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Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

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Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#121

Post by johnchristopher »

jedieaston wrote: post #45
coolspot wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because casting votes online makes it easy to start voting market where you get perks for voting in desired direction.

I could just as easily start a system right now where I'll send you $15 to get a absentee ballot, vote how I want, and take a picture of it with some kind of unique identifier (post it note with your username on it, for example) before mailing it in. It's possible that a much lower price would even work too, since if you were going to vote my way anyway, you'd do it for free. So I only have to convince the voters on…

I have been playing with that idea, as some kind of activist political stunt but I am pretty sure my country has limitations in place to prevent/forbid the selling of vote.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#122

Post by cwkoss »

filoleg wrote: post #106
cwkoss wrote: post #87

I hope someone hacks the vote to make Mickey Mouse or some other stupid name win. Phone voting is a cybersecurity nightmare.

Why would someone need to do any "hacking", if the only thing needed to vote is name and date of birth. Someone could easily aggregate all that data and write a short python script to do all the voting on everyone else's behalf. Not advocating for anyone to do so, as this is extremely illegal, but imo whoever signed off on this kind of online voting system is an even bigger criminal in my eyes. EDIT: upon reading fur…

Under US law 'unauthorized access of a computer system' is hacking, so writing someone elses name and DOB would qualify as 'hacking' in the legal sense.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#123

Post by alistairSH »

JumpCrisscross wrote: post #81
legitster wrote: post #33

I want to point out that voting in Washington state is incredibly easy. They mail you a ballot, and a packet with detailed information on every single candidate and issue, and then you can drop your ballot just about anywhere - supermarket, mailbox, probably the street (who knows). It's probably the best voting system, hands down. I don't buy that a smartphone magically hits some convenience threshold that turns out…

> It's probably the best voting system, hands down. The disadvantage to this system is the erosion of the secret ballot. Someone ( e.g. an employer, spouse or friend) can now ask you for proof of your vote. (I think absentee ballots should be voidable in person.)

I'm missing something... how does mailing your vote allow somebody to demand that vote be exposed? If my employer asks me how or if I voted in VA (in-person paper), I tell him to fuck off. If my employer asks me how or if I voted in WA (mail-in paper), I tell him to fuck off.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#124

Post by JumpCrisscross »

jimmaswell wrote: post #116
venantius wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this sounds like the opinion of someone who has spent literally zero time investigating how universal the consensus is among voting security professionals about how paper is still the best, most reliable, most secure technology with which to run elections.

In-person voter fraud isn't that difficult, and especially in Washington people get packets in the mail they can vote with by returning in the mail which would be pretty easy for someone to go swiping from mailboxes. Verifying identity online is not an impossible challenge and we can't just avoid improving anything forever.

> In-person voter fraud isn't that difficult

It’s difficult to scale without getting caught.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#125

Post by Spivak »

will4274 wrote: post #110
Spivak wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean it would work for me. I typically vote by mail but if my phone popped a notification that was like "It's election day!" and let me vote it would be done less than 5m after the ping.

How can you vote in less than 5 minutes? For president, sure, but state elections have dozens of people you've never heard of and non-partisan positions and ballot issues. It's only really possible to vote in less than 5 minutes if you're obsessed with state politics or if you're letting somebody else's thinking (either a newspaper or state party) substitute for your own. I think I'd rather you didn't vote.

I mean am I not allowed to follow the judgement or organizations I trust: namely the ACLU, the League of Women Voters, the local Democratic Party, (and some other local ones but it would give away where I'm from).

It seems presumptuous that I, a software dev who has no serious connection to the statehouse, could do better.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#126

Post by Biganon »

alistairSH wrote: post #123
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's probably the best voting system, hands down. The disadvantage to this system is the erosion of the secret ballot. Someone ( e.g. an employer, spouse or friend) can now ask you for proof of your vote. (I think absentee ballots should be voidable in person.)

I'm missing something... how does mailing your vote allow somebody to demand that vote be exposed? If my employer asks me how or if I voted in VA (in-person paper), I tell him to fuck off. If my employer asks me how or if I voted in WA (mail-in paper), I tell him to fuck off.

An abusive wife can force her husband to vote for X and mail the envelope in front of her. She couldn't do that if the husband was voting alone in a booth.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#127

Post by filoleg »

cwkoss wrote: post #122
filoleg wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would someone need to do any "hacking", if the only thing needed to vote is name and date of birth. Someone could easily aggregate all that data and write a short python script to do all the voting on everyone else's behalf. Not advocating for anyone to do so, as this is extremely illegal, but imo whoever signed off on this kind of online voting system is an even bigger criminal in my eyes. EDIT: upon reading fur…

Under US law 'unauthorized access of a computer system' is hacking, so writing someone elses name and DOB would qualify as 'hacking' in the legal sense.

My bad, I guess I misunderstood what you were saying.

I was just trying to make a point that there is no usual "evil hackers trying to break into our systems" kind of situation. It's like stealing someone's car by simply entering the wide open door and turning the keys someone left in the ignition.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#128

Post by Spivak »

legitster wrote: post #52
Spivak wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean it would work for me. I typically vote by mail but if my phone popped a notification that was like "It's election day!" and let me vote it would be done less than 5m after the ping.

Voting without the information packet seems mind boggling to me. But then I realize that's how 99% of the world votes and I understand so much more now.

I have zero idea what you're talking about. I have never in my life received in informational packet along with my ballot. Like there's a short short summary of ballot issues but nothing about any of the candidates.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#129

Post by specialist »

Ill_ban_myself wrote: post #113
specialist wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh boy. Thanks for links. I know, and have occasionally crossed swords with, most of the players mentioned. Our conservation districts fund their own elections. They don't have the budget to pay to be on the normal ballot. The only fix would be for state government to appropriate the money. People like Toby Nixon have floated this reform at various times the last 20 years. Otherwise, there's no push. Current WA SOS W…

I hope by the length of my next sentence I'll be worthy of some small part of the praise you're giving the Seattle Times here :-) It seems to me that the only difference between an exit poll and a voluntary disclosure checkbox which, if utilized by a statistically significant portion of the electorate, could be leveraged by official government commissions to audit election results where online voting is offered is th…

Forgive me, I don't know what you're advocating for here. I greatly appreciate that you're chewing on the policy, problem, tech.

For the USA, I no longer think polls are useful predictors, nor are exit polls useful audits or verification. For polling to work (be useful), like is done in Germany, requires the whole system to be designed as such.

Our gold standard is the Australian Ballot. Private voting, public counting. We weaken this system to extend the franchise, eg absentee ballots.

But the real kicker is our FPTP (winner takes all) election system. It's so brittle. The inevitable error rate intrinsic in any form of voting (casting ballots) coupled with durvergers law virtually ensures drama.

Said another way, my militant defense of the Australian Ballot, this recurring national spaz attack, would be mooted by switching to a more robust form of elections. Ranked choice and proportional representation have the most interest and support, though I prefer Approval Voting for a better balance of fairness and simplicity.

Back to your point about disclosure, if I follow you: I very much would like to see tech, POCs, research into time boxed privacy. Like maybe all election materials, including ballots, are released when an election is certified. Versus hidden and then destroyed a few weeks later. My motivation is to find other balances, equilibria, between people's privacy (and protection) against society's need for confidence in the results.

Re: Seattle-area voters to vote by smartphone in district election

#130

Post by Biganon »

Ohn0 wrote: post #103

Why is this an app? Why not web?

Today I spent quite some time looking for the mobile app created by my town to allow people to anonymously denounce street harassment and catcalling when they see it. Then I found out it's just a website, and they call that "an app" for some reason.
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