On Secure Voting Systems

Andrew Appel shepherded a public comment—signed by twenty election cybersecurity experts, including myself—on best practices for ballot marking devices and vote tabulation. It was written for the Pennsylvania legislature, but it’s general in nature.

From the executive summary:

We believe that no system is perfect, with each having trade-offs. Hand-marked and hand-counted ballots remove the uncertainty introduced by use of electronic machinery and the ability of bad actors to exploit electronic vulnerabilities to remotely alter the results. However, some portion of voters mistakenly mark paper ballots in a manner that will not be counted in the way the voter intended, or which even voids the ballot. Hand-counts delay timely reporting of results, and introduce the possibility for human error, bias, or misinterpretation.

Technology introduces the means of efficient tabulation, but also introduces a manifold increase in complexity and sophistication of the process. This places the understanding of the process beyond the average person’s understanding, which can foster distrust. It also opens the door to human or machine error, as well as exploitation by sophisticated and malicious actors.

Rather than assert that each component of the process can be made perfectly secure on its own, we believe the goal of each component of the elections process is to validate every other component.

Consequently, we believe that the hallmarks of a reliable and optimal election process are hand-marked paper ballots, which are optically scanned, separately and securely stored, and rigorously audited after the election but before certification. We recommend state legislators adopt policies consistent with these guiding principles, which are further developed below.

Tags: , ,

Posted on March 26, 2024 at 7:08 AM • 39 Comments

Comments

Albert • March 26, 2024 7:54 AM

I love this proposal. I have been saying the same for many years. Not only would it be more secure, but it would eliminate any lines at polling places since scanning only takes a few seconds and ballots can be filled out in parallel.

However, one thing this document does not delve into is the insecurity of mail-in ballots. I believe they are an even bigger security hole because all it takes to modify hundreds to thousands of ballots is to suborn one mail carrier. Once of have possession of the ballot it is easy to steam open the envelope and place your own ballot inside.

Kevin Campbell • March 26, 2024 8:21 AM

Why stop at hand-marked paper ballots? Why not require a thumb print or video tape people making a verbal statement as optimal?

With the advent of technology and various non-repudiatable methods, technologists should be focusing on how to expand the base of voting while accommodating acceptable risks. It’s easy to hand-wring over obscure and hypothetical threats, but voter suppression is just as much, if not more, a problem for democracy than if the Chinese have cracked elliptical codes.

wiredog • March 26, 2024 8:45 AM

“rigorously audited after the election but before certification” Or, in other words, hand-counted. One of the problems in 2020 was the delay in reporting results.

@Kevin Campbell
“a thumb print or video tape people making a verbal statement as optimal” Well, it’s optimal if you want to de-anonymize voting, thus making it easier for vote buyers to verify that the voter they bought stayed bought.

Eriadilos • March 26, 2024 8:59 AM

@Kevin Campbell

This conference from CCC may be relevant
‘https://media.ccc.de/v/37c3-12298-should_e-voting_experience_of_estonia_be_copied

As said by Bruce, a big part of why electronic voting is not trusted is because it is too complex to be fully understood, even by technical people.
Trust in the process plays a big part in an election and how it is percieved afterwards.

As for biometric authentication, appart from the de-anonymization possibilities, it is simply not a robust authentication method : what if you cut your hand and your print does not correspond to the file ? What if you broke your nose and the machine doesn’t recognise your face ?
And for any e-voting : what if electricity is not reliable where you live and vote ?

Thane Walkup • March 26, 2024 10:52 AM

@Albert:

Include temperature activated ink in the ballots? Any attempt to steam open the ballot would spoil it.

Anonymous • March 26, 2024 10:54 AM

I am an Election worker in “Small Town, New England, USA”. I heartedly agree with this summary.

Our town uses paper ballots which require the voter to fill-in an oval to vote for a candidate or answer a ballot question. These ballots are used for all elections: local , State or Federal. After being marked the ballots are read by a tabulator which scans the ballot counting votes and depositing them into either of two bins inside the locked compartment of the tabulator. The results are stored internally with a paper tape printed at the close of polls. These are the unofficial results and are posted in the polling place and copies sent to the State Sectary which certifies the results and posts the official results within the next few days.

