Bangladesh exploring e-voting technology for future elections

Many democracies clear across the globe have adopted e-voting technology in varying capacities and the popularity of electronic voting machines, both for vote-capturing and for counting ballots, has been steadily rising. Brazil has had a long history with e-voting, for example, and countries like the Philippines and Estonia continue to set positive examples for the rest of the world to follow. 

While there is still much research and exploration to be conducted, a delegation from Bangladesh recently visited with election commissioners in neighbouring India and they were “impressed” by the Indian electronic voting machines. As the world's largest democracy, India has proven not only that e-voting technology is viable and advantageous, but that it can also be utilized on an incredibly massive scale, improving accessibility to its citizens. 

The Indian electoral system with its deployment of e-voting technology was designed from the start to be as cost-effective as possible, particularly given the grand scale of the Indian election, while still maintaining high levels of security and integrity. The Bangladeshi delegation, which was led by Muhammad Faruk Khan and consisted of 10 members from the Bangladesh Parliament, sought to “know the traits of conducting free and peaceful elections” from their Indian counterparts.

Harinshankar “HS” Brahma, one of India's Election Commissioners, emphasized the importance of increasing voter enrollment and encouraged the appropriate use of technology. He said it has been a real game changer in elections, addressing many of the major challenges that elections can face. 

One of the most common challenges is engaging the youth electorate and India has been largely successful with this, empowering the tech-savvy youth with political start-ups like Grassroute, MumbaiVotes and Know Your Vote. 

The Indian officials provided their visitors from Bangladesh with a demonstration of the electronic voting machines and how they worked in tandem with the voter verified paper audit trail (VVPAT), a vital component for audits and recounts, ensuring that the correct voter intent was properly captured and recorded. Accountability is of great importance.

It is through delegations and meetings like this that the state of electronic voting can continue to improve and grow well into the future. Countries do not exist in isolation and it is through collective collaboration that they can leverage their expertise in a synergistic manner. This is why events like the EVOTE International Conference in Austria are so valuable, gathering together many of the most important decision makers from different democracies. The budgets and details may vary, but the primary objectives remain the same. 

The history and politics of the region are such that India and Bangladesh have not always gotten along as the keenest of allies, but major strides like this for mutual benefit can also help to foster goodwill and peace between nations. By encouraging further collaboration and partnerships between countries all around the world, e-voting technology can continue to be strengthened for elections of all sizes. It is far more cost effective to co-develop e-voting solutions than to develop them individually.

And by learning from the experience and missteps of those who moved to e-voting before them, Bangladesh can position itself to be as problem-free as possible for its elections in the future.

The advancing innovations and trends of voting technology

All industries and business sectors should aspire for continuous innovation, ceaselessly moving forward with changes that make for a better product or experience by all. In the case of mobile phones, the rise of the smartphone and mobile apps has completely revolutionized the way that people communicate on the go. Modern cars are packed with an increasing assortment of technology, providing drivers and passengers with more comfort, better safety and improved fuel economy.

In the context of elections, the pace of innovation can sometimes feel slowed by the bureaucracies of government, but this should not thwart the continuing advances in creating a better and more efficient voting process. This should include innovations for the election infrastructure, hardware and software for collecting ballots, and advances in the tabulation and reporting of results.

Traditionally, innovations that impact how the voter casts a ballot tend to create friction as they have direct require legal framework adaptations. As a rule of thumb, the closer the technology is to the voter, the harder it is to implement it. 

 

That is why, some of the innovations being implemented in the industry address problems either before the voter casts a ballot, or after when the vote is being processed. To better illustrate our point, let’s look at three recent elections that employed technology in different stages. 

Voter authentication

Biometric technology can help to protect against election fraud, giving voters greater confidence in the integrity and legitimacy of results. In Brazil, approximately 21 million voters where authenticated biometrically before casting a ballot, thus eliminating the possibility of voter impersonation. Authorities are expecting to extend the use of the biometric devices to the entire electorate by 2017. 

Electronic poll books 

Among the many recommendations made by the Presidential Commission on Election Administration electronic poll books emerged as one source of possible innovation in the field. The report, handed to the President of the US on January 1st, 2014, sees e-poll books as a way for jurisdictions to make voter processing at polling places more accurate and efficient. The report stated “In the national survey of election of­ficials, e-poll books was one of the most frequently identified innovations that respon­dents desired.”

The Onondaga County Board of Elections recently tried a new electronic poll book during the recent midterm elections in the US. Using an electronic pad similar to what it is used to pay with credit cards at grocery stores, polling management got much easier. 

According to Onondaga County Elections Commissioners, Dustin Czarny, and Helen Kiggins Walsh voters at three polling places were asked to sign their names on the electronic pad. Also, elections inspectors typed voters' names into a database, to pull up information.

Promising to end long lines at polling stations, an election technology provider, everyone counts is also promoting their Electronic Polling Book in their website. 

Results processing

Oonce voters have left the precincts, there are still plenty of instances where administrators can use some help from technology. 

Recently, the West Heath Ward by-election of the Rushmoor Borough Council in the United Kingdom, used a digital pen to streamline the transmission of results. The digital pen, adapted to elections by Smartmatic, was employed in two aspects of the West Heath by-election. It was used by the election officials during the official tabulation and reporting of the election results. More specifically, it was used by officials with the ballot box verification form and the election results verification form. The former aggregates the final tally in each box, while the latter records the results for each electoral candidate. In both cases, the ePen was able to digitally capture the important information, allowing election officials to quickly and easily verify and transmit the results. 

