ELECTRONING VOTING: NECESSITY OR FICTION

Branko Dimeski, PhD1 Meri Boskoska, PhD2 Milco Prisajganec, BSc3

Mr Branko Dimeski is assistant professor at the St. Kliment Ohridski State University, Faculty of Administration and Informations Systems Management, Bitola, Republic of Macedonia
2

Ms Meri Boskoska is assistant professor at the St. Kliment Ohridski State University, Faculty of Administration and Informations Systems Management, Bitola, Republic of Macedonia
3

Mr Milco Prisajganec is a computer specialist at the St. Kliment Ohridski State University, Faculty of Administration and Informations Systems Management, Bitola, Republic of Macedonia

ABSTRACT
Electronic voting or popular stated E-voting is one of the most innovative ways for electoral voting during the presidential, parliamentary and local government elections. The concept was being searched in a literature for the recent years and primarily is based on the usage of information technology. The principal research objectives of the paper are: to search for the main advantages and disadvantages of using electronic, E-voting during an electoral campaign; conditions of implementation; basic laws or needed legislature that is of necessary importance that will permits mass and free usage implementation of electronic, E-voting; various experiences of implementation of electronic voting in different countries in the world and the expressions that exist in the literature of their successful or unsuccessful implementation. The scope of the research is covering explanation of the abovementioned objectives and will depend on the knowledge that already exists in the literature and is provided by different authors that made past research on electronic, E-voting. For the purpose of writing the paper, we employed different methodology that will be based on: content analysis of various governmental documents and research papers that are dealing the issue of electronic popular voting; comparative analysis; and during the research, the deduction aspect will be applied.

The research summarized the following results and findings: the electronic, E-voting is characterized with numerous advantages as: transparency, availability, speed, efficiency and effectiveness; the disadvantages include: communication problems, possible computer defects, insufficient political culture among the residents and political parties which is expressed in doubtful acceptance of using the electronic, E-voting and possible fraudulent behaviours that can result in revealing or abusing the electoral data during the voting process; in order for the electronic voting to be successful implemented there are a certain conditions that must be met; adopting the basic laws or needed legislation that is of necessary importance that will permit mass and free usage implementation of electronic voting; many countries in the world have already implemented electronic voting at different times as governmental projects under different titles. In some countries the system was successfully implemented while in the others it was unsuccessful.

From the research findings and results, the following principal conclusions can be derived: in recent years, electronic voting is a very popular way of processing electoral data. Besides the fact that there are numerous noted disadvantages, its advantages overcome the disadvantages; without adopting an appropriate legislation, the system of electoral voting can not be implemented in the country/countries. In other words, there must be a strong political will and personal confidence among the politicians that the electronic voting system is a way ahead better than the present way of voting and counting the votes; and finally, so far the system was implemented in many countries in the world and there were different experiences, from highly positive to highly negative. These experiences can serve as an indicator for future successful implementation of the electronic voting in many countries in the world, by adopting the positive experiences and in the same time, eliminating the negative characteristics that can happen during the introduction and the subsequent implementation of the electronic voting system.

1. INTRODUCTION
New elections are underway, we are checking our name in the voting ballot, where to go for voting, the process of personal identification, too many crowded voting places, filling the voting ballot etc On a moment it seems very complicated and very simple prescribed procedure that is present in most countries worldwide. Many analysis shows that people that did not vote have an extraordinary reasons for not voting, for example: everyday family commitments, poor weather conditions, business travels, annual vacations, visit out of the country etc. In addition, there is a strong influence that comes from the crowded voting places as well as the pressure that the voters feel before the election day and even the decreased confidence in fair and free democratic elections. In basics, the so-called concept of e-voting that will take place in this paper is internet voting of every voter by using a standardized personal computer and unique so-called digital signature. The biggest importance in describing the whole concept of e-voting is the digital signature which is expected in a very close future to become a personal characteristic of every citizen with the right to vote on the election day. Virtually, we all know that as the information technology got its scientific peak, the procedures and techniques for identification of the personal data of citizens become more technologically sophisticated. As a concept that is widely known as one of the main innovation of the usage of the information technology in the public sector, we strongly believe that there is an immense need of a legislative support in order for every citizen to be required to obtain a personal digital signature, and in that direction, there is a strong need of his implementation in the personal documents of his/her identification. In the following parts of the paper, the subject of our analysis will be the potential advantages and disadvantages, the overall conditions of implementation, legislative framework supporting the e-voting procedures and the most known examples of the practical usage of e-voting in the countries in the world that have already established a tradition of digital signature and electroning voting machines/systems. By that, we will try to answer the following question: Is electroning or popular stated e-voting a necessity or fiction in todays level of democratic system of society?

