressed. Requiring all servers in the .nz namespace to be secure severs rather than open would make it damn near impossible for the NSA to spy on what’s said. They’ll still be able to get the meta-data and so that needs working on and the best way to do that would be to make the equipment in NZ under strict security protocols.

    7 – There are better ways of lifting participation rates: lowering voting age to 16, making the election a statutory holiday, allow prisoners to vote, allow easier enrolment onto the non-published roll.

    I doubt if lowering voting age to 16 will affect participation rates at all. The young don’t vote because they’re out partying. Civics taught at school would do more.

    Statutory holiday will possibly help. The problem I see there though is that a lot of people will just go out and party the night before and then not vote anyway.

    Prisoners should never have had their right to vote removed from them and doing so should have resulted in this government going to jail.

    I didn’t even know that a non-published roll even existed so that would certainly have an effect in getting people enrolled. Doubt if it would have any affect on voter participation though.

    • I agree with pretty much everything you’ve said here.

      I know (because I have to, I make my living online now) that it is possible to be ahead of the spies. It is possible to make a system secure, at least as secure as paper voting is anyway.

      Hackers would be the group to go to. An open crowd designed system with some good hackers working on it and testing it could do the job.

      There’s only one thing I must disagree with in your comment, and I’m only doing so because it seems to be a commonly thought thing. Civics is taught in our schools. I used to teach and I’ve taught this. My son is now year 9 and he’s learning this at the moment. There are some excellent resources for teachers from NZ Elections which make it very easy. Unfortunately so many (mostly older) teachers see it as a boring but necessary topic and with that mindset they teach it in such a boring way it turns kids off. Which is bullshit IMO. It can actually be one of the most exciting because you can get kids doing it from the very first lesson. Its fun!

  5. Agree. The apathetic aren’t going to decide to vote because they can suddenly do it online. And the sign-up and verification process will unlikely be “simply a click away”.

    • Are you saying that the blind, the sick and the elderly have to change their attitudes to voting because they don’t get to vote on their own ?
      Are you saying these people need to “harden up” and make do with serious obstacles which is completely unnecessary in the modern era ?

  6. Consider the most powerful Military on the planet ,the United States of America ,all run from their Headquarters .yes the Pentagon .
    Now it goes without saying ,their secrets are serious and therefore they have a very very serious and robust system to prevent unauthorized access to their “information” .
    Do you know that even with a security system that has no limit with regards to cost ,the Pentagon gets “hacked” (in their own estimate) 250,000 times per year !
    It is impossible to 100% safe guard the results of elections if electronic devices are part of the process, impossible !
    Now if you consider also that the winner of a given election could benefit by billions of dollars depending on the results of a given party beating another party. How much would an outside entity (with no alliance with New Zealand) pay to guarantee “their” party wins ?
    As an example …Look at the TPPA ,4 plus years of secret meetings ,600 corporate lobbyist draw big bucks per year , election year in a key country , one party totally falling over themselves to get TPPA signed and in place , the other party against in principle the risk to our sovereignty etc. ,you as the TPPA CEO know you could bring your group billion and billion of dollar more profits if you can remove the regulations etc by having TPPA signed and in place a.s.a.p. ! What would you spend ? Do hacker charge by the job or the hour ?
    Would we know if our election was ever hacked ?
    Notice over time with elections how the results are now very close at times ,notice how polls don’t always reflect the results on election day …these (and other) things make hacking the result almost undetectable .
    Them you have the esoteric nature of “code” , you can write programs that hide till a certain date then do there function only to delete themselves leave not a single bit of evidence that they existed …QED “It is impossible to 100% safe guard the results of elections if electronic devices are part of the process, impossible ! “

    • Do you know that even with a security system that has no limit with regards to cost ,the Pentagon gets “hacked” (in their own estimate) 250,000 times per year !

      [citation needed]

      Is the Pentagon hacked 250,000 time per year or is there 250,000 attempts? I figure it’s probably the latter with no actual breaking into the system (except where the Pentagon wants people to break into).

      It is impossible to 100% safe guard the results of elections if electronic devices are paper is part of the process, impossible !

