This is where it becomes a little more of a personal piece. I, Brice Moon, have been the one responsible for providing you, our lovely readers, with this information. As of today, December 10th, as Follow My Vote stands on the precipice of something huge, I just wanted to take the time to personally wish them the best of luck, and I hope you will join in with me as well. For too long, voting, the most important of civic duties, has been allowed to remain a cumbersome and antiquated establishment, and I’m sure that many of us want to see this changed. I understand that the path to change is one littered with red tape and other various distractions, but I for one believe that an adventure such as this is about the journey. Along the way, we have been able to learn so much, and as long as we are able to share with others that a solution is at hand, then everything else will come in due time…voting will finally be allowed to enter the 21st century.

Folks, I want to thank you for reading these last few days, and I truly do hope that you are able to say that you have learned a thing or two. Again, wish the gang good luck tomorrow as they convene onto the Joint New Law Conference, and here’s to hoping they put on one heck of a good show!

~Brice Moon~

The post The Road to California – The Finale appeared first on Follow My Vote.

With that said, let’s start with a little bit of background building. To this point, any time that a state wanted to adapt a new voting system, it had to have been approved by both state and federal agencies. However, the federal certification standards have been lagging behind for years now, a fact that is represented by the fact that the vast majority of voting still takes place via paper ballots. Actually, to add insult to injury, Los Angeles County is currently operating under a voting system only slightly upgraded from that used to elect President Richard Nixon in 1968. Oh, and just for good touch, in New York City, for their most recent mayoral election, what system did they happen to use? The good old lever-machine. For some, luckily, this was a system that was finally deemed unfit for today’s electorate, and that a new system should be put in place to encourage the usage of today’s technology to usher voting into the 21st century.

Enter Senate Bill 360. Drafted by now Secretary of State Alex Padilla, it was created to streamline the certification process while also creating more stringent standards than even the federal ones currently in existence. Better yet, this proposal wants to put in place a voting system that is open-source, eliminating the veil that exists with today’s voting systems. Padilla, in regards to the potential of an open source voting system, was quoted as saying that “a public voting system will be more transparent, instill public trust, be more accountable and provide greater access to all voters.” Why shouldn’t it be? As the system is in place to benefit the public at large, it makes perfect sense that the software provided should be open-source, because when one has the ability to see exactly what is going on, and be able to have the means to fix it should an issue arise, it only stands to deepen the trust involved with the system. At the end of the day, this is what S.B. 360 is all about…trust. Up until now, there hasn’t been any way to know whether or not the system is working, you just have to cast your vote and hope or pray that it gets counted as intended. California wants to ensure this is no longer the case, and what better a place than the home of Silicon Valley?

Thanks to Padilla and his supporters, and The California Association of Voting Officials, we at Follow My Vote have the opportunity in a matter of days to show the country that we have the solution they are so desperately seeking. A voting system that is intuitive, secure, and most importantly, completely transparent. The world of voting is coming upon a new horizon, and again, who better than California to be leading the charge?

The post The Road to California – Senate Bill 360 appeared first on Follow My Vote.

None of these scenarios come even close, though, to being the oddest occurrences in the game. In fact, there have been some problems with online and electronic voting that have just left people flabbergasted. There was the situation that just occurred very recently in Canada, with an entire set of municipal elections stalled due to human error resulting in the misnaming of the files that stored the votes. While it is certainly understandable that human error may occur at any time, for it to happen in a situation as important as this just shows how fragile the system truly happens to be. Or there’s the situation that occurred in Denmark in 2006, where using a process known as Van Eck Phreaking forced officials to ban electronic voting for the time being. This process happens when radio emissions from the voting machine’s monitor are captured, then able to be replicated, to some extent, on a remote monitor. Wij vertrouwen stemcomputersniet” (“We don’t trust voting computers”) was the group that carried out the experiments, and were able to convince voting officials that electronic voting machines simply were not up to the task. Bringing it back to the United States, there were multiple scenarios in the midterm election where, due to “calibration” issues, voters would select a candidate, only to have another candidate chosen.