2. THE ADVANTAGES OF E-VOTING

There is a general agreement among many authors in the literature, that the potential advantages of evoting are the following: economic effects; transparency; availability; efficiency; speedy process of the available data; and voter intent;

2.1 Economic effects

Without any deep analysis, it can be stated that the e-voting is by far cheaper comparing to the classic voting. There is no need for printing the electoral ballots. A process that is very complicated and expensive. During the printing process there is a need of using a special protection paper in order to avoid a potential emergence of falsified voting ballots. The place where the voting ballots are printed, the people that are involved in the printing process and the transport of the voting material to the voting units must be maximally secured by the police forces under the conditions of rigorous security measures. The graphic design of the ballot from the technical point of view and considering the fact that the text and the logo on the ballot must be printed in different languages in order to promote clarity and to avoid potential bias to some voting groups, can be very complicated and expensive procedures. During the classic voting there is a permanent need for additional staff on the voting places to ensure more fluid of voters. In addition, there is a need of required and prescribed personal identification procedure of each voter in the voting ballot, his/her registration in the ballot before voting (by manual signature and finger print). After closing the voting place, there is a strict procedure of counting the votes, packing the voting ballots, their transport to the central election commission under highest security standards. All previously described requires lots of time, well trained personal and huge amounts of public money.

2.2 Transparency

It has been alleged by groups such as the UK-based Open Rights Group4 that a lack of testing, inadequate audit procedures, and insufficient attention given to system or process design with electronic voting leaves "elections open to error and fraud". In 2009, the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany found that when using voting machines the "verification of the result must be possible by the citizen reliably and without any specialist knowledge of the subject." The DRE Nedap-computers used till then did not fulfil that requirement. The decision did not ban electronic voting as such, but requires all essential steps in elections to be subject to public examinability.

2.3 Availability

On the election day, each voter can vote from every personal computer that is internet connected, inside or outside the country. Its enough to be fulfilled the conditions that are prescribed with the law and the voter can vote by using his/hers digital signature as his/hers personal identification code by logging to the voting internet site. Taking this into consideration, every voter, practically, can accomplish his/hers voting right from the place where he is at the moment (his home, working place, annual vacation or business travel inside or outside the country). Off course, that for a certain population groups (sick, hospitalized, prisoners, disable etc.), the concept of e-voting is very suitable in a sense that they can vote from any place, even from their homes, If they have a regular internet connection. All that enables the authorities to organize less number of voting places with less people that will be involved in the organization of the elections. As a consequence, that will cause higher percentage of people that can use their right to vote. As a result, the higher percent of turnover is in direct correlation with the higher democratic representation of the candidates, which means that, in some sense, e-voting increases the democratic and institutional capacity of the country.

2.4 Speed

In the moment when the voter votes, there is an option by which the voter by a single click on some of the candidates, can obtain a detail information about the personal and professional background of each candidate, his/hers political party, campaign, political program, and his/hers attitudes around the present and potential issues in society. All that information is of enormous help for each voter in deriving his/her decision for which candidate to vote.

2.5 Efficiency

During the process of e-voting, the voting results are counting on the so-called central basis. Their update is current during the electoral process. There is no need of manual count of the votes by the members of the election commissions (the local, regional and central), filling the necessary voting records, packaging and transporting it to the nearest voting place etc. The reports of the voting turnover and the election results are extremely accurate for every voting place and they are available in every moment. That means that they can be viewed by each voter in every moment. The final election results are available shortly after the end of the electoral race. In addition, during the electoral process, each voter can change/update his/hers voting decision many times if he/her change his/her voting decision until the end of the election process. The efficiency of e-voting can be seen from the internet voting in Estonia. During the elections, each voter had been able to visit the electoral site, to make authentication, to vote and to change several times his/her voting decision. But, as we said before, the computer considers only his/hers last voting decision as a valid.

2.6 Voting Intent

Electronic voting machines are able to provide immediate feedback to the voter detecting such possible problems as undervoting and overvoting which may result in a spoiled ballot. This immediate feedback can be helpful in successfully determining voter intent.