      FTFY

      It’s impossible to make a perfectly secure system. What it comes down to is if the risk is manageable and using online voting the risk is manageable.

      Here’s a thought for you – online voting will be able to produce better democracy. A democracy that the rich won’t be able to own through their donations to political parties.

      • “online voting will be able to produce better democracy. A democracy that the rich won’t be able to own through their donations to political parties. ” ,go home your drunk !

        How the hell is it “manageable” if it can be accessed and the results changed ? I have worked in electronics for most of my life and spent 20 years hacking programs and once again I ask you in your Utopium world ,how the fuck is it “manageable” ?

        So in your world where ” the rich won’t be able to own through their donations to political parties” what would stop them spending that money on hackers ? Are you really that naive ? You obviously have no understanding of computer security !

        • As someone who has 34 years experience with using computers, 31 years programming and 25 years of cryptography experience in both analog and digital systems…
          I have to say that your lack of knowledge is incredible.
          The design of cryptography systems that can’t be broken goes back to 1917 and is trivial to implement properly.

          I would suggest that you have no knowledge of anything you can’t be bothered to search wikipedia for.

        • “The Pentagon alone estimates its computer networks are hacked about 250,000 times a year…. But at least 500 are considered serious attempts at breaking into classified systems….

          Yeah, exactly as I thought – 250,000 attempts, ZERO cracks.

          You really should read your own sources better.

    • Actually, the NSA has mandated that the only cryptography system that is allowed to be 100% secure is the nuclear weapons communications system.
      The standard military system is the broken AES system, which the NSA has full real time access to at the Utah facilities.

      The trivial way to assure the online voting system actually works without any tampering possible is to design and implement the online voting system in NZ, without the hinderance of the GCSB.

  7. If people are that disinterested that they can’t find an a hour every 3 years its better they don’t vote

    • Actually, online voting would also leave a trail and it would be very difficult to manipulate the online ballots. Done properly, it would be near on impossible to manipulate.

      Really, people have been watching too many movies where some hacker gets into a secure system in five minutes every time. Even with today’s computing power it would still take until the end of the universe to crack a 128 bit encryption routine.

  8. You are assuming that the political system will remain the same and all that changes is that we vote at home rather than at a polling booth. Using those assumptions I could agree with the arguments but internet voting offers a true democracy, which can change the entire parliamentary system whereby voters get to cast just one vote every three years and then have a government claim that it has a mandate for even the most trivial idea. It could rid of us of the party system that has become a sick joke.
    Anyone who cares to look at the Internet Mana Party website can see that members get to propose any topic they wish, discuss it and vote on it. The process is entirely continuous; there is no beginning and end.
    I have participated and concede that their present system is flawed but that is just teething problems. The concept can be made to work. I dont know if the system can be hacked but if hundreds of thousands were participating and voting regularly, I cant see what point there would be in attempting it.
    Decisions made would be sent directly to the responsible Ministry to action. The Departmental head could be involved in the discussion process. There could be an Ombudsman to resolve disputes and an auditor to ensure that the appropriate actions are happening. No John Key, No National Party. Whats not to like about that.

    • DennisD

      It’s easy to forget; what with the present government’s frequent use of urgency, this is much how the select committee process is supposed to operate – proposing legislation then inviting public submissions.

      There is no direct analogy to the IP’s policy “Incubator”, maybe a petition to a local MP who then introduces a private members bill into the ballot?

    • Open source.

      Direct democracy.

      No more politics bullshit, no more political parties, no more only once every three years bollocks.

      Love it! Love it!

  9. Agree Martyn.

    I witnessed a husband telling his wife on voting day who she had to vote for.

    He stood over her shouting at her that she had to vote national!

    This woman was an abused woman.

    There are many homes like this in NZ, and if the online vote was done from inside a home – from your PC, then some men would be getting 2 votes!

    At least with our good old paper system these women can hide behind the screen and vote for whoever they like – ensuring their husbands that they have voted for who they were told to vote for.

    Online voting would be so very wrong, for all the reasons you have stated Martyn, and for this reason too.