Replace postal voting with secure internet voting

The traditional view of collecting votes during an election would entail having citizens visit an official polling place to cast their ballot. In the past, this may have been with colored balls in marked jars, but it has since evolved to involve paper ballots, pull-lever machines and direct-recording electronic (DRE) voting machines, some with intuitive touchscreen displays and advanced security measures. 

While this standard, regardless of the exact mechanism used, largely remains the primary way that most democracies in the world allow their citizens to exercise their right to vote, it is not always enough on its own. Particularly when it comes to universal access and convenience, people living in rural areas or more remote parts of the country can encounter significant difficulty in making the physical trip to a polling place in the city.

The world as a whole is experiencing a greater level of urbanization than ever before, but this does not mean that people living outside of major metropolitan areas should have any greater difficulty in casting a vote than their urban counterparts. To address this, electoral commissions have typically relied on postal voting, offering an extended period of time where citizens could send their ballots in through the regular postal mail.

However, postal voting is “becoming increasingly problematic” for a number of reasons. The pieces of mail can easily become lost and sending private ballots through the postal service may not live up to the security and confidentiality standards that a legitimate election should have. Mail tampering is not uncommon and this could jeopardize the integrity of the election results.

A more recent solution to gain popularity in countries like Estonia is Internet-based voting. Also called i-voting, online voting may not necessarily replace precinct-based voting places for the majority of people, but it can provide much greater access and convenience to those who wish to use an online system instead. 

Naturally, there are also many concerns about security when it comes to anything to do with the Internet, but these concerns can be suitably addressed if the proper audits are in place and the right firms are handled to manage the elections. Online systems have the potential of becoming the victim of malicious attacks, but they can be prevented. The hacking of an online vote in the Canadian province of Alberta was suitably thwarted, despite “multiple attempts to infiltrate the website.” The internal security systems prevented these attacks from having any impact on the results of the vote.

Because of the possibility of such attacks, it is important that all online voting systems allow for an adequate period of time during which voters can cast their ballots online. The time needs to be sufficient to mitigate a distributed denial of service (DDoS) attack. Should the voting website go down for a period of time, there needs to be enough time to recover and to ensure that voters can still cast their vote.

As expert William J. Kelleher has asserted in the past, Internet voting can be safe and reliable and it is certainly a more viable, scalable and secure solution than the increasingly archaic system of postal voting.

E-voting in Australia could use myGov for voter verification

Source: my.gov.au

In most parts of the world where elections still rely on traditional paper ballots submitted at official polling stations, the volunteers and election staff on hand are tasked with the responsibility of verifying the identities of voters and comparing them with the list of registered voters. In most cases, a simple driver's license or some other form of government-issued photo identification will suffice. Other places may ask for a piece of mail with the voter's home address. Depending on the jurisdiction, the rules may be more strict or more lax.

When direct recording electronic voting machines are introduced at official polling sites, there are still staff on hand who check the identity of voters before directing them to the appropriate machine. The machines themselves may or may not have voter verification technologies in place, like scanning a government-issued identification card. What happens, then, when the vote is taken online?

This is the question being raised ahead of the 2016 federal election in Australia and the current proposal is calling for integration with the existing myGov account system. The Australian Department of Communications is looking for an e-voting trial for the upcoming election, following the success of smaller trials in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and New South Wales. Extending this trial on a national scale introduces additional challenges, but the existing infrastructure of the myGov government log-in system could work.

The myGov system is meant to provide Australians with a simple way to access government services, using “one login, one password [and] one destination.” Member services already utilizing the myGov system include Medicare, Child Support, and Centrelink, the last of which handles a range of government payments.  Department of Communications deputy secretary Abul Rizvi says myGov “may provide an ideal vehicle to trial e-voting at the federal level.”

However, it has been met with skepticism and critics due to vulnerabilities that were discovered in the website. It is important that the Australian government address these concerns over security and confidentiality ahead of the 2016 e-voting election trial. In many parts of the world that are experimenting with or have already implemented e-voting technology on a widespread scale, biometric authentication of voters can be very useful.

To accurately identify voters, electoral agencies can utilize biometric data that is unique to each individual, including 10 fingerprints and iris scans, as well as photo identification, signatures and secure passwords. Biometric technology can protect against election fraud, as in the case in Tanzania ahead of its 2015 national elections.

One of the reasons why Estonia continues to be a world leader in online voting technology is that all citizens have mandatory identification that includes biometric data. The myGov system in Australia could serve as a similar platform as it continues to grow and mature. Rizvi feels that Internet voting is the “inevitable long term outcome” for electronic voting and having the pieces in place ahead of time can prepare the country and its citizens for this reality.

In the meantime, as voters still submit their ballots in a physical voting place, electronic voting devices could provide a reliable bridge between the two technologies. Indeed, Rizvi states that voters may be able to bring their own device—like a smartphone or tablet—to the voting place and connect to the local system to cast a vote. This reduces cost for the electoral system and allows for experimentation with myGov-based Internet voting in a closed and secure network. 

Ireland and Northern Ireland push for more e-voting technology

Source: Wikimedia

Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland don't see eye-to-eye on many issues. The relationship between the two can be strained and, for many outsiders unfamiliar with the area, it can also be quite confusing. Whereas Northern Ireland is a part of the United Kingdom, the Republic of Ireland is a sovereign state on its own. And even though they may have their differences, it appears that they have at least one thing in common: they both want to increase the use of electronic voting technology.