ORG Election Report highlights problems with voting technology used The Open Rights Group : Blog Archive ORG verdict on London Elections: Insufficient evidence to declare confidence in results

3. DISADVANTAGES
There is a general agreement among many authors in the literature, that the potential disadvantages of e-voting are the following: privacy; vote confirmation; abuse; communications; and inaccessibility;

3.1 Privacy

The basic characteristic of every contemporary voting system is the requirement for privacy during the voting process. In other words, the voters requirement is to properly identify himself/herself and to vote. In order for the system to guarantee a 100% anonymity of the voter, there exist two techniques that are contradictory to each other. According the first, it is possible for the process of identification to be fulfilled just by fulfilling the basic law requirements for voting, and simply, after the voting the system will just register the vote. By that, we have a higher degree of anonymity but it is very hard to create a mutual link in a case of any possible error during the voting process. A second alternative is when together with the voting result, the digital signature of the voter is registered at the same time into the system. That can allow the voter during the electoral process to change or to make the necessary corrections of his/hers voting decision for a several times, until the end of the election process. But, what is questionable, is the issue of securing his/hers anonymity. The abovementioned security problem is present in almost every electoral process and not just during the e-voting process. Realizing the fact that during the process of e-voting, we must identify ourselves with the digital signature, we become conscious or become distrust about any public reveal of the result of our vote. But, many experts agree that the question of voters distrust during the process of e-voting can be eliminated and easily solved by using the contemporary information technologies. The level of voter security can be set on a higher level and there is no need of any distrust or suspect of the results during the voting process.

3.2 Vote confirmation

Naturally, the e-voting process itself can generate the problem of voters distrust and suspect in a sense: Is my vote considered? How it is processed? etc. The main problem is that during the e-voting process the voter does not receive any paper confirmation about his participation during the voting process. He stands in front of the computer, uses his digital signature and by using several manual computer clicks, he votes. From that simplicity, he asks himself: This is too simple in order to be real? Thats one of the reasons, why he expresses distrust and is suspect of using computers for voting. But, that is just a temporal distrust to the electronic system that can disappear parallel with the distrust that exists against any other electronic transactions in everyday life, as: money transactions, hotel reservations, electroning trade, e-libraries etc.

3.3 Abuse

We must agree that since the humanity exists until today, with one person or group trying to satisfy their own interests, there is always a possibility for abuse and falsifying the results of the electoral process. Some of the abusive activities that can lead to criminal activities during the election process can be: corrections of somebody else vote/votes, releasing false electoral data, revealing a personal voting decisions etc. Technically, thats not practically feasible, but when in all that we put the human factor in a combination, there are many arguments that point to emergence of some irregularities. But, overall, not more comparing to the classic paper-based voting. If we analyze the increased turnover rate during the e-voting process on one side and the decreased number of irregular votes on the other side, we can conclude that the possible emergence of voting irregularities is neglected.

3.4 Communication problems

It is more than sure that a big problem could emerge if in the moment of voting some part or parts of the communication infrastructure that connects a large geographical region gave up. But, those technical defects can be short lasting and easily overcome and can cause just short time inaccessibility of the voters to the voting place. In those situations, the voters can give their votes after securing an

alternative way that can be workable and realized during the planning process at the beginning of the elections by the central election body. Off course that in some cases, the technical incorrectness can be abused with purpose of blocking of some voting places which voting results are known in advance. But, we must agree that such a cases of diversion are present even during the classic, paper-based voting using methods such as: physical violence, psychological intimidation etc.

