Comments on: Online Voting: A Bright Future or Inevitable Disaster? http://consideronline.org/2012/02/21/online-voting-a-bright-future-or-inevitable-disaster/ Read. Discuss. Enjoy Wed, 27 Mar 2013 15:17:47 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: Passionate http://consideronline.org/2012/02/21/online-voting-a-bright-future-or-inevitable-disaster/comment-page-1/#comment-37585 Passionate Thu, 23 Feb 2012 00:59:47 +0000 http://consideronline.org/?p=7824#comment-37585 Hello Preeta, I completely agree with Chris about your blog being a very balanced and logical perspective on the issue of online voting. I thoroughly enjoyed reading your blog and look forward to reading more blogs which have similar intellectual clarity as well as realistic analysis. Hello Preeta, I completely agree with Chris about your blog being a very balanced and logical perspective on the issue of online voting. I thoroughly enjoyed reading your blog and look forward to reading more blogs which have similar intellectual clarity as well as realistic analysis.

]]> By: Christopher Camp http://consideronline.org/2012/02/21/online-voting-a-bright-future-or-inevitable-disaster/comment-page-1/#comment-37544 Christopher Camp Tue, 21 Feb 2012 22:09:25 +0000 http://consideronline.org/?p=7824#comment-37544 Preeta - this is a balanced post on a highly contentious subject. Elections are vitally important, especially at this time of national and international challenges. Given this as our starting point it's important to remember that our current election systems are badly in need of repair. At present we're losing 10M+ votes each election due to problems of voter registration, voter convenience, vote by mail, machine error, etc... 10M+ votes is unconscionable when margins of victory can measure 537 (as they did in the presidential election in Florida in 2000). These troubling problems were well documented in the immediate aftermath of 2000 and for the most part, despite spending billions of federal dollars through the Help America Vote Act, they persist. Solutions to many of these problems exist but have not been implemented at scale. For those who believe that our democracy is a cornerstone to a well-functioning society this pace of change has been deeply frustrating. It is in this context that we must weigh the value of internet voting. Concerns about privacy and security are entirely legitimate and must be fully addressed. Internet voting is a technical challenge of the first order and it will take considerable investments of time and money to overcome these substantial hurdles. But perhaps this is a task worth doing. Given the right mix of innovation and determination we could create a secure internet voting system. Yet, at this time there are no major research efforts in this area, the climate has become so toxic and so barren of funding that few are willing to expend their energies on solving the internet voting problem. That's unfortunate. Restart Democracy is working to turn the tide - not as an unalloyed advocate for immediate internet voting, but as a proponent of a long term research project on the viability and value of secure internet voting. Reasoned and pragmatic perspectives like yours are surprisingly scarce and very refreshing. Best, Chris Preeta – this is a balanced post on a highly contentious subject. Elections are vitally important, especially at this time of national and international challenges. Given this as our starting point it’s important to remember that our current election systems are badly in need of repair. At present we’re losing 10M+ votes each election due to problems of voter registration, voter convenience, vote by mail, machine error, etc… 10M+ votes is unconscionable when margins of victory can measure 537 (as they did in the presidential election in Florida in 2000). These troubling problems were well documented in the immediate aftermath of 2000 and for the most part, despite spending billions of federal dollars through the Help America Vote Act, they persist.

Solutions to many of these problems exist but have not been implemented at scale. For those who believe that our democracy is a cornerstone to a well-functioning society this pace of change has been deeply frustrating.

It is in this context that we must weigh the value of internet voting. Concerns about privacy and security are entirely legitimate and must be fully addressed. Internet voting is a technical challenge of the first order and it will take considerable investments of time and money to overcome these substantial hurdles. But perhaps this is a task worth doing.

Given the right mix of innovation and determination we could create a secure internet voting system. Yet, at this time there are no major research efforts in this area, the climate has become so toxic and so barren of funding that few are willing to expend their energies on solving the internet voting problem. That’s unfortunate.

Restart Democracy is working to turn the tide – not as an unalloyed advocate for immediate internet voting, but as a proponent of a long term research project on the viability and value of secure internet voting. Reasoned and pragmatic perspectives like yours are surprisingly scarce and very refreshing.

Best,
Chris

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