An article in the Belfast Telegraph recently discussed the accuracy of predicting elections in the area and how “it would be good to have even more information on the innards of the voting system to analyse.” In order to gain this more detailed analytical data, several parts in Northern Ireland are calling for “a system of electronically counting votes.”

By moving to e-voting technology for the tabulation of ballots, far more detail about the voting patterns in different areas could become clearer. It would make it easier to see where party support was coming from and, thus, parties could then better organize their campaign strategies to target perceived “openings” and how they could reinforce their efforts where they were “falling short.” As more data became publicly available and as this data was organized into charts and tables, smaller parties would collect insight that would help make them more competitive against more established parties and politicians.

Of course, using a computerized model of counting ballots would also mean that election results could be reported sooner.

A similar push for e-voting machines and electronic vote counting is being witnessed in the Republic of Ireland as well. While e-voting machines have been “maligned” in the country, Ireland's Minister for Children and Youth Affairs Charlie Flanagan has noted that it takes too long for the results of local and European elections to be reported.

“Counting is taking far too long,” said the Children's Minister. “Electronic voting must be returned to the political agenda.”

In three constituencies during the 2002 Irish general election, electronic voting equipment was used on an experimental basis. Tests were conducted and the equipment was purchased, but the governing bodies of Ireland never expanded the e-voting technology to the rest of the nation. Flanagan feels it is time to revisit this technology and the many benefits it can provide.

E-voting allows for better accessibility for people with disabilities, for instance, and the technology can help to invigorate and energize the youth vote. With countless strange stories coming out of manual voting and manual ballot counting, updating and upgrading to electronic voting can modernize the electoral process and minimize human error.

From Dublin to Belfast, the people of both Ireland and Northern Ireland are rooted in deep tradition. However, the traditions of paper ballots and manual vote counting must be put forth for public debate, opening an opportunity for e-voting to reach both the United Kingdom and the independent Republic of Ireland.

Why the future of democracy should embrace e-voting

Source: www.tmglobalist.org

What may be perceived as novel or foreign to an older generation could be the norm for the younger ones. They grew up around technology and it is their expectation that just about everything can be completed online in some way. They expect to use their smartphones and tablets to connect to the world. They expect to interact with the rest of the world in a digital way. Given this, they can view more traditional paper ballots for elections as an archaic and outdated practice, one that they may not wish to participate in because of this perception.

In the future, Government agencies should embrace having more technology involved in the electoral process, in order to engage the younger voters, stirring up their interest in politics today so that they will continue to be involved for years to come.

Indeed, this is why the Rock the Vote movement of the 1990s has suddenly received new life in 2014. The original movement played an integral role in the 1992 general election in the United States and it was through this targeted engagement of younger people that Bill Clinton was elected President of the United States. Voter turnout among those aged 18-24 dramatically increased during that period, voting overwhelmingly for Clinton. Indeed, it is similarly through technology, pop culture and the engagement with young people that current President Barack Obama got elected to office.

Leading up to 2014 midterm elections in the United States, Rock the Vote will be deploying an updated strategy to improve voter turnout among younger voters. The goal of the organization is to register 1.5 million people, focusing heavily on the youth vote. They're also approaching the Latino community and approaching issues related to the voting process that affect these demographics.

Getting young people to vote has historically been a challenge and it may be more difficult than ever. Less than a quarter of those polled by Harvard University’s Institute of Politics between the ages of 18 and 29 years old said they would “definitely be voting” in the upcoming election. That needs to change and e-voting could be part of the solution. Young people have said that they either don't know or can't be bothered with absentee ballots sent through postal mail; they would much prefer a fully online solution. If polling places had e-voting machines that were connected to a central network, it would be conceivable for these young voters to cast their ballot from anywhere in the country. The terminal would simply bring up their local information. That's just one possibility.

Considering that an increasingly number of less developed countries around the world—like India, Namibia and Nigeria—are embracing technology in some form or another for their elections and how this is actively engaging the youth demographic and getting them much more interested in the politics of their area, more developed and established countries like the United States need to catch up. They need to bring e-voting to the forefront and capture the interest of younger voters who have become increasingly disinterested and disenchanted with the democratic process.

E-voting, in one form or another, can help shape the future of democracy. 

Remote voting civil initiative in Slovakia needs 50k signatures

 

When discussing the technology involved in running an election, most conversations turn to voting machines, for example, or they may talk about the infrastructure involved in recording, tallying and transmitting the ballots as part of an election. By large, the vast majority of ballots cast in an election are done in person in some form or another, but it is just as important to consider the voting rights of citizens who are unable to make a physical appearance at an official polling place on Election Day. And this was a hot topic issue leading up to the presidential elections in Slovakia earlier this year.

After no candidate was able to secure a majority in the first round of voting on March 15, a second round of voting was conducted on March 29 in which Andrej Kiska defeated Robert Fico with 59.38% of the popular vote. Part of the problem with this election was that it effectively did not allow for true remote voting. The current Slovak law says that citizens without permanent residence in the country can vote, but they must be present on Election Day. There is no support for remote voting, since this cohort “still isn't numerous enough to make it worthwhile investing such an amount of money”, according to Slovakia's Interior Minister Robert Kaliňák.

To demonstrate the interest and desire of the Slovakian people in Internet voting and support for remote voting for those living abroad, a civic association of Slovaks living abroad has put together a petition. As it stands, expatriate Slovaks can vote via the postal service, but having an Internet-based system could make it easier for voters to engage and participate. The petition seeks to get at least 50,000 signatures before being delivered to the Slovak parliament.