3.5 Inaccessibility

As a problem can emerge in the rural places where there is an absence of internet connection and in some places even an absence of electrical power. In those regions, thee is a necessity of organizing an additional voting places that must be equipped with personal computers and registered voters must come to the certain voting place in order to vote. Other possibility is using lap top computers with permanent internet connection. Electronic voting systems may offer advantages compared to other voting techniques. An electronic voting system can be involved in any one of a number of steps in the setup, distributing, voting, collecting, and counting of ballots, and thus may or may not introduce advantages into any of these steps. Potential disadvantages exist as well including the potential for flaws or weakness in any electronic component. Charles Stewart of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology estimates that 1 million more ballots were counted in 2004 than in 2000 because electronic voting machines detected votes that paper-based machines would have missed.5 In May 2004 the U.S. Government Accountability Office released a report titled "Electronic Voting Offers Opportunities and Presents Challenges" 6, analyzing both the benefits and concerns created by electronic voting. A second report was released in September 2005 detailing some of the concerns with electronic voting, and ongoing improvements, titled "Federal Efforts to Improve Security and Reliability of Electronic Voting Systems Are Under Way, but Key Activities Need to Be Completed"7. It has been demonstrated that as voting systems become more complex and include software, different methods of election fraud become possible. Others also challenge the use of electronic voting from a theoretical point of view, arguing that humans are not equipped for verifying operations occurring within an electronic machine and that because people cannot verify these operations, the operations cannot be trusted. Furthermore, some computing experts have argued for the broader notion that people cannot trust any programming they did not author.8 Under a secret ballot system, there is no known input, nor any expected output with which to compare electoral results. Hence, electronic electoral results and thus the accuracy, honesty and security of the entire electronic system cannot be verified by humans.9 Critics of electronic voting, including security analyst Bruce Schneier, note that "computer security experts are unanimous on what to do (some voting experts disagree, but it is the computer security experts who need to be listened to; the problems here are with the computer, not with the fact that the computer is being used in a voting application)...DRE machines must have a voter-verifiable paper audit trails... Software used on DRE machines must be open to public scrutiny"10to ensure the accuracy of the voting system. Verifiable ballots are necessary because computers can and do malfunction, and because voting machines can be compromised. Electronic voting systems may use electronic ballots to store votes in computer memory. Systems which use them exclusively are called DRE voting systems. When electronic ballots are used there is no risk of exhausting the supply of ballots. Additionally, these electronic ballots remove the need for printing of paper ballots, a significant cost. 11When administering elections in which ballots are offered in multiple languages (in some areas of the United States, public elections are required by the National Voting Rights Act of 1965), electronic ballots can be programmed to provide ballots in multiple languages for a single machine. The advantage with respect to ballots in different languages appears to be unique to electronic voting. For example, King County, Washington's demographics require them under U.S. federal election law to provide ballot access in Chinese. With any type of paper ballot, the
5

6 7

Friel, Brian (November 2006) Let The Recounts Begin, National Journal Government Accountability Office (May 2004) "Electronic Voting Offers Opportunities and Presents Challenges"

Government Accountability Office (September 2005) "Federal Efforts to Improve Security and Reliability of Electronic Voting Systems Are Under Way, but Key Activities Need to Be Completed" 8 Thompson, Ken (August 1984) Reflections on Trusting Trust 9 Lombardi, Emanuele electronic voting and Democracy 10 Schneier, Bruce (September 2004), openDemocracy Whats wrong with electronic voting machines? 11 "http://post-journal.com/articles.asp?articleID=6218". The Post-Journal

county has to decide how many Chinese-language ballots to print, how many to make available at each polling place, etc. Any strategy that can assure that Chinese-language ballots will be available at all polling places is certain, at the very least, to result in a significant number of wasted ballots. Critics argue the need for extra ballots in any language can be mitigated by providing a process to print ballots at voting locations. They argue further, the cost of software validation, compiler trust validation, installation validation, delivery validation and validation of other steps related to electronic voting is complex and expensive, thus electronic ballots are not guaranteed to be less costly than printed ballots.

4. CONDITIONS OF IMPLEMENTATION 4.1 Digital signature

The electronic (so-called digital) signature is electronic non scanned version of the manual signature that is regulated according the positive law of one country. That means that the document with electroning signature sent through internet is equally important as a manually signed document. There is a general agreement that three main goals can be fulfilled by using the digital signature: Information integrity that is transferable (Data Integrity). In other words, is there any possibility that through the process of information transmission, can happen any distraction from third party and the result might be information change; Information secrecy (Confidentiality). Securing information privacy during the transmission process, so that she will be available only for people that possess the original digital key; and Identity Check (Authentification). Providing accurate identity of the person that emerges as information sender. According the techniques that are used in the process of generating the digital signature, we can be absolutely sure that there is a 100% security through the process of identity identification without any possibilities for eventual abuse or falsification. One of the biggest problems, especially in the developing countries, is that the digital signature is obtained upon the request from the individual user and is not mandatory requirement posed the country. Thats the basic reason, why all present or potential voters do not possess digital signature that can use during the election process.

4.2 Computer literacy

E-voting process requires the basic knowledge of computer literacy of the voter. It is necessary that the voter be familiar of using a computer in a sense that he will be able to use the internet browser in order to get with the web-page over which the voting is implemented, and normally, to know how to use the digital signature. But, all abovementioned is not some sort of professional knowledge. In addition, there is a need to educate the voters how to behave during the voting process i.e. each voter to get a short and clear guidance in several steps in order to see how to vote (i.e. where to vote, which function to perform etc.).

4.3 Informatics Infrastructure

The contemporary informatics and communications technologies are characterized with heterogenic structure. But that does not have any meaning if the voting process is web-oriented and like that will be available to almost everyone. It is necessary to have internet coverage on the whole territory of the country. A condition that in present days is fulfilled even in some less developed countries. The computer shortage in some parts of the population can be solved by installing the so-called centralized voting election units in which the government could provide the necessary number of computers and internet connection.

