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 candidates need to focus on first-time voters

Source: conscienhealth.org

Most people have a tendency to be loyal and to gravitate toward what is comfortable and familiar. If a person has a Honda as his first car, he is more likely to purchase another Honda as his next car than someone who had a Ford as his first car instead. It's not that Honda is necessarily any better or worse than Ford; it's that this person already has a good idea of what to expect from a Honda and already has some grasp on its strengths and weaknesses. This psychological concept can be seen from a commercial perspective when it comes to buying certain brands or preferring certain products, but it also plays a very critical role in the world of politics.

A good number of political candidates may gravitate their attention toward their core demographic, but the electorate will continue to age and it is arguably even more important to focus their efforts on the newest and next generations of voters if they hope to secure their political future. Pursuing the youth vote also means attempting to secure that first voter advantage. If a young person is voting for the first time and chooses candidate A from party X, he or she is more likely to vote for party X again in the next election.

This situation is playing out right now, leading up to the 2014 presidential elections in Indonesia in July. The Indonesian Democratic Party-Struggle (PDI-P) has clearly recognized this, as the party's presidential candidate Joko Widodo has garnered a lot of attention on social media in the country. And social media is a platform that is dominated by younger demographics. When “Jokowi” was announced as the PDI-P's presidential candidate, the hashtag #JKW4P quickly started trending locally. This would then lead to further influence on other young voters who may not have otherwise cared or paid attention to the upcoming election.

Of the 187 million people registered to vote in Indonesia, an impressive 29 percent (54 million) are under the age of 30 and an incredible 22 million – aged 17 to 21 – are voting for the first time. If the PDI-P is able to capture the hearts and minds of these 22 million voters, they would have secured 12% of the popular vote already.

In Indonesia, as well as other countries around the world, the youth movement is centred upon technology. Countless election-related apps have sprung up in Indonesia, educating the public on the importance decision they are about to make. American President Barack Obama certainly leveraged technology and social media during his 2008 campaign and the youth of Nigeria support e-voting technology. Whereas older generations may be reluctant to change, young people are embracing the power and convenience of the Internet and e-voting.

A presidential or other political candidate in nearly any part of the world must be cognisant of this shifting paradigm if they hope to stay relevant in the years and decades to follow. The parties and candidates that clearly demonstrate their dedication to social media, the Internet and advancing technology within and beyond the election cycle will be better positioned to appeal to younger generations.

And if receive that same kind of enthusiasm and dedication in return, they may just see a flood of voters buying more Hondas for years to come. 

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. 

E-voting can expand well beyond government elections

Source: Flickr

You might remember there was a trivia game show on television called 1 vs. 100 where a single contestant would be pitted against a “mob” of 100 other contestants. They would answer multiple choice trivia questions and the main contestant would continue if he got the answer correct and they would eliminate all the members of the “mob” who got the question wrong. The “mob” members would enter their choice through a small handheld device so that their selections could be instantly recorded and tabulated.

In many ways, this is not unlike how e-voting could be implemented in town meetings, board meetings and other gatherings where an instant poll among attendees could be invaluable. Traditionally, these kinds of polls would be conducted with those in favor of a motion verbally voting “yes” and those opposed verbally voting “nay” when prompted. This is hardly efficient or accurate, but electronic voting technology can be adapted to this purpose, just as the handheld devices used in 1 vs. 100 were used to quickly record the answers of the “mob” members.

While most conversations of voting technology understandably focus on how the machines and infrastructure can be best utilized in government elections for new members of parliament or a new president for a country, they can also be used under other scenarios. Online voting was utilized for the 2014 Academy Awards, for instance. With in-person e-voting, the system could be even more streamlined and easy to implement. It could be anonymous or the individual votes by the individual members could be recorded for public scrutiny.