So as you may be able to ascertain, the online voting game, to this point, has had it’s fair shares of ups, but an oppressive amount of downs. Unfortunately the attitude that has arisen out of these failures isn’t one of, “What can we do to fix these issues and move forward,” but instead a feeling of defeat. There are many among the public who believe that there is just no way, in today’s world, that secure and transparent online voting can exist. Take for example, the word of Ron Rivest, an MIT computer scientist and early pioneer of current cryptography. He, for one, believes that if the resources are available to maintain such secure and transparent results, then they shouldn’t be wasted on voting. Instead, they should be used for the Department of Defense, or the financial industry. Of course, he is correct, to an extent. The cryptographic technology used to aid Follow My Vote’s systems could have ramifications for a variety of fields, true. However, we feel that the timing is appropriate to assist with the voting industry because at the end of the day, this is what the foundation of our country is built on, the ability to choose those who represent us. Also, it is disappointing to see a gentleman, whose entire career is based on forward-thinking be so willing to completely dismiss the idea. Suffice it to say, perhaps he just isn’t willing to think outside of the box on this issue, or he just doesn’t hold voting in as high regard as, well, money or war.

However, we aren’t going to let this negativity slow down what we are trying to achieve. We do, in fact, believe that secure online voting can be done, and in the next post, we’re going to give you some insight into what exactly is allowing us the opportunity to prove ourselves.

~ Brice Moon ~

The post The Road to California – Part Four appeared first on Follow My Vote.

Estonia.

I’m going to let you lower the one eyebrow that is inevitably raised right now.

It is indeed true that Estonia, the former Soviet Bloc country, is one of the pioneers of widespread online voting. Established in 2005, their voting system has been adopted by nearly a quarter of the country’s electorate, and it is one that they actually believe in and support. It most definitely creates a positive picture for the system, but not everything is bright and cheery. In fact, one of the biggest concerns for the system is that it could be open to attack in a manner that is swift, silent, and nearly undetectable…from Russia. Tensions have been high between the two countries since the dissolution of the Soviet Republic over two decades ago.

In fact, researchers from Michigan University have proven that by using simple malware programs installed on voters computers, all they have to do is wait for the user to log in. After this, the highway for any changes to be made were wide open. They also discovered that by uploading a specific Trojan software to the servers responsible for these votes, they could take votes that were, for all intents and purposes, legitimate and turn them into votes for whoever they pleased, leaving the voter thinking their vote was counted as cast. While Estonia has claimed that these tests were faulty, and that they had the security protocols necessary to prevent such attacks, it nevertheless casted a shadow on the system. A big problem with the system is its lack of transparency, with the government only releasing bits and pieces of the source code to the public. This prevents the user from having their opportunity to detect any weaknesses in the system, and basically leaves the entire process to chance. This is one of the biggest issues…

Trust.

One of, if not the most important factors of voting is trust. In the midst of the entire process, trust is necessary to keep it going. We as voters have to trust that the system we are using allows our vote to, well, actually count as well as be counted as cast. Norway, a country known for its progressive nature, has recently taken its shot at the online voting game, albeit with less positive results than Estonia. One important takeaway from their attempt is that they did in fact allow the source code to be available to the public, that way the electorate had full access to the system they were using. Great start, but unfortunately there were a few flaws.

One, the system was unable to completely quell voter’s fears, ultimately leaving officials to declare the program didn’t do anything to add to the voter pool. Also, days before their elections in 2013, software experts cast their shadow of doubt over the program, claiming the random number generator for the voting algorithms were easily exploitable. These results led to the experts asking for the system to be scrapped and re-written to ensure better results. Oh, and the true insult to Norway’s method was the finding that nearly one percent of voters were actually able to vote twice, once online, and then again in person, with both votes being counted. Ouch. For these reasons, Norway’s online system has in fact been shut down, and any attempts to reinstate the process must be rewritten and brought bac to Norway’s Parliament for approval.

This continues to show that Follow My Vote’s focus is in the right direction. The biggest flaws with the voting system today involve safety, security, and transparency. Unfortunately, all attempts to this point have only addressed one or two of the issues, never truly all three. Join me next time as we take one more look at some of the issues surrounding online voting, and why some experts claim the system can never work logistically. Until next time, readers.

~ Brice Moon ~

The post The Road to California – Part Three appeared first on Follow My Vote.

Voting.