    Opinion.

    • I witnessed a husband telling his wife on voting day who she had to vote for.
      He stood over her shouting at her that she had to vote national!

      I hope you reported that because it is a very serious crime.

      There are many homes like this in NZ, and if the online vote was done from inside a home – from your PC, then some men would be getting 2 votes!

      But it doesn’t have to be done at home. Internet cafes, school computers, smart phones. And you have to also encourage and support people to report such abuse as you describe so we can deal effectively with the undemocratic and abusive arseholes.

      • Yes of course encourage her to report it, but of course, as is usual, she was too scared of the repercussions to report it.

        However she voted for her choice because of the security at the polling booths meaning he couldn’t force her.

        And..she spits in, and does other gross things to his food every day.

        She is ancient now. Are senile people allowed to vote?

  10. “2 – There is a certain bonding that occurs between people who are physically forced to line up and vote together. This proximity is an important part of the process, it is a unique event occurring once every three years that requires more respect than a click on a keyboard”

    That’s an EXCELLENT point Martyn — and I wish it was made more often. The importance of election day as a communal and social event is often neglected in debates about e-voting.
    Organising events that enhance the social side of e-day may help increase participation (maybe it should be a public holiday)

    • The importance of election day as a communal and social event is often neglected in debates about e-voting.

      That’s probably because it’s neither.

  11. I like the easier enrolement onto the non published role. To much risk in disclosing full name, address etc these days.

  12. Like I asked before “how come the right are the ones pushing for on-line voting?”. It isn’t because they want to make it easier for people to cast their ballots. It isn’t because they want to get the turnout up. It is because they see an opportunity to manipulate it to get the results they want. If you think I am being fanciful then just remember that it was the right’s 19th century Tory forefathers in England who most vigorously opposed the introduction of the secret ballot in 1872 because it removed opportunities to intimidate voters.

    • Like I asked before “how come the right are the ones pushing for on-line voting?”

      I haven’t seen a single right-wing person advocating for online voting.

  13. Until white hats convince me that electronic voting is unhackable, I will support only the standard tried and proven paper ballot method. It has worked well for UK with none of the USA superior drawbacks – hanging chads, error electronic votes, uploaded viruses in the voting consoles.

    • Until white hats convince me that electronic voting is unhackable

      Nobody here is trying to do that. You’re obviously someone else that needs to learn the difference between online voting and voting machines.

  14. I’m sorry, but this article and the appalling unchecked linked articles have nothing to do with reality of online voting in a new zealand designed context.

    This is not going to be a stupid system where we pay an american company that donates to the republican party to build a closed source machine that can’t be trusted to be secure from tampering.

    The online voting system means you can use your own device to vote online, with no need for special hardware at the voting booth. Instead you have your own voting booth, where you don’t have to insist that your grandma walks down to the local school in a walking frame, she can just burrow your laptop.
    This also means that people in hospital can vote personally, that the blind have personal access to voting.

    The other brilliant thing is that it means that the people who don’t know their electorate can easily find their electorate as part of the voting process. It also means expats can vote without having to get to a NZ consulate or embassy, they don’t need to send an expensive fax to NZ.

    Basically the online voting idea is to make it easier to vote, so more people can participate, which can only strengthen democracy in NZ.

      • By putting in place adequate security protocols. And when someone actually tries to do that they go to jail for a very, very long time. Oh, and lose everything that they own including trusts.

    • I don’t agree with online voting.

      A vote is supposed to be entirely private and personal.

      How will anyone police that (if the voting happened as you say here on your own PC) ensure the voter is alone in the room.

      There aren’t too many grannys with walking frames who would have enough faculties to be able to vote anyway.

      We just need more polling booths so the appeal of casting a vote isn’t lost on the young ones, when the queue is too long. Quick in, and quick out – thats how to get more voters. More polling booths. And more reminders.

      Opinion.

  15. This blog entry sounds very yesteryear to me. Very contradictory from someone so active in the online world. Personally, I’d love to to be able to vote online. I filled my Census form out online, didn’t you?

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