The paper ballots allow for write-in candidates. A voter may write-in a candidate’s name (where applicable) and then fill-in the oval next to that write-in slot. When the tabulator detects that oval as being filled-in the other votes are counted and the ballot is diverted to a separate bin to be hand-counted.

Some voters will write-in a name but forget to full-in the oval. At the close of polls all ballots in the main bin are manually searched for write-in candidates. Those ballots are grouped with the known write-in ballots and hand counted with the results recorded on Precinct Reconciliation Work Sheets. It is sad what some people will write-in.

The ballots, made of card stock, are roughly 8 1/2” by 17”. The format is fairly straight forward, alignment marks down both sides and across the both top and bottom and, if required, both sides. The tabulator will correctly “read” the ballot regardless of the orientation in which it is fed.

The tabulator is simply scanning for a given oval in a given position i.e any column, any row, front or back. The “software” to configure the tabulator for a given election simply assigns a name or question to a given column, row or side.
The tabulators are publicly tested just prior to each election. This is to assure the public of the integrity of that portion of the process.

Our state laws require the ballots be stored securely for 22 months after each election. Should there be a recount, there was. In some instances that 22 months is longer than the office of the candidates.

Having worked dozens of elections, including local; state primary; national primary and presidential elections I will say I am satisfied with the integrity of that portion of the election process that I am involved with.

Hand counts do not delay the results of an election. Consider, when the election takes place and when the candidate takes office. There is no need to “tell the Press” the results literally within one minute after the Polls close.

There are many safeguards; checks and balances I haven’t mentioned. There are allowances for Early voting; Absentee Voting and voting for those with disabilities. It isn’t and needn’t be all on one day.

It concerns me that all states don’t have a simply and straight forward of a voting process. Consider Arizona last year. Or, as some states do, the voter uses a touch screen. Why the unnecessary additional complications of a touch screen?

Why should I be concerned about the voting process in another state? Because those elections have a direct effect on me when it comes to federal elections.

Winter • March 26, 2024 11:13 AM

@Kevin

Why stop at hand-marked paper ballots? Why not require a thumb print or video tape people making a verbal statement as optimal?

That could compromise anonymiiof the vote. Votes must be untraceable.

Chelloveck • March 26, 2024 11:23 AM

I’m so glad the full article recommends against barcodes or other non-human-readable marks being counted. That’s one thing I always emphasize when discussing this – the voter, tabulating machines, and human tabulators MUST all be looking at the same marks, otherwise they’re not actually cross-checking each other.

Clive Robinson • March 26, 2024 11:28 AM

@ Anonymous, Bruce, ALL,

Re : GIGO can work in the ballot printers favour.

“I am an Election worker in “Small Town, New England, USA”. I heartedly agree with this summary.”

You description of the ballot helps make the point I’m concerned about.

Whilst all voters are supposedly,

“Equal in the eyes of the law”

They are not equal in many other ways. For instance in the eyes of nature, some of us are “Disabled” in numerous ways not all are immediately obvious.

However as we know Silicon Valley Mega Corps have spent billions in research about peoples disabilities and how to profit by them.

Part of that is how you visually place things on the computer screen to gain “advantage” especially on “Smart Device Touch Screens” where a users “handedness” makes quite a difference.

With a few moments thought most will realise that such research would apply equally to ballot papers / cards.

Whilst it might only give less than 1% advantage, in “First Past The Post” voting that is expected to be very close run it maybe more than sufficient to make a very real difference.

It’s not just disability where,

“All voters are not equal”

And such ballot paper printing / rigging can be used to one sides advantage in a close run two party political system.

I could give a list of ways it can have an effect much like gerrymandering does, but it’s longer than most will realise.

My point though is that,

1, People should be aware of it
2, Open / Academic Research should be carried out
3, Preferably there be Federal Legislation to reduce the potential effects.

vaadu • March 26, 2024 11:37 AM

The only reason for mass mail-in voting is to enable fraud.
The only reason for black box machine voting and counting is to enable fraud.

Mail-in voting should be the exception, require ID to request a ballot and require the same ID + a 3rd party witness when submitted.

Voting should be a national holiday, in person only, ID required and paper-only. Other countries do it, so can the US. Mail-in ballots have to be received before election day and get counted first.