5. LEGISLATION
We must agree that the basic pre-condition of implementation of e-voting in the countrys system is the existence of appropriate legislation that will allow legal introduction and e-voting implementation. By that, we think on required presence of digital signature for every adult with the legal right to vote, accompanying all the necessary documentation for identification and implementation. We strongly hope that that will happen in a very near future.

In the summer of 2004, the Legislative Affairs Committee of the Association of Information Technology Professionals issued a nine-point proposal for national standards for electronic voting. 12 In an accompanying article, the committee's chair, Charles Oriez, described some of the problems that had arisen around the country.13 Legislation has been introduced in the United State's Congress regarding electronic voting including the Nelson-Whitehouse bill. This bill would appropriate as much as 1 billion dollars to fund states replacement of touch screen systems with optical scan voting system. The legislation also address requiring audits of 3% of precincts in all federal elections. It also mandates some form paper trail audits for all electronic voting machines by the year 2012 on any type of voting technology. 14 Another bill, HR.811 (The Voter Confidence and Increased Accessibility Act of 2003), proposed by Representative Rush D. Holt, Jr., a Democrat from New Jersey, would act as an amendment to the Help America Vote Act of 2002 and require electronic voting machines to produce a paper audit trail for every vote. The U.S. Senate companion bill version introduced by Senator Bill Nelson from Florida on November 1, 2007, necessitates the Director of the National Institute of Standards and Technology to continue researching and to provide methods of paper ballot voting for those with disabilities, those who do not primarily speak English, and those who do not have a high literacy rating. Also, it requires states to provide the federal office with audit reports from the hand counting of the voter verified paper ballots. Currently, this bill has been turned over to the United States Senate Committee on Rules and Administration and a vote date has not been set. 15 During 2008 Congressman Holt, because of an increasing concern regarding the insecurities surrounding the use of electronic voting technology, has submitted additional bills to Congress regarding the future of electronic voting. One, called the "Emergency Assistance for Secure Elections Act of 2008" (HR5036), states that the General Services Administration will reimburse states for the extra costs of providing paper ballots to citizens, and the costs needed to hire people to count them. This bill was introduced to the House on January 17, 2008. This bill estimates that $500 million will be given to cover costs of the reconversion to paper ballots; $100 million given to pay the voting auditors; $30 million given to pay the hand counters. This bill provides the public with the choice to vote manually if they do not trust the electronic voting machines.16 A voting date has not yet been determined.

6. VARIOUS EXAMPLES OF THE USAGE OF E-VOTING IN PRACTISE

Polling place electronic voting or Internet voting examples have taken place in Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, Estonia, France, Germany, India, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Venezuela and United States.

6.1 Documented problems

There are a number of problems with voting systems in Florida since the 2000 Presidential election: 17 Fairfax County, Virginia, November 4, 2003. Some voters complained that they would cast their vote for a particular candidate and the indicator of that vote would go off shortly after; The Premier Election Solutions (formerly Diebold Election Systems) TSx voting system disenfranchised many voters in Alameda and San Diego Counties during the March 2, 2004 California presidential primary due to non-functional voter card encoders; On April 30 California's secretary of state Kevin Shelley decertified all touch-screen machines and recommended criminal prosecution of Diebold Election Systems. The California Attorney-General decided against criminal prosecution, but subsequently joined a lawsuit against Diebold for fraudulent claims made to election officials. Diebold settled that lawsuit by paying $2.6 million. On February 17, 2006 the California Secretary of State Bruce McPherson then recertified Diebold Election Systems DRE and Optical Scan Voting System;
12 13

"Legislative Committee Resolution Awaiting BOD Approval". (July 2004). Information Executive Oriez , Charles (July 2004). "In Search of Voting Machines We Can Trust". Information Executive 14 Padgett, Tim. November 3, 2007. "Voting out E Voting Machines" Time Magazine. Retrieved November 28, 2007 15 The Library of Congress. Retrieved March 3, 2008 16 Election Archives. Retrieved March 3, 2008 17 The Problem with Electronic Voting Machines

Napa County, California, March 2, 2004, an improperly calibrated marksense scanner overlooked 6,692 absentee ballot votes; On October 30, 2006 the Dutch Minister of the Interior withdrew the license of 1187 voting machines from manufacturer Sdu NV, about 10% of the total number to be used, because it was proven by the General Intelligence and Security Service that one could eavesdrop on voting from up to 40 meters using Van Eck phreaking. National elections are to be held 24 days after this decision. The decision was forced by the Dutch grass roots organisation Wij vertrouwen stemcomputers niet ("We do not trust voting computers").18

