Comments on: Voting Black Boxes Bleg http://madisonian.net/2006/09/25/voting-black-boxes-bleg/ a blog about law, tech, culture, and related things Sat, 11 Feb 2012 02:59:42 -0600 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.8.4 hourly 1 By: Frank Pasquale http://madisonian.net/2006/09/25/voting-black-boxes-bleg/comment-page-1/#comment-80972 Frank Pasquale Mon, 25 Sep 2006 20:34:17 +0000 http://madisonian.net/?p=809#comment-80972 I'll post this for Michael Carrier, whose comment got caught in the spam filter: There is in fact a testing and certification process. The problem is that it is not robust. The companies complete the process in secret and refuse even to discuss it. Also of concern, the “independent” testing laboratories are chosen and paid by the vendors, with the consequence that they are “under enormous pressure to do reviews quickly, and not to find problems.” Editorial, Who Tests Voting Machines?, N.Y. TIMES, May 30, 2004, § 4, at 8. I have written about the dangers of electronic voting here: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=792324 I’ll post this for Michael Carrier, whose comment got caught in the spam filter:

There is in fact a testing and certification process. The problem is that it is not robust. The companies complete the process in secret and refuse even to discuss it. Also of concern, the “independent” testing laboratories are chosen and paid by the vendors, with the consequence that they are “under enormous pressure to do reviews quickly, and not to find problems.” Editorial, Who Tests
Voting Machines?, N.Y. TIMES, May 30, 2004, § 4, at 8.

I have written about the dangers of electronic
voting here: http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=792324

]]> By: James Grimmelmann http://madisonian.net/2006/09/25/voting-black-boxes-bleg/comment-page-1/#comment-80907 James Grimmelmann Mon, 25 Sep 2006 13:52:23 +0000 http://madisonian.net/?p=809#comment-80907 Giving a voter a receipt is technically tricky. You have to (a) give them a a receipt that doesn't actually list their votes (or they could use it to sell their vote), and (b) give them a receipt that is comprehensible enough that they trust accurately reflects their vote and isn't just a bunch of random gibberish. Doing (a) and (b) at the same time require serious cryptography; even if it's working correctly, the voter may not believe that it is. Voter-<i>verified</i> paper trails (as opposed to voter <i>receipts</i>) are a more robust solution, because the voting machine keeps the piece of paper (which can therefore show the actual names of the votes). The voter confirms that the paper correctly indicates her vote, but the ballot workers can then have a separate independent mechanism to count from in case of dispute. The answer to your question, then, is that the secrecy of the ballot booth creates some requirements for less than complete transparency. Those requirements, however, don't translate into a similar requirement that the source code of the voting machines be secret. That's just ill-advised security by obscurity. Giving a voter a receipt is technically tricky. You have to (a) give them a a receipt that doesn’t actually list their votes (or they could use it to sell their vote), and (b) give them a receipt that is comprehensible enough that they trust accurately reflects their vote and isn’t just a bunch of random gibberish. Doing (a) and (b) at the same time require serious cryptography; even if it’s working correctly, the voter may not believe that it is.

Voter-verified paper trails (as opposed to voter receipts) are a more robust solution, because the voting machine keeps the piece of paper (which can therefore show the actual names of the votes). The voter confirms that the paper correctly indicates her vote, but the ballot workers can then have a separate independent mechanism to count from in case of dispute.

The answer to your question, then, is that the secrecy of the ballot booth creates some requirements for less than complete transparency. Those requirements, however, don’t translate into a similar requirement that the source code of the voting machines be secret. That’s just ill-advised security by obscurity.

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