Me • March 26, 2024 11:39 AM

@Albert

“Not only would it be more secure, but it would eliminate any lines at polling places since scanning only takes a few seconds and ballots can be filled out in parallel.”

If only. Had a school referendum a while back and it took hours to cast the vote. What was the hold-up? Every ballot needed to be cast into a single scanner. 10s per person doesn’t sound like much, but when you are dealing with thousands of people, it adds up in a hurry.

Chelloveck • March 26, 2024 11:45 AM

@albert: I’ve not actually taken advantage of mail-in voting, so I’m not familiar with the particulars. However, there are a number of tamper-evident seals that could be used to secure the inner envelope. If something like that isn’t already being used it would be an inexpensive addition. Would that address your “steam open the envelopes” concern? If not, why not?

I’m more concerned about the bribery/coercion aspect. You know, the ever popular, “Nice place/job/family you got there, shame if the wrong guy gets elected and something were to… happen… to it.” Hand your blank ballot and signed envelope over to the legitimate businessman asking for it and he’ll make sure to fill it in for the right candidate. Or maybe just take a photo of the completed ballot to show that you’re voting correctly. Or get some hot Instagram influencer to post, “Send me a photo of your ballot with a vote for John Doe and I’ll send you a naked photo.” There’s a reason why voting is designed so you can’t prove how you voted even if you want to.

@Kevin Campbell: What problem are you trying to solve with the introduction of biometrics? And can you preserve the secrecy of the vote while doing so?

Twain • March 26, 2024 11:45 AM

” The people who vote decide nothing, the people who count the vote decide everything ”

-- Josef Stalin

.

these supposed “election cybersecurity experts” are quite naive about the actual full ‘System’ vulnerabilities inherent in all Voting processes

Winter • March 26, 2024 11:56 AM

@Chelloveck

Or maybe just take a photo of the completed ballot to show that you’re voting correctly.

Voters can always vote in person and invalidate the mail-in vote.

Maybe, someone has thought about all these ingenious “hacks” before? [1]

[1]’https://news.columbia.edu/in-mail-absentee-ballots-secure-vote-election

‘https://scienceexchange.caltech.edu/topics/voting-elections/vote-by-mail-security

JonKnowsNothing • March 26, 2024 12:14 PM

@Winter, @Kevin, All

re:
@K: Why stop at hand-marked paper ballots? Why not require a thumb print or video tape people making a verbal statement as optimal?

@W: That could compromise anonymity of the vote. Votes must be untraceable.

In USA, California the ballots do require identification.

  • If you go in person, you queue in front of the registration area, and they look up your information (paper or online) and you sign the register with your signature before you get the ballot.
  • If you are using a mail in ballot, you have to have done all this before hand. You also have to sign the ballot in a “secret area” provided.
    • The signature has to match what is on file. If you are unable to write, you can use an alternative signature method.
  • For primary or run up elections you have to be a member of the party for that ballot. GOP gets one ballot. DEM get another. 3d party sometimes have cross over rights to vote on one of these.
    • For main elections you can vote for whoever is on the ballot

The ballots are not anonymous. They are fully traceable. They have serial numbers and various codes that indicate where that ballot came from and who got that ballot (chain of custody).

The workers at the polling station do not know how you voted, unless you need voting assistance. The people doing the counting do not know who created the ballot, they only see a serial id when they count votes. The folks opening the envelopes verify the proper identification is part of the package.

If there is any question, the election officials can trace back every ballot to its source.

In other states, the rules are far more draconian. For Texas mail in ballots, there are 2 secret areas that you need to fill out. The instructions imply only one of them is required. People have gone to jail for only filling out one of the two. Penalties in Texas are severe and their ballot-toss rate matches their approach to voting.

An observation:

  • A great number of complaints about voting come from people who have never voted.

Looky • March 26, 2024 12:37 PM

Hand marked ballots, hand counted, with independent and adversarial observers. Anything else not only allows for impropriety but allows for the appearance or question of impropriety. Anything else is a fools errand. God knows why electronics need to be involved at any point in the custody chain.

Winter • March 26, 2024 1:02 PM

@Vaduu

The only reason for mass mail-in voting is to enable fraud.

Where is the proof?

The only people I hear this say are those who do want as few people to vote as possible.

