Public trust demands open-source voting systems • Hacker News Board

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#191

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:26 PM UTC

philips wrote: post #169

yongjik wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you feel that the paper bill counter in your bank is closed source? It does not matter because it's trivial to verify. The counter says "here is a pack of one hundred ballots for candidate A," and if you're in doubt, you just count them again. While representatives from candidate A's and B's team are watching.

The difference is that I know the sum ahead of time and can object in the moment at the bank. A vote recount and/or judicially called audit can take months to resolve. This can lead to a loss in confidence in the outcome and for political shenanigans (e.g. Bush v. Gore). I feel far more confident in a system where the software is open source because it increases trust for free. As a citizen having the software be ope…

[deleted]

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#192

Post by xboxnolifes » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:30 PM UTC

hannofcart wrote: post #57

bkummel wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True! In The Netherlands, where I live, we still vote on paper ballots. The ballots are counted by hand. The counting is public, anyone can go and observe the counting.

This is in no way intended to be disparaging: there are processes that work within the scale of small European nations that simply won't at larger scales.

This doesn't make sense. In the same way that police, firefighters, ambulance, farmers, etc, can scale to any country population, so can ballot counting.

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#193

Post by okanat » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:30 PM UTC

estimator7292 wrote: post #91

teddyh wrote: post #13

No. Public trust demands no software or programmable hardware in the election process. • Why Electronic Voting is a BAD Idea https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3_0x6oaDmI > • Why Electronic Voting Is Still A Bad Idea https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkH2r-sNjQs >

Aren't most paper ballots processed by machine anyway? Every ballot I've ever cast has gone through something akin to a Scantron machine. The cost of human labor to count all ballots by hand will be enormous. Probably worth it I suppose, but this really is something that should be primarily automated. But again, trust in software. Sigh, why can't we just have nice things?

The cost of human labor? Maybe US-exceptionalism is peeking through?

In actually democratic countries the elections are done on holidays(Sunday) and the polling stations are in where you live.

It is your vote you silly. It is your democratic duty, right and responsibility to guard it if you don't trust the observers by becoming one. Everybody should be able to watch the process and the count!

Losing one day of revenue would not hurt. Especially on a holiday.

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#194

Post by themafia » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:30 PM UTC

okanat wrote: post #186

themafia wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Candidates drop out, die, or become ineligible in all kinds of ways. Paper is not strictly better and can create costs and complications on the day of the election itself. Electronic voting is fine. Why can't we just have a printer in the polling booth? I run my ballot, then hit print, then I can manually verify it, and then drop the printed ballot in a box. Literally the easiest thing to do.

If there is a most HN comment award, this comment must get it. Congrats you invented the most expensive pen / stamp!

[flagged]

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#195

Post by didibus » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:33 PM UTC

tadfisher wrote: post #163

didibus wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Cryptocurrencies don't need to do things like make sure that no human gets more than one vote That's pretty much the problem they were designed to solve no? It's called the double spend problem, and it's crypto's big comp-sci innovation. The whole paper was about it.

The secret ballot requirement foils this. Transaction identities are well-known and public; voter identities are secret and unverifiable. Any attempt to link ballots with identities to prevent double-voting also reveals how someone voted.

Crypto identities are anonymous. I don't see the issue?

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#196

Post by okanat » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:38 PM UTC

themafia wrote: post #194

okanat wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there is a most HN comment award, this comment must get it. Congrats you invented the most expensive pen / stamp!

[flagged]

You still have to securely distribute those machines. All of the things still apply. Actually you need even more security!

Printing paper is cheap. Shipping it is cheap. Checking it is cheap and obvious. Reprinting is cheap. You don't even need to ship them. Most of the cities are close to industrial areas which has big printers and paper mills.

Making stamps or buying pens is cheap. You validate ballots at the polling stations which is scalable and cheap. It is the members of public who validate it. You don't need to pay most of them. They are just local constituents! It is their vote!

You are not aware how far away you are from the point!

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#197

Post by constantcrying » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:41 PM UTC

American elections just seem totally absurd.

Here in Germany every single vote is on paper and is counted publicly, where any citizen has the right to observe the counting process. There is a list of all people eligible to vote at a certain voting location, where all voters are crossed out when they come to vote. While errors of course happen, I have absolutely no doubt that the results are free from intentional interference and that the only people voting are those who are eligible to vote.

The idea that my vote is digitally recorded seems absurd. And I do believe that the consistent distrust of Americans in the integrity of their elections is caused by the design of the voting system. There just seem to be so many completely unaddressed flaws. Open sourcing only addresses some part of the flaws and I do not think that electronic voting should ever be trusted.

Trust in a democracy starts with trust in elections, which I do not think can be reasonably provided by electronic voting mechanisms.

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#198

Post by Areibman » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:42 PM UTC

abdullahkhalids wrote: post #72

Areibman wrote: post #26

From a process perspective, how can a constituent know with absolute certainty that their vote was counted, every voter in the system was legal, and the final tally was authentic? Especially when there's no way to even audit what you voted for after the fact? Every time I try to get to the bottom of this, it always boils down to "trust the system" which makes me uneasy.

Each polling station should have representatives from multiple parties as well as independent observers. > how can a constituent know with absolute certainty that their vote was counted The representative of your party plus independent observer said all votes at your polling station were counted. You know both those community members and know them to be generally honorable. Ergo your vote was counted. > every voter i…

To rephrase: "You should trust political volunteers."

Surely we could do better? Testimony doesn't assuage my concerns that the process may not be tamper proof.

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#199

Post by n8cpdx » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:42 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #131

n8cpdx wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The US doesn’t have a national ID system, so your proposal doesn’t make sense. The closest thing is social security cards but those are not photo IDs. A signed affidavit or local ID should be fine to establish identity. That can be done when signing up for mail in voting (although I personally prefer in person). Voter fraud is extremely rare under the current system.

> The US doesn’t have a national ID system, so your proposal doesn’t make sense. The closest thing is social security cards but those are not photo IDs. RealID is a national ID system (that they pushed since the 90s for no reason), and we're all issued voter IDs when we register as voters. > A signed affidavit or local ID should be fine to establish identity. I don't think you understand that people are against showi…

> we're all issued voter IDs when we register as voters.

I don’t think you know what you’re talking about. I have never been issued a voter ID at the time of registration.

> Mail-in voting allows other people to watch you as you vote, and is the opposite of voter integrity.

Or you could just vote in person which is an option even in universal vote-by-mail states.

> hypothetical gangsters to go door to door threatening to shoot people if they don't give their ballots up.

Why make up hypothetical situations and invent a problem that doesn’t exist? You can just as easily cite made up problems for any proposed solution.

High tech electronic voting schemes and voter ID schemes solve problems that literally do not exist, and frankly do a poor job at solving even those made up problems.

Re: Public trust demands open-source voting systems

#200

Post by kiitos » Tue, Oct 21, 2025, 8:43 PM UTC

didibus wrote: post #155

ItsHarper wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cryptocurrencies don't need to do things like make sure that no human gets more than one vote, only humans (no bots) from a specific part of the world get a vote, and keep votes secret. Blockchain is not the solution.

> Cryptocurrencies don't need to do things like make sure that no human gets more than one vote That's pretty much the problem they were designed to solve no? It's called the double spend problem, and it's crypto's big comp-sci innovation. The whole paper was about it.

keypair != human