Experts criticize West Virginia’s plan for smartphone voting

Minimalist · Aug 8, 2018

The state of West Virginia is planning to allow overseas voting via smartphone in the 2018 election, and election security experts aren't happy about it.

"Mobile voting is a horrific idea," said Joe Hall, an election security expert at the Center for Democracy and Technology in an interview with CNN.

The West Virginia project is being run by Voatz, a startup with $2 million in venture capital funding. To ensure buzzword-compliance, the Voatz system uses a blockchain in addition to a mobile app.
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https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy...ze-west-virginias-plan-for-smartphone-voting/

guest · Aug 11, 2018

Voatz: a tale of a terrible, horrible, no-good, very bad idea
August 11, 2018
https://techcrunch.com/2018/08/11/voatz-a-tale-of-a-terrible-horrible-no-good-very-bad-idea/

[...] We need to step back and ask a question here: why are we trying to vote via an app and collate election results on any kind of centralized system at all? We don’t want to make voting more efficient. Efficiency is not the problem we are trying to solve with elections. The inefficiency of paper ballots and their handling and collation and tabulation is a feature, not a bug.

Just ask everyone at Def Con’s Vote Hacking Village, whose successes have been rampant this weekend, in the midst of the enmity of the National Association of Secretaries of State:

ARE YOU GOING TO BELIEVE US OR YOUR OWN LYING EYES?! https://t.co/SOVL4Jb0dU [...]

Voatz were approaching the wrong problem in the wrong way from the start. [...] Voting cannot rely on apps and servers, no matter how allegedly secure they are claimed to be. It’s nice that you generate paper ballots for a post-election audit, but since we should not and cannot ever trust voting servers and software, and therefore will need to do a post-election paper ballot count every time
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guest · Aug 27, 2018

Mobile Blockchain Ballot Trial Raises Voting Security Questions
August 27, 2018
https://securityintelligence.com/mobile-blockchain-ballot-trial-raises-voting-security-questions/

[...] West Virginia has partnered with Voatz [...] cast ballots with devices connected to a blockchain-enabled vote recording system.

Security experts have had mixed reactions to the plan, with some saying blockchain technologies aren’t yet ready for important tasks such as voting security.
How Can Governments Address Voting Security Challenges?
Even so, the forthcoming trial will employ other security measures in addition to blockchain. The voting system will use two-factor authentication (2FA) — fingerprints and facial recognition — to identify and verify voters, Queen said.

“We’re not suggesting the blockchain is 100 percent foolproof,” he said, but blockchain, combined with other security measures, “is as safe as we can get.”
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guest · Mar 7, 2019

Denver to test blockchain-encrypted mobile voting in May election
March 7, 2019
https://statescoop.com/denver-to-test-blockchain-encrypted-mobile-voting-in-may-election/

Election officials in Denver said Thursday that the city’s voters who are currently on military deployments or living abroad will be offered the ability to cast their ballots in upcoming local races through a mobile app that uses blockchain encryption.

While Voatz defends its app as impenetrable, internet-based voting has many critics who question whether the company can vouch that its servers are secure and that its users’ mobile devices are free of malware.
There are also concerns that blockchain technology does not protect user anonymity, potentially threatening the sanctity of individual ballots.
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Experts criticize West Virginia’s plan for smartphone voting

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