The two main reasons cited by Kaliňák as to why Internet voting is not yet viable in Slovakia are related to cost and security risks. These are issues that have also been raised in other countries around the world, but they have also been suitably addressed by voting experts like William J. Kelleher, Ph.D. He says that most hacking jobs “are the result of human insiders abusing their positions” and not the fault of the voting technology itself.

Indeed, recent expansions in remote voting technology have already been successfully demonstrated in Australia and the Philippines. However, if the petition is able to get the 50,000 signatures it desires, this would provide a clear illustration to the Slovak government that a large contingent of the Slovak people, particularly those living and working abroad, are calling for an updated electoral system where they are better able to cast a remote vote without having to rely on a more archaic postal-based system. 

The 2014 Slovak presidential elections have come and gone, but the civil initiative of those Slovak expatriates still have several months to get the signatures they need. The goal is to collect the 50,000 signatures in 12 months, which would give them a soft deadline of January 2015.

Is Canada’s conservative government limiting online voting for selfish reasons?

Source: Google Images

It is understandable that some people can be quite sceptical about voting technology systems. They may have concerns about the security and confidentiality of such systems, but it has been proved that if the chosen technology is robust, secure and auditable you can indeed improve transparency and efficiency in your country’s electoral processes, as well as increase voter confidence and participation. E-voting can also save governments a great deal of money. However, it looks like the Conservative government in Canada could be holding back this technology for self-serving reasons.

Bill C-23, also known as the Fair Elections Act, is being proposed as part of the Conservative government's new elections act in Canada. There are several provisions included in the proposed act and one of these would make it more difficult for Elections Canada to experiment with online voting and other electronic voting technologies. With the current law, alternative voting methods can be tested as long as the chief electoral officer gains the approval of the parliamentary committees that oversee elections.

If the Fair Elections Act is approved and goes into law, however, then these tests would first need to gain the approval of both the House of Commons and the Senate. Given that the Conservative Party of Canada currently has control of the Senate, they could presumably refuse to authorize any tests for online voting that are put forth by Elections Canada.

The reason why this Act is self-serving, according to NDP Democratic Reform critic Craig Scott is that “e-voting is something [the Conservatives] know appeals to younger generations, which is not necessarily their voting cohort.”

While not always true, it is generally understood that younger demographics are the ones that are more likely to gravitate to and embrace voting technologies, while older generations are more likely to prefer more traditional methods. As it stands, older generations are also more likely to vote Conservative than their younger counterparts. If a larger number of youth voters cast their ballots, the elections could swing away from the Conservative Party.

The only way that electronic voting and online voting can move forward in Canada is if Elections Canada is granted the ability to conduct pilot projects to test out these technologies. By adding another layer of bureaucracy, one in which the Conservatives would first have to give their stamp of approval, they could be stifling progress in the country. This is particularly troublesome when you consider that members of the Senate are not elected, but are actually appointed.

Even beyond online voting and electronic voting, the Fair Elections Act proposal could also limit the ability for students to vote at the polls, because it would place more stringent restrictions on the current vouching system in Canada. The same is true for several other demographics, like minority voters and low-income families, who may not be able to qualify for traditional eligibility, but should still have every right to vote.

As it stands, Canada has already stopped any plans of an Internet voting pilot program in 2015, further impeding progress in the country to modernize its electoral system and bring it in line with current technology. If passed, the Fair Elections Act will make it more difficult than ever to evolve from the archaic manual, paper-based system for casting ballots. 

Remote voting civil initiative in Slovakia needs 50k signatures

Source: Google Images

When discussing the technology involved in running an election, most conversations turn to voting machines, for example, or they may talk about the infrastructure involved in recording, tallying and transmitting the ballots as part of an election. By large, the vast majority of ballots cast in an election are done in person in some form or another, but it is just as important to consider the voting rights of citizens who are unable to make a physical appearance at an official polling place on Election Day. And this was a hot topic issue leading up to the presidential elections in Slovakia earlier this year.

After no candidate was able to secure a majority in the first round of voting on March 15, a second round of voting was conducted on March 29 in which Andrej Kiska defeated Robert Fico with 59.38% of the popular vote. Part of the problem with this election was that it effectively did not allow for true remote voting. The current Slovak law says that citizens without permanent residence in the country can vote, but they must be present on Election Day. There is no support for remote voting, since this cohort “still isn't numerous enough to make it worthwhile investing such an amount of money”, according to Slovakia's Interior Minister Robert Kaliňák.

To demonstrate the interest and desire of the Slovakian people in Internet voting and support for remote voting for those living abroad, a civic association of Slovaks living abroad has put together a petition. As it stands, expatriate Slovaks can vote via the postal service, but having an Internet-based system could make it easier for voters to engage and participate. The petition seeks to get at least 50,000 signatures before being delivered to the Slovak parliament.

The two main reasons cited by Kaliňák as to why Internet voting is not yet viable in Slovakia are related to cost and security risks. These are issues that have also been raised in other countries around the world, but they have also been suitably addressed by voting experts like William J. Kelleher, Ph.D. He says that most hacking jobs “are the result of human insiders abusing their positions” and not the fault of the voting technology itself.

Indeed, recent expansions in remote voting technology have already been successfully demonstrated in Australia and the Philippines. However, if the petition is able to get the 50,000 signatures it desires, this would provide a clear illustration to the Slovak government that a large contingent of the Slovak people, particularly those living and working abroad, are calling for an updated electoral system where they are better able to cast a remote vote without having to rely on a more archaic postal-based system.