JonKnowsNothing • March 26, 2024 2:15 PM

@Looky, @Winter, All

re: @L: independent and adversarial observers

This already happens along with verification audits.

re: @L: Why electronics need to be involved at any point in the custody chain.

Because everything is in a database and computers can cross check data faster than you can look up a scrabble word.

  • Yet Another Non-Voter Complaining About Voting

re: @W: [they] want as few people to vote as possible

The USA has a long history of denying voting rights to people. Goes all the way back to our founding, when only Landed-Gentry could vote. It’s a slow slog uphill, to expand voting access.

The principle opposition is that whoever is in power, is afraid they might not stay there if more people vote.

  • An old joke:
    • Florida has more people voting than are alive in Florida. They simply empty the graveyards until they get the result they want.

===

h ttp s:/ /en.wi kipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Hiaasen

  • Hiaasen’s adult novels are humorous crime thrillers set in Florida. They feature casts of eccentric, sometimes grotesque characters and satirize aspects of American popular culture. Many of the novels include themes related to environmentalism and political corruption in his native state.

For humorous books and stories about Florida

Eric • March 26, 2024 3:01 PM

Some countries require everyone to vote — doing that here might change a few things…

Many (most?) states require a signature as part of the fraud-prevention effort — why? Is a signature impossible to forge? Do signatures not change?

Washington has been vote-by-mail for all elections for years, without fraud issues. Voters have the choice to us the US Mail or an official ballot dropbox. Washington has had more problems with rejected ballots due to signature matching than it has had with fraud.

US expats and military use mail-in voting, pretty much by definition. Absentee voting has been allowed for decades — what is the difference?

It appears that a lot of opposition to vote-by-mail is really opposition to vote-by-others-not-like-me.

uh, Mike • March 26, 2024 3:30 PM

I am beyond unconcerned about the time it takes to tabulate the votes.
Our nation is addicted to instant news.
Let the news networks chew their limbs off,
if it gives us the time to conduct an orderly, secure election.
I am incensed at the faux urgency taking priority over accuracy.

Extraneous • March 26, 2024 3:42 PM

Viewed from continental Europe, this entire discussion is hard to even understand. In most countries over here, photo ID is required to vote, there is (almost) no machine voting, and there is no machine tabulation (the counting is done by hand). Anyone who knows how to read and write and is familiar with election rules can observe the process and be confident that the rules have been followed. Fraud is not impossible, but infrequent. Why do Americans have to overcomplicate things?

Re vote-by-mail: most European countries either don’t practice it or allow it only for citizens abroad. France eliminated it in 1975 because there was pervasive fraud in Corsica. So either Europeans are paranoid, or vote-by-mail is less secure than its proponents like to say.

Ballot Mailer • March 26, 2024 3:57 PM

@Eric on Washington

https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2021/feb/25/state-house-passes-bill-to-exempt-certain-election/

I tend to take the cyber/crypto stance on this in that security through obscurity isn’t security.
If things in Washington were actually secure they wouldn’t have to exempt records from public disclosure. They would instead issue a comprehensive plan that outlines all the ways votes and voters are protected. Instead Washingtonians get “trust us, it’s all secure, now stop asking questions”

Seems legit to me.

JonKnowsNothing • March 26, 2024 4:03 PM

@ Eric, All

re: Is a signature impossible to forge? Do signatures not change?

Yes hand scribed signatures change. Forged ones do not.

It’s one of the big HINTs in all the global use of ROBOdebt and CLAWbacks, is that the signatures are forged.

In order to get a valid hand signature, these organizations have to do something different, such as Auto-Debit schemes, where no one verifies anything.

It should also be noted, that in the USA, generally, being able to read and write is no longer a requirement. There are provisions made for this. It may come as a shock to the highly educated but a large percentage of the world cannot read or write, even in their first language.

Other blocks like being able to recite the US Constitution verbatim or recite specific state laws on demand, are on the decline too.

Winter • March 26, 2024 4:04 PM

@Extraneous

Why do Americans have to overcomplicate things?

The required voter ID is one that many voters do not have, and often cannot easily or cheaply obtain. Especially not before an important election.

Before you can vote, you have to register as a voter. A registration that can be annulled without notice for various haphazard reasons. Also, anyone at the polling station can doubt your registration and keep your vote on hold.

In short, lots of effort is invested in reducing the number of voters.

