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0 pointsgodelski6y ago0 comments

> It sounds like you've already taken many steps backwards in your voting system

My voting system or the systems in the 4 states I've voted in? Which, I'll remind you, one uses paper ballots.

The year 2000 example I gave was literally what happened in Florida. Besides the chad part (which was a _MAJOR_ part of what I was suggesting as unverifiable), I'm also suggesting that given the close call there were many more opportunities for fowl play or accidents.

Really we don't care about verifiability in elections that went as expected. We care when they are close. Where mistakes make a difference. With thousands of ballots everywhere, it isn't hard for a few to get lost. Also, there were plenty of complaints about the ballot layout and how it confused people (Buchanan). You're also not going to be able to keep an eye on the ballots for 36 days (how long it took before the supreme court got involved).

Unless you have a receipt and a database you can easily access you can't really verify that your vote was counted. I'm not aware of any state that has this.

> it's still worse than a properly run paper system.

I also cannot think of a case where this is being done. I'll also note that according to this list[0], I voted with "Paper and DRE without paper trail", but I definitely did not vote on a piece of paper. I was put in front of a machine, so I'm not sure why this is called paper.

[0] https://ballotpedia.org/Voting_methods_and_equipment_by_stat...

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6 comments · 2 top-level

tptacek6y ago· 2 in thread

Touchscreen BMDs are called "paper" because they produce paper ballots, which you can (presumably) inspect, and those are what is counted. The nightmare scenario for us in Cook County last cycle was a night where the counts in our pollbook didn't match up with the count of paper ballots we ended up with; we had to stay a bit late because of a minor snafu with them.

godelskiOP6y ago

Thanks for that clarification with Touchscreen BMDs.

The problem here is that many of these don't have the receipts (see link). And I'm guessing the other ones the receipts are upon request, so I don't know if it is obvious for users to print them out. And that still doesn't solve the problem of a lack of a easy to access database to check your ballot.

tptacek6y ago

As I understand it, if it doesn't have a paper artifact, it's not a BMD, it's a DRE. BMDs are suboptimal; DREs are actively harmful.

I strongly recommend people volunteer for their next election cycle to see this stuff firsthand. You'll definitely have better "this is how the election will be stolen" stories to tell than this mixnet verification stuff. At this point, I'm automatically skeptical of any story, positive or negative, about election security that doesn't include the word "pollbook".

nemetroid6y ago· 2 in thread

> Unless you have a receipt and a database you can easily access you can't really verify that your vote was counted. I'm not aware of any state that has this.

With a paper ballot, you can.

godelskiOP6y ago

Where's the database you can easily access?

nemetroid6y ago

You don't need it.

1. in the morning, the ballot box is shown to be empty and is then locked.

2. during the day, voters leave their paper ballots in the box.

3. in the evening, the box is opened, and all the ballots inside it are counted.

The entire process is public, and the ballot box never leaves the public eye. So you can verify that your vote went into the box, and that all votes in the box were counted.

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6 comments · 2 top-level

tptacek6y ago· 2 in thread

godelskiOP6y ago

Thanks for that clarification with Touchscreen BMDs.

tptacek6y ago

As I understand it, if it doesn't have a paper artifact, it's not a BMD, it's a DRE. BMDs are suboptimal; DREs are actively harmful.

nemetroid6y ago· 2 in thread

> Unless you have a receipt and a database you can easily access you can't really verify that your vote was counted. I'm not aware of any state that has this.

With a paper ballot, you can.

godelskiOP6y ago

Where's the database you can easily access?

nemetroid6y ago

You don't need it.

1. in the morning, the ballot box is shown to be empty and is then locked.

2. during the day, voters leave their paper ballots in the box.

3. in the evening, the box is opened, and all the ballots inside it are counted.

The entire process is public, and the ballot box never leaves the public eye. So you can verify that your vote went into the box, and that all votes in the box were counted.

1 more reply

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