There were many problems in the United States general elections, 2006: During early voting in Miami, Hollywood and Fort Lauderdale, Florida in October 2006 three votes intended to be recorded for Democratic candidates were displaying as cast for Republican. Election officials attributed it to calibration errors in the touch screen of the voting system; In Pennsylvania, a computer programming error forced some to cast paper ballots. In Indiana, 175 precincts also resorted to paper. Counties in those states also extended poll hours to make up for delays;19 Cuyahoga County, Ohio: The Diebold computer server froze and stopped counting votes then the printers jammed so paper copies could not be retrieved for many votes and there was no way to be sure of the accuracy of the votes when the votes were being counted;20 Waldenburg, Arkansas: The touch screen computer tallied zero votes for one mayoral candidate who confirmed that he certainly voted for himself and therefore there would be a minimum of one vote, this is a case of disappearing votes on touch screen machines; Sarasota, Florida: There was an 18,000 person "undervote" in a congressional election; The subsequent investigation found that the undervote was not caused by software error. Poor ballot design was widely acknowledged as the cause of the undervote; Instances of faulty technology and security issues surrounding these machines were documented on August 1, 2001 in the Brennan Center at New York University Law School. NY University Law School released a report with more than 60 examples of e-voting machine failures in 26 states in 2004 and 2006. Examples included Spanish language ballots that were cast by voters but not counted in Sacramento in 2004; In Finland, the Supreme Administrative Court declared invalid the results of a pilot electronic vote in three municipalities, and ordered a rerun of the municipal elections. The system had an usability problem where the messages were ambiguous on whether the vote had been cast. In a total of 232 cases (2% of votes), voters had logged in, selected their vote but not confirmed it, and left the booth; the votes were not recorded;21 2008 United States Elections: Virginia, Tennessee, and Texas: Touch screen voting machines flipped votes in early voting trials; Humboldt County, California: A security flaw erased 197 votes from the computer database. 22

6.2 California top to bottom review

In May 2007, California Secretary of State Debra Bowen commissioned a "Top to Bottom review" of all electronic voting systems in the state. She engaged computer security experts led by the University of California to perform security evaluations of voting system source code as well as "red teams" running "worst case" Election Day scenarios attempting to identify vulnerabilities to tampering or error. The Top to Bottom review also included a comprehensive review of manufacturer documentation as well as a review of accessibility features and alternative language requirements. The end results of the tests were released in the four detailed Secretary of State August 3, 2007 resolutions (for Diebold Election Systems, Hart InterCivic, Sequoia Voting Systems and Elections
18 19

20 21
22

http://www.wijvertrouwenstemcomputersniet.nl/English a b c Poll Workers Struggle With E-Ballots[dead link) http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/magazine/06Vote-t.html?pagewanted=3&_r=1 "KHO: Kuntavaalit uusiksi Vihdiss, Karkkilassa ja Kauniaisissa" . YLE Uutiset, Talous ja politiikka. YLE. 2009-04-09 http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/21626/

Systems and Software, Inc.) and updated October 25, 2007 revised resolutions for Diebold and Sequoia voting systems.23 The security experts found significant security flaws in all of the manufacturers' voting systems, flaws that could allow a single non-expert to compromise an entire election. On August 3, 2007 Bowen decertified machines that were tested in her top to bottom view including the ES&S InkaVote machine, which was not included in the review because the company submitted it past the deadline for testing. The report issued July 27, 2007 was conducted by the expert "red team" attempting to detect the levels of technological vulnerability. Another report on August 2, 2007 was conducted by a source code review team to detect flaws in voting system source code. Both reports found that three of the tested systems fell far short of the minimum requirements specified in the 2005 Voluntary Voting System Guidelines (VVSG). Some of the systems tested were conditionally recertified with new stringed security requirements imposed. The companies in question have until the February 2008 California Presidential Primaries to fix their security issues and insure that election results can be closely audited. The Premier Election Solutions (formerly Diebold Election Systems) AccuVote-TSx voting system was studied by a group of Princeton University computer scientists in 2006. Their results showed that the AccuVote-TSx was insecure and could be "installed with vote-stealing software in under a minute." The scientists also said that machines can transmit computer viruses from one to another "during normal pre- and post-election activity."24