See also
‘https://www.bbc.com/news/election-us-2020-54240651

JonKnowsNothing • March 26, 2024 4:33 PM

@Winter, All

re:
* The required voter ID is one that many voters do not have, and often cannot easily or cheaply obtain.

  • A registration that can be annulled without notice

These are the common methods of denying voting rights, atm. You have to have REALID or the state’s version of it. It requires a tonnage of documentation and similar to the ROBODebt and Hostile Environment schemes may require a long look-back period for “proof”.

The penalty for voting incorrectly is draconian in some states. It’s a felony. People with felony convictions cannot vote unless they have their Civil Rights Restored. People are told they have these rights restored by the courts and then vote, find out after they are arrested for felony voting fraud, that this was not the case. Generally some technical error but leads them to be forever excluded and spend many years in prison.

A favorite tactic, atm, is to find a felony in someone’s history. Perhaps years ago a marijuana bust or other infraction that can be “superseded” into a felony conviction. Then they can double up with an election fraud case which gives them a double felony charge. In some situations they receive permanent incarceration.

A MSM report about how tricky this can be, details how in a small town one of the city council members was evicted as their building was sold. The new rent was 4x what they had been paying. So they couch surfed at friends houses for a bit, but someone noticed their new couch-bed address was not in their elected district. Feathers started to fly. The council person as able to get a place inside their elected district, so the feathers sank. (1)

===

1)

HAIL Warning

ht tps://ww w.lati mes.com/california/story/2024-02-28/homeless-tent-encampment-ojai-city-hall

The affordable housing shortage is nothing new in Ojai, but the issue received increased attention last year after a septuagenarian member of the City Council was priced out of her rented house, declared herself homeless and was investigated by a grand jury for no longer living within her council district.

—

In late 2021, Francina, 74, lost the two-bedroom house she had leased for eight years when an investor purchased it, she said. Francina had been paying $1,650 a month in rent. She later saw it listed for $4,000 a month.

Francina, a former mayor, had spent more than a decade on the City Council. To keep her seat, she had to stay within her district, a roughly two-square-mile portion of south Ojai.

Francina could not find an affordable rental that would accept her two small dogs, Benny and Honey. While she searched, she moved, rent-free, into a small room with no kitchen above a friend’s garage that was in Ojai but not in her district. Francina put most of her belongings in storage and said she was homeless, arguing that people who are couch-surfing fit the description.

She was investigated by the Ventura County Grand Jury, which, in a report last May, said her seat was legally vacant since she did not find housing in her district within 30 days. But she was not removed from office.

lurker • March 26, 2024 11:40 PM

@Extraneous, Winter
“Why do Americans have to overcomplicate things?”

My guess is the guys with the overcomplicated thingamajigs have more money to splash over thirsty legislators than the guys who are only peddling pencils, marker pens and form-printed pads.

@Anonymous from New England described pretty much the system we run in New Zealand. But he has the luxury of write-in votes. Here anything extra written on the ballot, and it gets counted as a spoiled vote. There is no way to say none of the above. Which might be a handy thing for some Americans to say come November. I’ve seen numbers claiming over 60% of those polled favored neither Biden nor Trump, but their Electoral College delegates won’t be able to deal with that.

WhizzMan • March 27, 2024 5:45 AM

Paper ballots are a good and anonymous way to vote. The downside of people sometimes filling the form in is probably comparable to people pressing the wrong buttons on an electronic device. The downside of the time and effort it takes to count votes is a first world problem. Nobody absolutely needs the voting results instantaneously and not having a large mass of people putting effort in to have the votes counted makes the effort and amount of conspiritors to commit fraud lower than preferred. If people aren’t interested enough in an honest vote to wait a bit and count votes, they don’t really deserve proper results either.

Cigaes • March 27, 2024 5:51 AM

I have this idea for a voting device with easily auditable properties:

Each option on the ballot is implemented by a long strip of graduated paper that unwinds from one roll to another, like a cassette tape. A window let us see the current position of the paper, but the numbers of on the graduations are obscured.

When the voter chooses an option, it makes an ink mark on the current graduation or punches a hole, then advances to the next graduation.

That way, each voter can see the mark on the paper corresponding to the vote. And to know the results, we open the device to look at the numbers on the paper: the number on the last mark is the number of votes for that option.

