Considering the many doubts about elections using computer terminals for voting, I think this will be interesting. E-Voting ban
Germany's highest court has ruled that the use of electronic voting in the last general election was unconstitutional. However, the Karlsruhe judges said the 2005 vote was still valid as there was no evidence of errors.
September's upcoming elections looks set to see a return to the more traditional pencil and paper countrywide.
Constitutional judge Andreas Vosskuhle said that the judgment did not rule out digital voting for once and for all, but added that the equipment used four years ago did have shortcomings.
Nevertheless, Vosskuhle said there was no indication that there had been any errors. Some two million voters in five different German states submitted their ballots electronically in 2005.
Father and son opposed the technology
The use of electronic voting was challenged by a father-and-son team. Political scientist Joachim Wiesner and son, physicist Ulrich Wiesner complained that push button voting was not transparent because the voter could not see what actually happened to his vote inside the computer and was required to place "blind faith" in the technology.
In addition, the two plaintiffs argued that the results were open to manipulation.
Germany first introduced electronic voting in European elections in 1999 and first used it in parliamentary ballots in 2002, but 2005 saw the first large-scale deployment of the technology.
German hacker-cum-data-protection group Chaos Computer Club has been spearheading a campaign with the Dutch foundation Wij vertrouwen stemcomputers niet (We don't trust voting computers) to stop the further spread of electronic voting because of fears about the risk of electronic errors and the potential for abuse.
In 2008, the Dutch government decertified the use of existing paperless systems and rejected a proposal to develop a new generation of voting computers.
Good. E-voting is rife with security issues and quite difficult to ensure it is done right. E-voting machine manufactors often have a vested interest in elections and that simply can not be allowed.
"Okay, I'll have the truth with a side order of clarity." ~ Dr. Daniel Jackson.
"Reality has a well-known liberal bias." ~ Stephen Colbert
"One Drive, One Partition, the One True Path" ~ ars technica forums - warrens - on hhd partitioning schemes.
The title is something of a misnomer. The German Verfassungsgericht is not the German Supreme Court, it is the german federal constitutional court, the only one of its kind. The role of German supreme court is filled by the German administrative court, the Bundesgerichtshof (federal court) and the german constitutional court together.
Whoever says "education does not matter" can try ignorance
------------
A decision must be made in the life of every nation at the very moment when the grasp of the enemy is at its throat. Then, it seems that the only way to survive is to use the means of the enemy, to rest survival upon what is expedient, to look the other way. Well, the answer to that is 'survival as what'? A country isn't a rock. It's not an extension of one's self. It's what it stands for. It's what it stands for when standing for something is the most difficult! - Chief Judge Haywood
------------ My LPs
The use of E-Voting machines in 2005 was ruled unconstitutional, because you couldn't be sure if it recorded your vote correctly. If the machines, for example, print out a sheet of paper on which the vote is recorded, then it would be allowed. However, at that point you can use a paper ballot and save yourself the cost of the machine.
Xon wrote:Good. E-voting is rife with security issues and quite difficult to ensure it is done right. E-voting machine manufactors often have a vested interest in elections and that simply can not be allowed.
Xon wrote:Good. E-voting is rife with security issues and quite difficult to ensure it is done right. E-voting machine manufactors often have a vested interest in elections and that simply can not be allowed.
Maybe if you never, ever test it...
You mean like they tested the voting machines in the Florida elections in 2000 and. . .oh wait.
"It's you Americans. There's something about nipples you hate. If this were Germany, we'd be romping around naked on the stage here."
General Zod wrote:You mean like they tested the voting machines in the Florida elections in 2000 and. . .oh wait.
Hey, its not my fault if the Americans did something stupid.
It should be trivially easy to have a machine that is physically isolated from any networks (preventing hacking) and tallies votes. A simple round of QA is all that would be needed to ensure that it actually works as advertised and avoid a miscount (intentional or otherwise.)
People are more likely to miscount votes than a machine, and you can't even test them to see that they work the way they should.
Ryan Thunder wrote:
It should be trivially easy to have a machine that is physically isolated from any networks (preventing hacking) and tallies votes. A simple round of QA is all that would be needed to ensure that it actually works as advertised and avoid a miscount (intentional or otherwise.)