6.3 Florida, punched cards, and the 2000 presidential election

Punched cards received considerable notoriety in 2000 when their uneven use in Votomatic style systems in Florida was alleged to have affected the outcome of the U.S. presidential election. Invented by Joseph P. Harris, Votomatic was manufactured for a time under license by IBM. William Rouverol, who built the prototype and wrote patents, stated that after the patents expired in 1982, lower quality machines had appeared on the market. The machines used in Florida had five times as many errors as a true Votomatic, he said.25 Punch-card-based voting systems, the Votomatic system in particular, use special cards where each possible hole is pre-scored, allowing perforations to be made by the voter pressing a stylus through a guide in the voting machine. A problem with this system is the incomplete punch; this can lead to a smaller hole than expected, or to a mere slit in the card, or to a mere dimple in the card, or to a hanging chad. This technical problem was claimed by the Democratic Party to have influenced the 2000 U.S. presidential election in the state of Florida; critics claimed that punch-card voting machines were primarily used in Democratic areas and that hundreds of ballots were not read properly or were disqualified due to incomplete punches, which allegedly tipped the vote in favor of George W. Bush over Al Gore. Later investigations by independent organizations showed this allegation to be false. Other punch-card voting systems use a metal hole-punch mechanism that does not suffer nearly as much from this fault, although most states have eliminated punch-card voting systems of all types after the 2000 Florida experience. But, South Korea still predominantly use punch card ballots.

7. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT

Without any difference, the times came when the electroning voting is becoming reality. His low-level costs as a technique, his simplicity by using informational technology and the internet, his flexibility and accessibility during the voting process open the door to the democratic future. We must be assure that that will incorporate some inevitable changes during the political life, the way of how the politicians guide the political campaigns, the use of propaganda and agitations etc. The negatives and its weaknesses are very small or of little meaning when compared to the advantages that the e-concept offers. As a transition to something new, the e-voting concept will possess a certain mistakes; on time to time there will be strong attitudes against its usage by many political, citizen-oriented etc. groups in the society etc. In addition, at the beginning there might be a need for more financial resources in order
23 Grossman, Wendy M (30 April 2009). "Why machines are bad at counting votes". The Guardian.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/apr/30/e-voting-electronic-polling-systems. Retrieved 2009-07-14. 24 Simons, Barbara. August 13, 2007. "California: The Top to Bottom Review." The Voter. Retrieved November 27, 2007 25 Riordan, Theresa. 13 September 2006. Princeton University. Retrieved March 6, 2008

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for the whole system to start function well, education of the voters and education of those that will lead and will control the voting process. As was mentioned above, considering all the advantages and disadvantages of e-voting process, we are sure that the future is in electroning voting, in his technique that will enable for every voter without any pressures to give his vote, without any difference where he lives, works or is present in the election country or outside of the election country at the moment of the voting process. And, the countries must be conscious of the advantages and the benefits of the e-voting process. This is one of the main reasons, for the countries to start enacting legislation, imposing mandatory requirements for introduction of the digital signature and electroning ID identification, as an equal legislation to that of personal identification documents of every adult citizen in the country. Introducing and using of e-voting is in compliance with the main recommendations of the European Parliament of Ministries enacted in February, 2009 on e-democracy, in which there is an overview of the main directions for e-democracy development in member-countries of the EU. The research summarized the following results and findings: the electronic, E-voting is characterized with numerous advantages as: transparency, availability, speed, efficiency and effectiveness; the disadvantages include: communication problems, possible computer defects, insufficient political culture among the residents and political parties which is expressed in doubtful acceptance of using the electronic, E-voting and possible fraudulent behaviours that can result in revealing or abusing the electoral data during the voting process; in order for the electronic voting to be successful implemented there are a certain conditions that must be met; adopting the basic laws or needed legislation that is of necessary importance that will permit mass and free usage implementation of electronic voting; many countries in the world have already implemented electronic voting at different times as governmental projects under different titles. In some countries the system was successfully implemented while in the others it was unsuccessful.

From the research findings and results, the following principal conclusions can be derived: in recent years, electronic voting is a very popular way of processing electoral data. Besides the fact that there are numerous noted disadvantages, its advantages overcome the disadvantages; without adopting an appropriate legislation, the system of electoral voting can not be implemented in the country/countries. In other words, there must be a strong political will and personal confidence among the politicians that the electronic voting system is a way ahead better than the present way of voting and counting the votes; and finally, so far the system was implemented in many countries in the world and there were different experiences, from highly positive to highly negative. These experiences can serve as an indicator for future successful implementation of the electronic voting in many countries in the world, by adopting the positive experiences and in the same time, eliminating the negative characteristics that can happen during the introduction and the subsequent implementation of the electronic voting system.