This is an idea being proposed for the town of Eastham. Located in the Cape Cod area of Massachusetts in the United States, Eastham voters are deciding whether or not to adopt electronic keypads for voting in their town meetings. The simple devices, which are similar to TV remotes in outward design, would be distributed among those in attendance at the team meetings. When a vote is held, attendees would push the corresponding buttons on their handheld electronic voting devices and the ballots could be recorded and tabulated in mere moments.

Counting paper ballots manually is very time-consuming and voice-based votes can be inaccurate and they do not allow for the anonymity of a secret ballot. Online voting could not only save a tremendous amount of time, but it could also improve accuracy, save money, and better protect the privacy of the vote. Hand counting the ballots in a recent secret vote took about an hour, according to Eastham town meeting moderator David Schropfer.

The cost to rent the necessary equipment ranges from $10,000 for a small meeting up to $50,000 for a larger town meeting involving 2,000 voting attendees.

But online voting isn't just restricted to large elections and town meetings either. Washington County in New York State is also considering the implementation of voting technology for its county board meetings. The current system calls for a verbal vote from the Washington County supervisors in the same specified order, getting each individual to voice his or her vote into a microphone. The same person always votes first and the same person always votes last. This can understandably have an impact on the results, as those voting later in the order may be influenced by those who voted before them. And the results could already be determined well before reaching voters further down the list. An online voting system would suitably address all of these concerns and at a minimal cost.

Students vote via cellphone and laptop in Namibia school elections

Source: Googel Images

The traditional paper and pencil elections, which has been used all over the world to elect presidents, parliaments, or student councils are slowly changing.

One of the more notable examples of late has to do with the Polytechnic of Namibia. At that tertiary educational institution, students have been given the opportunity to utilize a cell phone and laptop-based voting system. More specifically, the tests were conducted with a mobile election system developed by AdaptIT. This provides a far superior level of flexibility for the students, because they are not bound to specific voting locations at specific times of the day.

Instead, according to Polytechnic of Namibia computer services department manager Juanita Frans, students were “afforded the luxury of casting their votes via cell phones or laptops, from wherever they were and at any time during the stated election period.”

When a traditional paper ballot-based election is held at any other school, students would normally need to take time away from class and other educational activities in order to cast their ballots. This takes away from valuable school time that could otherwise be spent. With the mobile election system, students can easily cast their ballots from home, during a meal break, or just about anywhere else. Unsurprisingly, the young people are very much embracing technology in elections as technology is increasingly becoming a part of everyday life for youth all around the world.

Perhaps even more notably, because an e-voting system was used where ballots were cast electronically, the tabulation of the votes was far more expedient. We should mention Accuracy. People make mistakes, computers don´t.

Also, manual counting implies somebody interpreting what the voter marked. It is not always obvious. When elections are electronic, no interpretation is needed. The intent of the voter is recorded directly. In fact, the results were available immediately after the election period officially closed. By contrast, the physical counting of paper ballots in the same election the previous year took several days to complete and this was with the electoral committee and the various staff members working through the night to complete the process. Instant results are naturally far preferable to waiting for days to get the results, not to mention the added expense and use of time by staff to tabulate the votes with paper ballots.

During the three and a half-day voting period, a total of 2,600 students at the Polytechnic of Namibia were able to cast their votes via the mobile system. This system can be similarly used at other institutions for any kind of election. Adapt IT's Amanda Lubbe says that the results “are updated immediately and displayed in a dashboard format” too.

Some have said that online voting may not necessarily increase voter turnout in general elections, but the overall use of electronic voting technology is continuing to grow through 2014 and beyond.  The youth of today embrace technology, particularly mobile and online technology, and this “beta test” in Namibia clearly illustrates the many benefits of using such a system. As schools move toward having more online resources, as well as the use of technology like sending exam results to students directly via SMS or through an online portal (as the Polytechnic of Namibia has been doing since 2006), the same evolution and transition should be made with student elections as well. 