The 2014 Slovak presidential elections have come and gone, but the civil initiative of those Slovak expatriates still have several months to get the signatures they need. The goal is to collect the 50,000 signatures in 12 months, which would give them a soft deadline of January 2015. 

The relationship between partisanship and confidence in election system integrity

Source: Google Images

There are many factors that should come into consideration when voters evaluate their level of confidence in how elections are run. The voter should think about the voting technology being used, for instance, and whether the voting machines have been subject to appropriate pre- and post-election audits for reliability and security. The voter should also think about the infrastructure in place for ensuring that ballots are recorded accurately and tabulated without fault. However, should the results of the election have any bearing on whether the election itself was run fairly?

This notion was brought up by the Pew Center on the States in a February 2012 report titled Election Administration by the Numbers: An Analysis of Available Datasets and How to Use Them. In it, they found that political partisanship appears to have a link to voters' confidence that the ballots are being counted correctly and as intended.

More specifically, the report found data showing “that many voters have more confidence in the election system's integrity when their candidate has won.” This could have to do with the psychological effect that winning and losing may have. If their preferred candidate wins, the voter is then pleased with the election result and thus may also have positive feelings toward the election infrastructure. Conversely, if the preferred candidate loses, the voter is then displeased with the election results and may be – consciously or unconsciously – seeking reasons why the results didn't go the way they had hoped. One of these reasons, in their mind, is a possible lack of integrity in the election system.

Of course, the legitimacy of a government is inherently tied to the confidence that voters have in election results. If the electorate feels that an election is rigged or otherwise compromised, they may feel that the elected government is there unjustly. As the administrative bodies in charge of running an election should be unbiased and objective, they should have no direct connection whatsoever with the party that ends up winning the election. Even so, voter perception can be very powerful.

The Pew Center report looks specifically at the American general elections of 2004, 2006, 2008 and 2010. When George W. Bush, a Republican, won the presidency in 2004, 81.5 percent of Republicans were “very confident” that their vote was counted accurately, but this number fell to 74.2 percent in the 2008 election that saw Democrat Barack Obama win the presidency. Conversely, only 56.9 percent of Democrats were “very confident” that their vote was counted correctly in 2004, rising to 74.8 percent in the 2008 election.

Interestingly, the level of confidence in regards to the nationwide ballots as a whole was recorded as being lower by voters of both parties when compared to the confidence that the voters had in the accurate tabulation of their own votes. As an aggregate, the confidence of voters in the United States that the election as a whole was conducted fairly has hovered at around 50 percent. That's very low, especially when compared to the 89 percent of those polled in Denmark. However, the same partisan effect demonstrated on an individual voter basis also persisted on national perception.

A mere 20.7 percent of Democrats were “very confident” that votes across the country were tabulated accurately in the 2004 election, compared to 75.0 percent of Republicans. When Barack Obama won in 2008, the trend reversed: 53.9 percent of Democrats were very confident, whereas only around 30% of Republicans were very confident in the accurate counting of votes in the 2008 presidential election.

Even though partisanship should not play a role in determining how confident a voter is that ballots are being counted accurately, it is clear that political allegiances do have an impact. Perhaps a greater move toward using even more impartial third parties to administer elections is the solution to this problem, helping to elevate voter confidence with better audits and greater transparency in the electoral system. 

How to encourage innovation with e-voting technology

Source: Google Images

Technology continues to evolve and develop at a breakneck pace, quickly generating new products and services that far surpass the capabilities of previous generations. The smartphone that most people carry around with them today is more powerful than full desktop computers from only a few years ago. As such, it is of paramount importance that all facets of government similarly keep up with this quickened pace of advancement and one area in particular where this need is pressing is with electronic voting technology.

The Presidential Commission on Election Administration (EAC) produced a lengthy report titled The American VotingExperience in January 2014 where it outlined several recommendations that it had for electoral reform in the country moving forward. In its investigation into the voting process in the United States, the Commission was particularly concerned with “the impending crisis in voting technology.” Indeed, many of the voting machines currently deployed across the nation are at least a decade old. Many of these machines on the market fail to “meet the current needs of election administrators.”

A large part of this struggle has to do with the bureaucratic red tape involved with the standard-setting and certification process for voting machines. This process has become far too cumbersome, stagnating any innovation in the space and acting as a significant barrier to entry for new companies who wish to develop newer and better e-voting machines that utilize better technology and can offer many benefits.

The current crop of voting machines in the United States came about from the Help America Vote Act of 2003, transitioning the country away from punch card ballots and mechanical lever machines and toward Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) and optical scan machines. This aided in efficiency and reliability, but even these machines are now outdated.

The current certification process for new electronic voting machines is too costly and too time-consuming. As a result, the different jurisdictions across the United States have neither the time nor the money to invest in new machines. The resources simply are not there and a reformation of this process is absolutely warranted, as recommended by the Commission.

Yes, a certification process is still needed, as the e-voting machines need to adhere to certain standards for the elections that they will manage. They still need to be reliable. They still need to be secure. There needs to be measures in place to make the voting fair and unbiased in its presentation, as well as protecting the machines against hacking or tampering. However, a reformation of the process needs to open up the market for e-voting machines to companies beyond the incumbents. The certification process needs to be faster and less costly.

To this end, the Commission recommended that the setting of such standards and the management of the certification process should not be dependent on the EAC itself. Instead, it says that “either some other body within or apart from the EAC must be in charge... or the states should adapt their regulations such that federal approval is unnecessary.” By streamlining the process, greater competition is encouraged among the e-voting machine vendors and this will help to encourage better and faster innovation in the industry.