Except for the sheer number of times its been proven trivially easy to hack the machine's software and manipulate the results after the fact. It would take a substantial deal of independent QA to ensure that there isn't a single line of code that tells it to make minute adjustments to the voting tally that would go unnoticed by the voter as they're selecting their choices.
People are more likely to miscount votes than a machine, and you can't even test them to see that they work the way they should.
Paper records are more difficult to manipulate due to leaving better, well, paper trails. If there's a question of a miscount or a significant discrepancy, you count them again with a different group of people. It's harder to disqualify someone using electronic machines, but tighter voting regulations can fix that.
"It's you Americans. There's something about nipples you hate. If this were Germany, we'd be romping around naked on the stage here."
General Zod wrote:Except for the sheer number of times its been proven trivially easy to hack the machine's software and manipulate the results after the fact.
Ah. There are ways around that, mind, but I suppose they wouldn't be worth the trouble. Might as well just go with the paper route.
One thing they should make an absolute law of, though, is that if the ballot isn't marked how they expect at all, its tossed. That lunacy with the "voter's intent" by the Republicans during the most recent recount was ridiculous.
Ryan Thunder wrote:One thing they should make an absolute law of, though, is that if the ballot isn't marked how they expect at all, its tossed. That lunacy with the "voter's intent" by the Republicans during the most recent recount was ridiculous.
A ballot shouldn't have to be perfect as long as it's clear who or what the person was voting for. It's one thing if there were marks all over the ballot, but disqualifying someone for having a tiniest sliver in a box unshaded is ridiculous.
"It's you Americans. There's something about nipples you hate. If this were Germany, we'd be romping around naked on the stage here."
Ryan Thunder wrote:One thing they should make an absolute law of, though, is that if the ballot isn't marked how they expect at all, its tossed. That lunacy with the "voter's intent" by the Republicans during the most recent recount was ridiculous.
A ballot shouldn't have to be perfect as long as it's clear who or what the person was voting for. It's one thing if there were marks all over the ballot, but disqualifying someone for having a tiniest sliver in a box unshaded is ridiculous.
Not quite what I meant. I was thinking more of things like "both boxes checked and then one scribbled over."
Ryan Thunder wrote:One thing they should make an absolute law of, though, is that if the ballot isn't marked how they expect at all, its tossed. That lunacy with the "voter's intent" by the Republicans during the most recent recount was ridiculous.
A ballot shouldn't have to be perfect as long as it's clear who or what the person was voting for. It's one thing if there were marks all over the ballot, but disqualifying someone for having a tiniest sliver in a box unshaded is ridiculous.
Not quite what I meant. I was thinking more of things like "both boxes checked and then one scribbled over."
What's unclear about that? If you make a mistake marking the ballot, you would do that. Of course, you can counter this sort of shit with a reminder to get a fresh ballot if you fuck up.
Ryan Thunder wrote:One thing they should make an absolute law of, though, is that if the ballot isn't marked how they expect at all, its tossed. That lunacy with the "voter's intent" by the Republicans during the most recent recount was ridiculous.
A ballot shouldn't have to be perfect as long as it's clear who or what the person was voting for. It's one thing if there were marks all over the ballot, but disqualifying someone for having a tiniest sliver in a box unshaded is ridiculous.
Not quite what I meant. I was thinking more of things like "both boxes checked and then one scribbled over."
What else do you think people were haranguing Republitards for over the whole voter's intent issue?
"It's you Americans. There's something about nipples you hate. If this were Germany, we'd be romping around naked on the stage here."
Wasn't it the democrats that opened that particular can of worms down in Florida 2000?
Once you start "interpreting" what the voter might have "intended" the ice has already broken.
Anyone who fails such an elementary IQ test as crossing in the correct box or push the right button probably should not have a say in how to rule a nation.
I thought Roman candles meant they were imported. - Kelly Bundy
12 yards long, two lanes wide it's 65 tons of American pride, Canyonero! - Simpsons
Support the KKK environmental program - keep the Arctic white!