Voting technology to modernize Parliament elections

Source: Google Images

Discussion on the use of electronic voting technology is usually in the context of the population at large heading to the polls in order to elect government officials. In 2014, technology will play an increasingly integral role in many elections around the world, including Brazil, Indonesia, Belgium and the United States. However, e-voting technology should not be restricted solely to the realm of public elections. The technology can be effectively adapted and used in all sorts of scenarios, even with government itself.

In a recent article in the Canadian magazine Maclean's, political expert Aaron Wherry asks why the elected Members of Parliament (MPs) do not vote electronically. This is a notion that was put forth by the McGrath committee in its second report (PDF link), stating that the current system of manual voting on the individual bills, amendments, clauses and other acts of government is a poor use of time and resources.

Under the current system, each individual Member of Parliament stands in turn to orally declare his or her vote on a particular motion. In order for the vote to count, the clerks have to read out each of their names. What this means is that a lot of time has to be spent, as each vote is read aloud individually and is cast individually.

If e-voting technology were to be adopted in the House of Commons, then the Members could simply cast their votes from their seats in the House. This could be done via a mobile application on their phones, through a secure terminal at their seat, or via any number of other possibilities. This way, all the votes can be cast within a few minutes and the results can not only be tabulated instantly by a computer, but they can be publicly displayed just as quickly.

This saves a lot of time, which should help to make governments more effective and efficient in doing the work that needs to be done. E-voting can also have an additional benefit.

With the current system of standing up and publicly declaring the vote, the Member is held individually accountable for his or her vote. There is value in that, but it also means that the Member will also feel a great deal of pressure to vote the same way as the rest of his or her party, even if he or she disagrees with that particular vote. Party politics play too large of a role.

James McGrath says that it is “awfully difficult to stand up and vote against your party knowing you’ve got the whip breathing down your neck.” Patrick Boyer, a former MP with the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada agrees: “I think electronic voting could overcome some of the institutional weight that is suppressing a lot of MPs. They talk about free votes in Parliament. Well, the real way to make that happen is to bring in electronic voting.”

If private e-voting technology is implemented, the true opinion and view of the Member of Parliament can be better reflected, as he or she won't feel the same kind of pressure to vote the same way as the rest of the party. A more accurate representation of the will of the people, by way of the voting of the Members, can be reflected. Even so, if this notion is a problem, the individual votes of Members can still be accurately recorded and open to public scrutiny if needed.

Government needs to continually modernize in order to best serve the needs of the people. 

The role of technology in 2014 elections

Source: Google Images

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. 

Thailand to hold early elections in a bid to defuse tension

Tumultous is one word that has often been used to describe Thailand’s political landscape. To most observers, the Asian country has indeed experienced one too many upheavals for comfort. Subjected to the absolute rule of kings for centuries, Thailand became a constitutional monarchy in 1932 when the country’s elite staged a “democratic revolution.”

Yet the change in the form of government did little to quell the restiveness. Shortly thereafter, Thailand has been wracked with numerous coups, which often left the country under the rule of juntas and resulted to seventeen charter changes.

The instability came to a head last year, when anti-government forces led a series of occasionally-violent protests against Yingluck Shinawatra, the country’s first female Prime Minister and sister to exiled ex-PM Thaksin Shinawatra.

In hopes of easing the rapidly escalating tension, the Prime Minister has called for early elections on February 2. The Election Commission has said that it is ready for Election Day, where the country’s estimated 46 million voters are set to elect 480 members of the House of Representatives. 

Yet things are never that easy in this deeply-divided country. The main opposition Democrat Party has said that it will boycott the polls. The party had demanded that the PM resign ahead of the elections and that an interim government be installed to effect reforms. The same position is being noisily advocated by protesters, which had been massing in crowds of as large as 150,000 warm bodies in the almost-weekly rallies since October. 