One technology that the EAC recognizes could have a significant impact on the voting experience is the ability for voters to “pre-fill” their sample ballots at home. This will speed up the voting process, thus reducing long lines and improving the overall efficiency of the electoral process. Even the use of an adapted off-the-shelf device like a tablet or computer can be worth exploring, as long as proper precautions are taken to ensure its security.

A better, more efficient, and more secure electronic voting experience can be enjoyed by voters, administrations and governments alike. It's time to revamp the certification process for these machines and move forward. 

How online voting worked with the 2014 Oscar awards

Source: Google Images

The increasingly widespread use of technology for voting systems is being witnessed not only when it comes to electing officials to varying levels of government, but also under other circumstances like electing a new student council at a school or when citizens can vote on a new referendum that directly affects their everyday lives. And even long standing organizations, like the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), are moving forward with the adoption of more advanced voting technology.

Voting for the Academy Awards, better known simply as The Oscars, has traditionally been with a conventional paper ballot, but that changed to online voting for the 85^th Academy Awards in 2013. This seemed like a genuinely good idea, as members of the Academy could then vote remotely at their leisure and the ballots could be counted almost instantaneously, the online voting system faced a number of problems, particularly with older members of the Academy who were not as familiar with technology.

It is important to note that the vast majority of the voting members are of the older generation, they were “altogether unfamiliar with the platform” and had great difficulty casting their votes. This may have had a tremendous impact on the results, but this does not mean that the idea of using e-voting or online voting is a bad idea. It simply means that a better system has to be implemented in a better way, helping to educate and train the members of the Academy in how it all works.

And indeed, considering all the complaints that it received, AMPAS rolled out an “upgraded and simplified” system for voting in the 2014 Oscar Awards. Members register for their account online and do not require a separate username and password for the voting session; for the 2013 Oscars, members had separate passwords for the registration and voting process, not to mention a complicated series of checks and balances. Changing passwords could also be done online independently, whereas members had to phone into the support system last year. The Academy also worked to improve the overall user interface to make the system easier to use.

While the aftermath of the voting session has not yet been completely revealed, it appears that online voting in the 86^th annual Academy Awards went far more smoothly than the first year of online voting. With over 6,000 voting members of the Academy, the administration of the voting process for these awards is understandably simpler than if a similar system were implemented for a larger government election, but this experience should be revealing for jurisdictions and organizations that are considering the use of online voting for their own referendums and elections.

To help aid in this transition toward the greater use of technology, particularly with online and mobile voting, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences still allows members to vote in person with a paper ballot, but most of the voting is online. This is in line with the growing movement toward fast-tracking younger applicants, providing a younger and more representative body of voting members than the older and more traditional demographic that has historically dominated the Academy and its ideological leanings.

By providing an online system as the primary method for voting, the Academy is helping to encourage greater voter turnout among its members. The Academy, as one voting member told David Gritten of The Telegraph, “is trying very hard to be fair and to be seen as fair.” This is not dissimilar from just about every government and organization in the world. 

Protecting against election fraud with biometric technology

Source: Google Images

The way that election officials verify the identity of voters varies widely from country to country, jurisdiction to jurisdiction. In some cases, voters can show any government-issued identification to receive their ballots. In other countries, an ID card may expedite the process, but isn't even necessary given some other supporting documentation or even the solemn promise of another registered voter. These kinds of systems inherently run the risk of voter fraud where a voter could potentially cast more than one vote. Technology, specifically biometric technology, can help to address this concern.

Indeed, this is the main reason why Tanzania will be adopting a biometric voter identification system for its national elections in 2015. While still in the early stages of planning, the proposal for this system calls for technology to capture the facial features of voters, in addition to fingerprints and identification documentation. This multi-factor approach is very robust and should guard against voter fraud.

In order for the biometric system to work during Election Day, voter registration will also involve the use of technology to match the facial, identification document and fingerprint data of voters. When entered into a central system, this data can then be checked by election officials when a voter comes to cast his or her vote. If the records show that a vote has already been cast, then the ballot can be denied.

As with the open nature of collaboration and transparency seen in Switzerland, Brazil and Estonia, the government in Tanzania also aims to be as open as possible regarding its introduction of biometrics in the 2015 election. The National Electoral Commission chairman said that the “whole decision was made by the government. As a result, there is no need of hiding the process from the public. Everything will be known after we complete the whole tendering procedure.”

This move toward biometric authentication in Tanzania follows in the footsteps of two other notable African countries where such technology was also used. Unfortunately, the elections in Ghana and in Kenya faced their share of issues. While they should be applauded for working to modernize its elections, the implementation of the technology was poorly executed. In Ghana, machines were stolen and documentation was set ablaze. Furthermore, the actual voting was still done manually with the results being sent via fax. This resulted in technical glitches and long delays.

However, similar biometric devices were successfully used to identify and authenticate 100% of voters in the Venezuelan presidential elections in 2012. Automation was used for the entire election, providing a greater deal of trust and transparency. The Integrated Authentication System, developed by Smartmatic, was used for the fingerprint scanning, verifying the identity against a central electoral roll.

Very successful electronic elections in countries like Brazil and the Philippines also demonstrate that the technology itself isn't to blame. Governments and providers just need to be more conscious about their implementation, ensuring that the infrastructure is suitably in place to prevent voter fraud and to allow for the smoothest and most efficient election possible.

