At this stage, to preserve software independence and transparency, paper ballots still win out as the best method. They tend, so far, to shy away from I-voting where it occurs, he added later--a case in point was a very small recent election in Hawaii, where the number of usual voters dropped considerably.
Huge questions remain before I-voting assumes center stage:
eliminating the possibly of remote intrusion via malware, spyware, and
phishing. This could be decades away. Thirty years of research in this area have
already passed.
Email and fax as voting vehicles in small quantities are
acceptable as a last resort, he added later. At least they are sure to reach
their destination on time, unlike ballots mailed in from overseas.
The stakes are so high in close elections, he also added
later; witness as examples the electronic sabotage of the Iranian nuclear
system, and the online attacks as forums of protest, as in the case of
Wikileaks.
*****
Adding election administration to the fray, Matt Masterson
told us that I-voting is illegal in his home state, Ohio.
Stepping back a decade, he said that until the Help America Vote act (HAVA) was passed, election administration was a backstage operation, if anything.
Since then, election officials have become PR agents: explaining processes to the press, directing and training poll workers, handling audits, and managing IT systems.
In the office, they direct registration, poll-workers lists,
and payroll. Election officials are getting better and better at understanding
the complexities of IT as it applies to voting.
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