Opponents of the Shinawatras, which mostly come from the educated middle and upper class as well as the business sector, are calling to reboot Thai society to stamp out the culture of corruption that they believe is driving away business and hampering the development of the country

Yet the appeal has fallen on deaf ears as Yingluck has already declared that the polls will proceed despite the planned boycott. Instead, she unveiled her own plan to ensure reforms which involves candidates taking an oath to call for the creation of a reform council right after being sworn into office. Her suggestion also specifies that the reform council be made up of members representing a broad spectrum of sectors at local and national levels.

Pakistan and NADRA, in the road to better elections

Source: Pulsosocial.com

With over 180 million people calling it home, Pakistan is the sixth most populated country in the world and it is the second largest Muslim democracy after Indonesia. Given such proportions, running an election for the national assembly and for its four provincial assemblies is quite the daunting task. That’s one of the main reasons Pakistan is advancing the adoption of voting technology.

Just to give an example, the most recent general election, held in May 2013 saw over 86 million registered voters cast a vote. The election was held in 272 constituencies, making for a quite the logistical challenge for NADRA (National Database and Registration Authority), the autonomous and independent institution of the Pakistani government responsible for databases and sensitive registration information.

In order for Pakistan to continue improving the quality of future elections, NADRA is slowly introducing what it calls a “foolproof” e-voting machine system. This system is designed to “control rigging in the polls.” by authenticating voters via biometrics.

The identity of the voter is automatically verified biometrically before the voter has the opportunity to cast a ballot. The system is still a work in progress and will require further refinement, but NADRA’s, Chairman Tariq Malik, says that this will prevent any “bogus voting”. The sentiment is echoed by Muhammad Daheem of the Frontier Post who writes that the new system will “eliminate the element of fake vote casting and rigging of any type in elections.”

Biometric authentication of voters is the most reliable methodology to guarantee that voter impersonation becomes a thing of the past. Technologies like the one being developed in Pakistan approach these challenges head-on, providing a “foolproof” system that verifies the identity of voters.

Under the proposal, the refined thumb impression verifying e-voting machine would be placed at all polling stations across the country of Pakistan.

A key element in this system is the voter identification card, which is then checked against the fingerprints of voters as stored in the NADRA biometric database. Following verification through the Voter Identification Unit, the voter then proceeds to the Vote Casting Unit where the relevant constituency and list of candidates is displayed. Finally, the Result Management Unit can record and tally the votes accordingly. The computer-generated report can then be reconciled against the manual counting of printed ballots as needed.

Estonia continues to innovate with new I-voting modalities

Source: emol.com

Most people likely would not name Estonia as their first choice of countries that are cutting edge, technologically advanced, but the demographic republic in the Baltic region of Northern Europe is actually one of the most forward thinking, particularly when it comes to the technology implemented in its government agencies and national voting paradigms.

While Estonia still offers a more traditional way to cast a ballot, it also has a long standing history with the adoption of Internet-based voting. It has even gone so far as to open up its “server side” source code to the public. For security reasons, the client side code remains secret and protected, but the server side is open to public scrutiny. And the Estonian population has embraced the I-voting revolution.

In the most recent parliamentary election in October of this year, over 133,000 voters cast their ballots electronically rather than using the more manual method. This represents over 20% of all the ballots cast in the election and what's even more interesting is that voters had the opportunity to vote online using their choice of no fewer than three different modalities, including one that involved mobile phones.

Measures were taken to ensure that all three of the online voting options were as secure as possible, authenticating the ballot while not necessarily connecting it directly to any individual voter. This worked in much the same way as a double-envelope method may be used with a more traditional ballot; the paper ballot is placed in an unmarked “inner” envelope, which is then placed inside of an “outer” envelope with the voter's information. A clerk can verify the outer envelope information, removing the sealed inner envelope to place it into the ballot box. For the purposes of the online ballot, a digital signature and PIN served a similar purpose.

The first of the Internet voting options involved the voter using the government-mandated ID card with its two public key infrastructure (PKI) based digital certificates. With this secure card and a card reader (available nationwide in many stores), the voter inserts the card and enters their PIN codes while on the government e-voting website and downloads and runs the voting application. They can confirm their identity with their first PIN, select their preferred candidate, and confirm the vote with their digital signature by entering the ID card's second PIN. After that, the person receives the confirmation that the vote has been registered on the system.