7.1 Recommendations for future improvement

In December 2005 the US Election Assistance Commission unanimously adopted the 2005 Voluntary Voting System Guidelines, which significantly increase security requirements for voting systems and expand access, including opportunities to vote privately and independently, for individuals with disabilities. The guidelines took effect in December 2007 replacing the 2002 Voting System Standards (VSS) developed by the Federal Election Commission. Some groups such as the Open Voting Consortium believe that to restore voter confidence and to reduce the potential for fraud, all electronic voting systems must be completely available to public scrutiny. Also proposed is the requirement for use of open public standards and specifications such as the Election Markup Language (EML) standard developed by OASIS and now under consideration by

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ISO. These can provide consistent processes and mechanisms for managing and performing elections using computer systems. One method to any error with voting machines is parallel testing, which are conducted on the Election Day with randomly picked machines. The ACM published a study showing that, to change the outcome of the 2000 U.S. Presidential election, only 2 votes in each precinct would have needed to been changed. Criticisms can be mitigated by review and testing procedures to detect fraudulent code or hardware, if such things are present, and thorough a verifiable chain of custody to prevent the insertion of such hardware or software. Benefits can include reduced tabulation times and an increase of participation (voter turnout), particularly through the use of Internet voting. Those in opposition suggest alternate vote counting systems, citing Switzerland (as well as many other countries), which uses paper ballots exclusively, suggesting that electronic voting is not the only means to get a rapid count of votes. A country of a little over 7 million people, Switzerland publishes a definitive ballot count in about six hours. In villages, the ballots are even counted manually. Critics also note that it becomes difficult or impossible to verify the identity of a voter remotely, and that the introduction of public networks becomes more vulnerable and complex. It is not yet clear whether the total cost of ownership with electronic voting is lower than other systems. When taking all the e-voting considerations above, the general recommendation is that the e-voting system must be constantly improved and by improving it, we can be sure that he will become a powerful solution in order to take off aside all the voters inconfidence and to become a practical tool in implementing a fully democratic society. In other words, the answer is that the e-voting in future is becoming a democratic necessity and modern concept that is far away from fiction.

8. REFERENCES

Buhrenen, Robin. 2004. a b c Poll Workers Struggle With E-Ballots. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Lernar, David, and Kurlight, Johnes, eds. 2007. CA SoS Top to Bottom Review. Boston: Boston University Press. Friel, Brian. 2006. Let The Recounts Begin. National Journal 965: 562-568. Government Accountability Office. 2005. Federal Efforts to Improve Security and Reliability of Electronic Voting Systems Are Under Way, but Key Activities Need to Be Completed. New York Times Book Review, July 3, 9 Government Accountability Office. 2004. Electronic Voting Offers Opportunities and Presents Challenges. New York Times Book Review, December 23, 31 Grossman, Wendy M (30 April 2009). Why machines are bad at counting votes. The Guardian. Also available online at http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2009/apr/30/e-voting-electronic-pollingsystems. Retrieved 2009-07-14. Broadway, Simon. 2004. Legislative Committee Resolution Awaiting BOD Approval. Information Executive 21: 219-287 Lombardi, Emanuele.2005. Electronic voting and Democracy. E-government Review 15: 245-247 Oriez, Charles. 2004). In Search of Voting Machines We Can Trust. Information Executive 19: 129142

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Padgett, Tim. 2007. Voting out of E-Voting Machines. Time Magazine. Retrieved November 28, 2007 Riordan, Theresa. 2006. Election. Princeton: Princeton University. Retrieved March 6, 2008 Schneier, Bruce. 2004. Open Democracy: Whats wrong with electronic voting machines? The Voter, Retrieved, December 20, 24 Simons, Barbara. 2007. California: The Top to Bottom Review." The Voter, Retrieved, November 27, 31, 2007 Thompson, Ken. trans. 1984. Reflections on Trusting Trust. Washington Review: Washington D.C.

Websites The Library of Congress. Retrieved March 3, 2008 http://www.wijvertrouwenstemcomputersniet.nl/English Election Archives. Retrieved March 3, 2008 http://www.nytimes.com/2008/01/06/magazine/06Vote-t.html?pagewanted=3&_r=1 ORG Election Report highlights problems with voting technology used http://www.yle.fi/uutiset/talous_ja_politiikka/2009/04/kho_kuntavaalit_uusiksi_vihdissa_karkkilassa_j a_kauniaisissa_673059.html. Retrieved 2009-04-09. The Open Rights Group : Blog Archive ORG verdict on London Elections: Insufficient evidence to declare confidence in results http://www.technologyreview.com/computing/21626/

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