Biometric technology can provide for far more reliable and accurate voter authentication in elections, particularly if multiple modalities are used as fail-safes against one another. By combining digital fingerprints with voter photographs and government-issued identification documentation, election officials can be far more assured of a voter's identity before allowing the citizen to cast his or her vote. It is important, as demonstrated by the experiences in Kenya and Ghana, that such technology is used with the context of a better organized and more comprehensive e-voting system as a whole. 

The importance of better election administration

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With the United States preparing for its midterm elections later on in 2014, special attention needs to be paid to improving the overall election administration in many of the counties across America. While it is certainly important to discuss the pertinent issues of the day when it comes to public and foreign policy, healthcare, education and other vital topics, the election process itself is something that must also be addressed.

Indeed, following the horrendously long lineups to vote in the 2012 Presidential election, the re-elected Barack Obama thanked “every American who participated,” but he also said that “we have to fix that” in relation to the very long lines. The democratic process needs to be expedited and it needs to be easier for citizens to cast their ballots, because long lineups and unnecessarily complicated processes can act as a significant barrier to entry. When it is difficult to vote, some citizens may simply opt out of voting altogether.

There are many challenges ahead for election administration in the United States. Scandals have plagued the electoral process, from the “butterfly ballot” scandal in 2000 to problems with lost votes, lack of availability of online voting information, problems with voter turnout, and accuracy and reliability of the posted results.

In particular, one problem that keeps coming up with American elections surrounds the issue of provisional ballots. These are ballots issued when there are questions related to the eligibility of a given voter. This could be because of inaccurate voter roll records such that the ID provided does not match what election administrators have on file. It may also relate to the voter not appearing on the electoral roll at all or the possibility that the voter's ballot has already been recorded.

Ideally, the number of provisional ballots should be kept to a minimum, because the administration of the election should be such that the records are completely accurate and up-to-date. There should be minimal conflict. However, this has been an issue in many cities and counties across the United States, as recorded on Election Day in 2012.

For example, an incredible 37 percent of the votes cast in Maricopa County in Arizona, home to Phoenix, were provisional ballots. This could indicate structural problems at the polling sites. Similarly, Denver, Colorado saw the highest rate of absentee ballots rejected in the state. Some say these were based on false claims of voter fraud, particularly against Latino citizens. In Duval and Hillsborough counties in Florida, a large number of provisional ballots were cast and many voters were removed from electoral rolls. A similar problem, possibly related to race, was observed in Pasquotank County in North Carolina, where students at a historically black university saw a high number of absentee ballots rejected.

All of these types of problems are rooted in the administration of the election and they are indicative of an electoral system that needs help. These issues can be addressed through the use of technology and greater automation, but the administration must first recognize the magnitude of these problems and work toward suitable solutions. Yes, you have to fix that. 

The role of technology in 2014 elections

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Democracy will once again be a very powerful force in 2014 with elections directly impacting forty-two percent of the world's population. Citizens in some forty countries around the globe will be heading to the polls to vote in 16 presidential elections, 26 legislative elections and four referendums, exercising their right to choose who governs them. This includes elections in such countries as Costa Rica, Slovakia, Afghanistan, Panama, Colombia, Fiji, Tonga and New Zealand, as well as the legislative election for the European Union.

While many of these elections will involve traditional pen-and-paper ballots, technology will also continue to play an increasingly important role in the world's democracies.

Indeed, technology can be leveraged to help combat political apathy. One such example is Brazil, a country that has had a long history with e-voting technology and should be continuing with that tradition in its presidential and legislative election in October. Further to this end, government-sanctioned “hackathons” are being organized wherein computer programmers and software developers can get together to collaborate on how to improve public services and communities. The use of openly available public data facilitates greater transparency and better voter engagement, above and beyond the ease of access that e-voting can provide.

Switzerland has several “popular initiatives” in February, including ones related a rail network, health coverage and mass immigration. To best capture the will of the people in the most efficient manner possible, Switzerland is set to use Internet voting as its primary vehicle. Indeed, 90% of Swiss voters cast their ballot online. This has been very effective in increasing accessibility.

Indonesia's third direct presidential election is scheduled for July 9 and it will elect a new president for a five-year term. Incumbent president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono is barred from seeking a third term. Indonesia has been working on increasing automation in its elections and a new e-voting system should be implemented in this year's elections. The system will be based on electronic identity cards (e-KTP) issued to eligible voters. They have already been distributed in the districts of Padang, Denpasar, Jembrana, Yogyakarta, Cilegon and Makassar. This includes the populous areas of Bali, Java and West Sumatra.

If the 2012 provincial and municipal elections are any indication, the May 2014 Belgian federal election could also involve e-voting technology. Over 17,000 voting machines were used by three million voters in 155 cities in 2012. Belgium has committed to a contract with Smartmatic to automate its elections until at least 2026.

Leading up to the European Parliamentary election in May, a website was erected that allows Europeans to “decide who YOU want to vote for.” Dubbed Debating Europe, the website focuses on Vote 2014, the “first ever pan-European online e-vote.” The voting here is based on political ideologies and the result can “act as a high-profile barometer of voting intentions.” Some of the 28 member states of the EU may also implement varying forms of automation and e-voting technology.

The United States will be holding its midterm elections in the early part of November. As has been the case in the past, the American elections will be incredibly complex. Many different mechanisms can and will be used, as the decisions are made by the local authorities in each state. Some will use traditional paper ballots marked by each voter, but these ballots may be tabulated by a machine rather than by a human volunteer. Other states may use direct-recording electronic voting machines (DRE), some with a voter verifiable paper trail and others without.  