The second voting option involved the use of an alternative “digital ID card”, also issued by the government and used primarily for online purposes. Just as the first method, the voter navigated to the government e-voting website using the credentials and security afforded by the digital ID card and its corresponding codes.

The third and newest method of I-voting in Estonia involved a mobile phone and a PC computer. The user registered for a mobile ID by providing the government with the SIM card from their phone, along with their government-issued secure ID card. The two were linked and the user was provided with two secure PIN codes via text message. The voter then navigated to the e-voting website on a computer, entered their phone number and first PIN code, and cast the vote. The second PIN was entered on the corresponding mobile app on the phone and the ballot was then authenticated.

Another innovation tested at the October election was a verification system of I-votes, developed to detect with a device (in this opportunity only Android mobile phones or tablets) if the computer you used to vote was infected with any malware that changed the I-vote or blocked the I-voting.

While there are certainly concerns surrounding Internet voting, Estonia's comprehensive system demonstrates how it can be implemented to great success. Other countries and governments around the world may benefit from collaborating with and learning from Estonia's example.

Can e-voting solve the oversized ballot papers problem?

Source: i.usatoday.net

While most major elections around the world feature no more than five major parties, it is not unheard of for a poll exercise to have a whole slew of parties slugging it out for votes.

In Australia, for instance, a total of 46 parties have already registered for the Australian Senate election in September. If the 11 additional applicants up for consideration are approved, that would bring to 57 the number of parties on a single ballot.

Given this scenario, it’s most likely that the ballot paper will measure an incredible 1.02 meters wide or over three feet across.  This makes the supersized ballot paper quite unwieldy not only for voters, but also for election staff who must handle, pack, transport, count and secure the extra large papers.

To make matters even worse for voters, the ballots use extra small six-point type.  The Australian Electoral Commission, in fact, is even issuing magnifying sheets to help staff and voters read the text on the ballots. The oversized ballots would also take much longer to count manually, as the staff would inherently have to spend more time reading and recording each of the votes.

                                               

Aside from problems an over-sized ballot causes on Election Day, it also entails many logistical challenges as the ballots must be properly secured and transported, and requires a much larger space than regular-sized ballots.

Yet as with most problems in this modern age, there is a technological solution to this particular challenge. For instance, Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machines use voting pads which could display an infinite number of candidates, rendering supersized ballots unnecessary as voters could record their vote on a touchscreen display.   

E-voting is definitely a step towards the right direction in making elections more efficient and transparent.  Safeguards like the Voter Verified Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT), where the machine prints out a confirmation receipt, ensure that the voter’s true intent is what is recorded on the ballot. After all, transparency and accuracy can never be sacrificed for efficiency and speed. 

E-voting is not without its challenges and concerns, yet its many benefits make it increasingly attractive to election commissions all around the world. More work is needed, but e-voting can be a viable solution to the problem of supersized ballot papers in cases like this in Australia. 

Biometric authentication vs electoral fraud gains ground in Uganda

Fraud is a problem that has bedeviled election managers since the earliest times. One of the more insidious forms of electoral fraud is identity theft where a voter passes himself off as another and casts his ballots at multiple locations, effectively skewing results of the election.

Fortunately, election commissions can now tap a rapidly-developing technology called biometric authentication to combat electoral fraud.

Biometric authentication is already widely used elsewhere. Some notebook computers  are equipped with fingerprint sensors that restrict access to its rightful owners. Security-conscious facilities have also relied on fingerprint, thumbprint or iris scan biometrics to restrict comings and goings of unauthorized entities.  Airports, too, have started utilizing biometrics to heighten security.

Recently, electoral commissions have started to explore how biometric authentication can make the electoral process more transparent and credible. In Uganda, for example, President Museveni has already declared that the 2016 general election in the country will utilize thumbprint machines to identify genuine voters, eliminating the possibility of anyone stealing of votes and double-voting.

