In case you've been living in the library recently, let me bring you up to speed: We live in some rather volatile times. Nation-states across the world are undergoing revolutionary changes, some of which are self-inspired, while others have been encouraged to start the process of regime change by other, larger neighbors.
At the same time, electronic voting machines have been slowly adopted by both well established democracies and relatively recent arrivals to the government-by-the-people scene. These machines aim to lower the cost of holding elections while increasing election accessibility to minorities and speakers of other languages.
Unfortunately, the track record of these machines in the United States has been mixed, at best, with political analysts and computer scientists upset about both the physical and electronic integrity of the machines.
On most e-voting machines used in the United States, votes are tabulated on an internal flash drive, similar to those found on many students' keychains. On some machines used in past elections, it was possible to hijack the results of the machine simply by swapping out flash drives for a few seconds, then replacing the original. A voter with malicious intent could have easily thrown election results without anyone knowing.
While the source code—the files that contain computer instructions in human-readable form—have largely been kept under wraps by the manufacturers of these machines, analysis of leaked copies of these files has revealed severe vulnerabilities in the software.
Although manufacturers have promised that the vulnerabilities have been addressed, internal memos released by whistleblowers make it unclear how many of these vulnerabilities are present in current versions of the software.
Problems are not limited to software. Ed Felten, professor of computer science at Princeton, recently demonstrated that it is possible to bypass the physical locks of the most common variety of e-voting machine used in the United States with a simple hotel minibar key.
While e-voting machines hold a promise of an easier voting experience for all citizens of democratic nations, these design issues have the potential to rob us all of our democratic integrity, while tricking us into believing that election results are more accurate than ever.
The remedy is simple, although one hotly protested by manufacturers: First, open the source code. Open-source projects, such as Linux, have benefited from the scrutiny of hundreds of thousands of programmers across the world. The most mature open-source programs are generally regarded to be vastly more secure than proprietary alternatives.
Second, make sure there is a paper trail, as there is with more traditional ballot systems. While many alternative systems have been proposed for accomplishing this, the simplest one is to print out a copy of the ballot, show it to the voter so that they can ensure it represents their choices, and then drop it into a secure storage box.
Of course, e-voting machines are not the only modern voting system without flaws. Other options, such as internet-based voting, have also had their problems. Here on campus, the Associated Students of Madison was forced to decommission their online voting system after the system failed to record hundreds of votes last spring.
Keaton Miller is a junior majoring in math and economics. He took a political science course once. But he might have slept through the whole thing. Let him know YOUR thoughts on our changing times by e-mailing keatonmiller@wisc.edu