A. Nonymous • March 27, 2024 7:18 AM

That’s basically the system we have in Spain. By night (two/three hours after the polling stations close) we have reliable provisional results. The only part with external intervention is the transmission of these results (a company does the database integration but later the results are officially checked).

Important details:

  • The counting is done in an adversarial setting. Each “table” is composed of three random people (six people get summoned, including substitutes and you are legally obliged to participate that day for a compensation, a bit like jury duty, with exceptions for the elderly, etc…). Then each party can send their observers. A small percentage of the votes ARE disputed (not following the rules, double votes, …). The observers will make their claims, the decision rests on the table members. Everything is recorded for later inspection.

It still mystifies me why some people insist this is almost from the Middle Ages. They would have volunteers be in the table (people who want to be there should probably not be trusted with the position, the observers are there for that) and online voting (because they see they can IDENTIFY themselves for online Government but do no see this is different from all the requisites). And the most important part: the whole system was designed after leaving a dictatorship and was designed by people that did not trust each other (but were willing to accept a majority vote).

This is a key point: people must be able to accept the results. Here there have been some attempts to question the fast counting company (saying the Government controls it). Voting machines seems a big problem that way. A candidate that does not want to accept the Election results (see Trump, but many others here) can say the machines have been hacked. And it works for any complex enough system. You only need the POSSIBILITY of hacking to happen. Even if you found a magic unhackable mathematical method to do electronic voting, if the math is too complex its useless to convince the loser (or the voters, to be precise).

Paper and hand counting is really hard to beat in all these respects.

cmeier • March 27, 2024 9:03 AM

I was amused while running a voting location in a recent primary election. In our county, a voter 1st approaches the roster table where a worker looks them up, verifies their ID, prints a paper with both a bar code and ASCII that has the voter’s precinct info, and gives them a longish blank ballot card.

The voter takes these to another worker who inserts the ballot card into the machine where the voter will make their choices. The worker then scans the paper with the bar code so the machine will present the correct ballot for their precinct.

When the voter has made their choices, the now filled-in ballot card is spit out with both a bar code and ASCII representations of the voter’s choices. The voter takes the ballot card to a counter that scans the card and deposits it into a box for potential hand recounts.

The 1st machine had a bug. If the worker tried to scan the precinct too quickly after the blank ballot card was inserted, the machine would crash and require a reboot. This happened 6 or 8 times during the day. I’d guess that there is a race condition somewhere in the code or a bug in the bar code reader library/code.

What do I see when I reboot the ballot marker? Grub followed by a Linux boot screen.

Lee • March 29, 2024 10:46 AM

This is how voting is done where I live. Works great. It’s fast and easy to vote, you see your ballot scanned and if there are issues you can be given a new ballot and see that the old one is invalidated. It’s easy to do a recount either by machine or hand count. No hanging chads, no worries about whether an electronic voting machine accurately recorded your vote.

Anonymous • March 31, 2024 4:13 PM

When I moved to Montgomery County, Maryland in the ’70s, we voted using IBM Votematic hand-held punches for IBM (naturally) computer cards, which were preprinted with the candidates’ names and blank lines (if I recall correctly) for write-ins. A “hanging chad” was virtually impossible with these devices. Votes were counted with tabulating machines but could be hand-counted if necessary, though I don’t know whether this was ever done. Cards were collected from the ballot boxes at noon and after the polls closed. The noon counts were released shortly after the polls closed, with final counts shortly thereafter.

Quick results, verifiable with hand counts, inexpensive polling devices; I wish they had not changed to electronic systems.

Francesco C • April 1, 2024 3:17 AM

Does “optical scanning” mean “eyeballed by poll worker”?
That’s how most of the world does it, and it gets results out within hours (one day at most) of the ballots closing.
This US obsession with tabulating mechanically is exactly the “unnecessary complexity” the main post mentions

lurker • April 2, 2024 2:07 AM

@Francesco C

“This US obsession with tabulating mechanically” has some history. It was the only way of getting the 1890 census results tabulated before the next census would be upon them.

‘http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/censustabulating.jpg

@ echo may have some comment on the obvious glass ceiling that intervened before the 1900 census wass tabulated “electronically.”

‘https://www.census.gov/history/img/1902_Hollerith_electric_tabulating_machine.jpg

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