This technology will finally allow Ugandan electoral staff to move away from manually authenticating voters –an unreliable and time-consuming process  that can, at its worse, serve as enabler for fraudsters. Obviously, a digitized thumbprint, or some other form of biometric authentication, is far more difficult to forge than a analog type of identification.

In an official State House statement, Museveni said that the election commission it will “use thumbprints to authenticate voters” and warns would-be fraudsters that “if you try to steal, the machine will throw you out.”   

Although procurement details of biometric thumbprint readers are yet to be released,  the  move is already gaining wide support from both administration and opposition parties, as well as cause-oriented groups.

Many are acknowledging that  a Biometric Voters Register (BVR) is the “most credible” protection against multiple registration and multiple votes.  

Uganda hopes that this strong multi sectorial support for biometric authentication will finally pave the way for cleaner and more honest elections in the country.  

Venezuela organizes presidential election in record time

Caracas. Photo: Marcio Cabral de Moura

Venezuela is getting ready to carry out new presidential elections only six months after the reelection of Hugo Chavez. The country was forced to call its citizens to the polling stations once more after the early demise of the nation’s president last March 5th.

Having less than 40 days to organize the electoral event, Venezuela has opted to make use of the advantages that its automated voting system provides. In order to speed up the preparation processes facing this challenge, the National Electoral Council (CNE) decided to use the same electoral registry from the October 2012 election for the voting machines that will be used during this new event.

On April 14th, 39,282 voting machines will be deployed. These are equipped with a touchscreen for candidate selection, they print out a voting receipt showing the cast ballot (facilitating citizen auditing), an e-ballot and a biometric device for voter authentication, which guarantees the “one voter, one vote” premise.

The device matches each voter’s fingerprint along with their ID number and compares these data with those from its database. If they match, the voting session is activated. This system not only prevents the occurrence of deceased voters and identity theft, but it also guarantees that each voter casts his or her ballot only once. It is worth mentioning that the biometric information is stored separately from the voting information, which guarantees the right to vote secrecy.

Venezuela’s electoral system has been celebrated for its speed and reliability. According to Jimmy Carter, member of the American Commission for the Federal Electoral Reform and founder of the Carter Center, an NGO that carries out observation processes with democratic purposes, “Venezuela has the best electoral system in the world.”

Voter biometric authentication - From Ghana to Venezuela

A Ghanian voter going through the
biometric verification process (Photo:UK in Ghana Flickr)

Although in this blog we promote the adoption of voting technologies as a mean to enhance efficiency and transparency, we understand the fact that having appropriate technology is not enough to guarantee success in election administration. A trouble-free implementation of the technology is paramount to achieve legitimate results. Also, the technology to be used on election day needs to be properly audited and tested, and mechanisms to solve unforeseen problems need to be developed. 

Two drastically different experiences serve to illustrate this point: the Venezuelan presidential elections held in October 7, and the December 7 elections in Ghana. 

In Venezuela, and for the first time in the history of elections, biometric devices were used to authenticate 100% of the voters. The elections ran smoothly, voting ended on time, and the results were published only two hours after polls closed. Opposition leaders conceded the defeat immediately. The very few problems encountered by voters on election day were solved according to a well designed contingency plan.

On the other hand, on December 7, Ghana headed back to the polls for the tenth election since democracy was reestablished in 1992. Although Ghana took an important step to increase electoral efficiency and transparency by automating this part of the electoral cycle, a poor implementation of the biometric system led to important setbacks that forced officials to extend voting for an extra day. According to the Coalition of Domestic Election Observers, 18% of polling stations across Ghana had some kind of problem with the biometric devices. In those regions were problems were reported, 33% of polling stations had difficulties. An inconvenience of this magnitude gave all the right to the opposition parties that lost the elections to complain, and served as basis to support their fraud claims. Political instability followed the elections, and post electoral violence erupted in certain cities. 

