Mon
Nov 13 2006
10:51 pm
verified voting
By: rikki

Someone told me Pilot Light had no cover on election night if you voted, but charged $20 if not. I suspect they used the honor system, but I was wondering how you could prove you voted. We don't purple our fingers in America.

It occured to me that I had tossed my voting receipt in a trash can on my way out of the polling place. Those tiny slips with the 4-digit code and a timestamp work as a receipt.

So here is my question: is it possible for the eSlate system to spit out a list of all the timestamped access codes for which it stored a ballot? If so, the list could be posted on the walls of the polling place or on the Internet or at the courthouse or all three. Voters could verify that their receipt is on the list and know their vote was counted.

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R. Neal's picture

Rikki, there doesn't seem to

Submitted by R. Neal on Tue, 2006/11/14 - 6:03pm.

Rikki, there doesn't seem to be a built-in report in the SERVO or TALLY software or in the controller internal functions to produce such a list.

But, it does appear that you can select and report specific audit records including cast voter records for a controller or voting machine using the SERVO software. However, it looks more like a data dump that would require further processing/interpretation, and the documentation isn't clear on exactly what data is printed. Also, I don't know that versions of the system these manuals apply to.

It would seem, however, that posting such a list publicly could raise privacy concerns (even though the codes are completely random and anonymous, someone would likely complain). There could also be a potential for abuse, such as someone in a position of authority collecting receipts from persons under their authority to see whether they voted or not, or people selling their votes and turning in their receipts to get paid. On the other hand, I guess either of these could occur anyway without posting a list to match them against.

Interesting idea though, as a sort of improvised voter verification to at least make sure your vote got counted.

rikki's picture

However valid those concerns

Submitted by rikki on Wed, 2006/11/15 - 1:17pm.

However valid those concerns might be, they are pre-existing. If the posted list had information about the content of the ballot, that would be a different matter. I'm imagining just a list of the timestamped codes and nothing else. And this is a completely voluntary system not intended as a formal verification process, just a way to offer voters peace of mind if they care enough check the list.

It wouldn't surprise me if the system does not generate such a report, but the critical question in terms of whether it is possible to generate one is whether stored ballots retain the access code used to initialize them. They may not.

Stepping back from the particulars of the eSlate system, this concept shows there are ways for the machine designers to prove their system's integrity without giving up proprietary secrets. I think proprietary secrets within our balloting process are a perversion. If the corporations profiting by selling these machines want our election commissions to keep their secrets, the least they can do is provide checkpoints to verify that their machines are doing what they are supposed to be doing.

spintrep's picture

purple finger scratch

Submitted by spintrep on Wed, 2006/11/15 - 9:02pm.

rikki on:
this concept shows there are ways for the machine designers to prove their system's integrity without giving up proprietary secrets.

glad smarter folk than me are on the case w/ all the details of these new sophisticated machines.

I see how the time stamp match could verify you were actually counted. But how do you verify the actual intended "voting result"? (still looking for that paper thru the 'window') Don't they mostly just match sign in sheet totals with basic machine totals? That seems as reliable as 'time stamped' receipt matching to me .

Tell me party officials (or anyone else) aren't privy to matching receipts with actual votes.

(and my polling place didn't explain the paper thing, I discovered I needed it in the booth by surprise. Then when I asked what to do with it on the way out, they just pointed to the ? trash basket and I yielded it. hmmm.)

R. Neal's picture

Tell me party officials (or

Submitted by R. Neal on Wed, 2006/11/15 - 9:25pm.

Tell me party officials (or anyone else) aren't privy to matching receipts with actual votes.

They are not. That's certain, at least based on the docs for the system.

rikki's picture

better if not best

Submitted by rikki on Wed, 2006/11/15 - 11:32pm.

Matching ballots to receipts would be difficult, if not impossible, but it's not the main thing to worry about. Crooked politicians are less interested in seeing your secret ballot than they are in seeing or changing a whole machine or precinct worth of results.

Making sure your ballot was accurately stored and counted is a harder issue than just knowing they saved something matching your timestamped code. I suppose you could allow people to sort through all the anonymous ballots and find their own, but that treads closer to the privacy concerns our host mentioned.

Also, what would you do if you looked up your ballot and it didn't match your memory of how you voted? You would have no proof. What we need to be guarding against is large-scale manipulations of ballots and results. A voluntary verification check makes hacking the results much more difficult, though still not impossible. Software checksums signed by poll officials along the chain of possession would also make a hacker's life exceedingly hard.

bizgrrl's picture

I say everyone "switch to

Submitted by bizgrrl on Thu, 2006/11/16 - 7:10am.

I say everyone "switch to optical-scan machines" as Sarasota County Florida will be doing. Then you have electronic voting with a paper backup the voter can verify.

spintrep's picture

TALLY SERVO !!!

Submitted by spintrep on Thu, 2006/11/16 - 1:17pm.

ok, to sum up...

i get to vote and see my selections on both the regular screen, and after I push "vote" thru the little window... (and this 'info' magically moves on in the window before the next voter steps in by the break away thread tied to my belt loop.)

RNeal troubleshoots the documentation while monitoring the software in all the internal controller processes as he audits the anonymous data stream of completely random codes.

while rikki stands over the poll workers with a new haircut to maintain the general welfare before heading to pilot light for a free beer.

with bizgrrl throwing the opti-scan switch to verify final results.

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