This year will be a busy one for voters and governments all around the world, from Central America to the European Union, the nations of Africa to elections in Southeast Asia. Following the examples set in countries like Belgium, Estonia and the Philippines, electronic voting technology will continue to gain in popularity and adoption for all the world's elections. 

Remote voting growing in the Philippines and Australia

Source: Google images

Voting technology can offer a number of potential benefits over a traditional, paper-based election: it can be used by voters to cast their ballots, and can also to expedite the vote counting process so the results of the election can be reported faster and with a greater level of accuracy. Remote voting is another area where e-voting shows a great advantage since it allows the inclusion of the electorate that has migrated from its nation or is located in hard to reach zones.

When a citizen lives in a major city, he or she is usually in relatively close proximity to the voting place for municipal, district or national elections, but this may not be the case for residents who live in rural areas. Absentee ballots are one way to handle this, but when it comes to overseas citizens, there are other challenges to overcome. E-voting technology can help to address some of these issues surrounding remote voting.

A great demonstration of the technology was recently witnessed in the 2013 midterm elections in the Philippines. In a mere ten hours, over 766 million votes were cast in the Philippines to elect over 18,000 local and national officials. Of these, several thousand citizens were able to participate in the May elections remotely from the different precincts, facilitated by the use of electronic voting technology.

The Philippine Commission on Elections (Comelec) recently won the Accessibility Award at the International Electoral Awards in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The International Centre for Parliamentary Studies (ICPS) recognized Comelec's efforts in making the election as accessible as possible to a range of voters, including those with disabilities. They were particularly impressed with how the election handled overseas absentee voters with the precinct count optical scan (PCOS) machines deployed in major international locations, like Hong Kong and Singapore, where there are large concentrations of Filipino workers.

With the aid of electronic voting technology, remote ballots can be more easily cast and counted more quickly than ever before.

Elections in Australia, where there can be substantial segments of the population that live in more remote and rural areas, are moving in a similar direction. The government of New South Wales (NSW) is investing $3.6 million on iVote, the voting system it will be using for the 2015 state general election. This is an expansion on the system that was already used in the 2011 general election, utilized by over 46,800 voters representing approximately one percent of all ballots cast. This number is expected to increase to 100,000 in 2015.

One of the advantages to the growth of iVote relates to accessibility for remote votes to be cast by citizens who live more than 20 kilometres away from a polling booth, including those away from the state on the day of the election. “Postal voting is becoming increasingly problematic as an effective channel for remote voters,” said the NSW Electoral Commission in an official statement. “It can be expected that in the not too distant future, reduced postal service delivery schedules will challenge the feasibility of completing postal vote application, ballot distribution and return within election timetables to the point where, for many electors, postal voting ceases to be a viable voting channel.”

The iVote system will also allow citizens with vision or physical impairments to more easily cast their votes over the phone or via a computer, rather than having to make the physical journey to a voting place or completing an absentee ballot through the mail.

E-voting technology and economies of scale

Source: Google Images

There are numerable benefits to the adoption and expansion of electronic voting technology for a range of governmental and organizational elections. For instance, the electronic ballots can inherently be more accessible to people with physical disabilities or limitations, because the voting machine can be setup to accommodate such challenges. The font on the touchscreen can be increased for the visually-impaired, for instance, and having larger buttons can be easier for those who may lack the fine dexterity to mark a traditional paper ballot. Another major advantage to e-voting technology is that it can help to save tremendous amounts of money.

Indeed, this has already been demonstrated in many elections around the world. We recently wrote on the thousands of dollars saved by the Irish Medical Council when it replaced the printing of paper ballots, along with the associated postage costs, in favour of an electronic ballot instead.

That being said, it is clear that there may be significant costs in the beginning when first making the shift from a more traditional paper ballot to a fully automated election. The government or organization would need to invest in the appropriate DRE voting machines, for example, and the appropriate software and infrastructure to handle such an election. A single DRE machine back in 2005, according to the State of Texas Elections Division, “costs between $2,500 and $3,500 and represents a major economic investment.”

It is very important to note, however, that these costs are hardly linear. There is tremendous value in adopting the electronic ballot, because the initial investment put forward by the government or organization lays the groundwork not only for the upcoming election, but also for many future elections moving forward. The acquisition of software and code is a one-time purchase and its maintenance is not related in a linear fashion to the initial investment.

What results instead is the ability to capitalize on very favourable economies of scale. As a city, district or country grows its population and gains a greater number of voters, the cost of the ballots on a per-voter basis are reduced over time. As The News Tribe's Mirza Abdul Aleem Baig put it, “the increase of the dimensions of the electoral roll doesn’t increase the price linearly.” The election becomes even more cost effective as the electorate continues to grow and mature.

Additional ballots do not necessarily cost any more money the same way that a paper ballot would in terms of printing, distribution, and tabulation, because the digital ballot can be simply displayed on a terminal screen or via some other electronic means. Having 20 copies of a document on a hard drive does not cost any more money than having just a single copy of a document.

By going with an electronic ballot, the “single” ballot can be far more flexible than its printed counterpart. A single ballot can inherently be multilingual, allowing the voter to select his or her language of choice. This is far superior to having an overly crowded single paper ballot (with the added expense of ink used) and decidedly better than printing multiple ballots in multiple languages.

Absolutely, there are initial costs and investments to be made when switching to an electronic voting paradigm, but the initial investment in hardware, code and infrastructure pays for itself in the long run with future elections and an increased need to handle a growing number of voters.