A few facts explain the different outcomes that biometric authentication had of in these two countries. In first place, the Venezuelan electoral commission was executing its eleventh automated election. The experienced gathered in eight years alongside Smartmatic, helped enormously. For Ghana, this was the first automation in their short democratic history.

Another determining factor was the fact that the Venezuelan platform was thoroughly revised prior to Election Day. More than 22 audits, tests and pilots were carried out in order to guarantee that the system worked properly. Technicians from all parties involved participated. In Ghana, the biometric platform was not sufficiently revised and that is one of the main arguments used  by opposition parties to explain the fraud allegedly committed. 

Also, in Venezuela, automation covered the entire election, from end-to-end, whereas in Ghana only the authentication relies on technology. Opposition parties claiming fraud in Ghana had little or no records to sustain their allegations. Authorities must ensure to build trust in the platform by allowing everyone to audit and review the system. Ghana and Venezuela are two good examples of what to do, and what not to do when it comes to automation.

E-voting will attest its value again in 2013

Image: Everystockphoto

Guiding the world through the path of automation is no easy task. Some countries have yet to learn some hard lessons with the use of archaic manual methods. In order for the nations to finally modernize their electoral systems, they need proof that e-voting is really the way to go. Last year we saw some impressive models of the effectiveness of voting technology —and the ineptitude of manual voting—, which should be enough to convince anybody of the need for electoral automation. However, it doesn’t stop there. Here are some of the aspects where e-voting will confirm its worth once again in 2013.

Reliability

Elections like the ones we saw last year in Russia, Ghana and Zimbabwe exposed the frailty of manual voting methods. With paper ballots, voters cannot be sure that their preference will be reflected in the results of the polls. Zimbabwe has a second chance to carry out a transparent electoral event now that it will be holding presidential elections this year, but since these will be carried out with manual methods, we might as well be expecting the same dreaded results that came out from last year’s internal referendum, if not worse. The recurrence of crimes such as ballot stuffing and identity theft breaks people’s trust in their electoral institutions. E-voting eliminates these problems easily. 

Speed

Elections need their results to be released to the public immediately after the closure of polling stations. The longer the announcement of final outcomes is delayed, the more the voters are prone to suspect their fairness. The chaos that took over the elections in Honduras should serve as a cautionary tale for other countries, as the final numbers for their November 18 primary elections were not known yet by the end of that month. This failure to deliver results on time could be immediately linked with corruption, which is unacceptable. Electoral technology does not allow for these inexplicable lags, as final results can be made public a few hours after closing the election. 

Security

Bringing back the Russian example, it is incredibly easy to breach security in manual elections. The implementation of transparent ballot boxes and more than 180,000 security web cameras did nothing to prevent the blatant occurrence of carousel voting and ballot stuffing during the March 2012 presidential elections. It becomes obvious then that any effort to eradicate electoral corruption paired with the use of manual methods is destined to fail.

Auditability 

When it comes to set an example about how audits can guarantee transparency to an electoral process, no country comes better than Venezuela. During last year’s Presidential election more than 16 audits certified the correct performance of the system before and after the election: from the voting machines, electronic ballots, and the biometric voter authentication system, to the transmission and totalization of the results. 

Accuracy 

For a voting system, accuracy is essential during the phases of voting, counting and transmission of results, so that the intention of every voter is respected and taken into account. Last year, Mongolians had the chance to employ an e-voting system that promised to be fast and reliable. However, the use of the Precinct-Count Optical Scanners (PCOS) developed by Dominion registered major inconsistencies between the electronic results in some precincts and the audits carried throughout, casting doubts about the credibility of the results.

2013 brings a new set of chances for electronic voting to attest its superiority over the dated and even dangerous manual voting methods. We hope to see more nations choose to successfully automate their elections in order to preserve the reliability, speed, accuracy, auditability and security of their electoral events.