To this day, in the United States, the vast majority of us are still using paper ballots or antiquated touchscreen systems to cast our votes. It’s embarrassing, to say the least, and we all know the issues with paper; namely ballot stuffing, hanging chads, scanning problems, the list is not small. That doesn’t mean that people haven’t been trying to fix the system…quite the contrary, really. Across the world, attempts have been made to usher in a new-age of voting, to varying degrees of success. I’m here today to share with you some of these attempts, and discuss what exactly has gone wrong, and what we can learn from their mistakes to ensure they don’t get made again.

Actually, to be completely honest, America does have an online voting system in place. In fact, nearly 3 million people were expected to have the ability to vote online for the midterm elections a month ago. These people were mostly members of the military, or overseas personnel currently abroad…or Alaskans. However, it must be pointed out, and I can not stress this enough, that while these people may be able to vote over the internet, they are doing so with the understand that they are waiving their rights to a secret ballot, and that faulty transmissions are not out of the question. Basically, the whole system is a crap shoot, no better than any systems that we have in place today. What is the point of even voting if there is no guarantee that it is going to be counted? This is only the most important of civic duties after all, and I’m pretty sure those who choose to engage in it would like to know that their vote counts.

In Alaska’s case, let’s just say that you’ve read, understood, and signed the waiver. The vote has been placed, submitted as a PDF, and sent back to the election commission representing your district. Along that path, though, cybersecurity experts were, in less than a day, able to develop a system that allowed the PDF to be temporarily intercepted, changed, and then sent along its merry way. Worst of all, this was all done while leaving the user in the dark and having them think that their intended vote was what made it through. Secure? No. Safe? Nope. Transparent? Absolutely not. While the effort must be applauded for merely just giving it a shot, this is a dart that didn’t even really hit the board.

Of course, this isn’t the only instance in which the United States has taken a crack at the online voting game. In 2010, Washington D.C., our lovely capital city, developed a pilot program intended to allow absentee voters the opportunity to vote online. It was then left open to the public to attempt to find any issues with the program, and lo and behold, in less than 24 hours, multiple groups had successfully hacked the system, changing votes and performing other various acts of prankish villainy (electing HAL 9000 as the council chairman). More frightening, though, was the noticing that multiple groups from China and Iran had gotten their way through some of the security protocols as well, turning this experiment into a problem of national security. Again, the ideals of safety, security, and transparency had been compromised, and the program was abandoned for the near future.

I think this is a good stopping point for today, please check back in later for a deeper look at some systems that have been tried outside of the United States, because some countries have actually found a semblance of success in their methods.

The post The Road to California – Part Two appeared first on Follow My Vote.

Folks, we are presenting this piece to you as we stand on the forefront of a potential breakthrough. If you’ve happened to view the news in the last few days, you may have noticed that humanity has landed a probe on Comet 67P, discovered how to use the Internet to produce telepathy, and (per a Scottish distillery) recently returned a batch of whiskey that remained on the International Space Stations for three years. Put shortly, we’ve been making huge strides in technological advancement here recently. In just under two weeks, the world will get its first glance at another new piece of technology. Is it as revolutionary as some of the other items just mentioned? Well depending on your definition of “revolutionary”, then maybe or maybe not; but it has the potential to change the face of democracy as we know it. While that may sound a tad hyperbolic, consider this for a second. What if we told you that on December 11th, in Sacramento, California, people would get their first true look at a new voting platform that is completely open source, transparent, and secure? Now we’ve got a big deal on our hands.

The post The Road To California, Part One appeared first on Follow My Vote.

Of all of the eligible voters who could have participated on the 4th, only 36.3 percent of them did so, and the question that the nation is left wondering…is why? Well, turns out there may be a few reasons, most of all topped by a sense of disillusionment with The White House, and Washington in general. In fact, according to exit polls provided by ABC News, nearly 56 percent of respondents were disapproving of the Obama administration, and 65 percent of people felt that the country was heading in the wrong direction. Now, this is disheartening. If people are not happy with how the country is being run, then why aren’t more people out trying to change it? Apathy? Anger? People perhaps believing that their vote really can’t change much? Well, I’m sure there isn’t one sure answer, however, it is still a problem nevertheless. Obama has said that he heard everyone’s voices, not just of those who voted (granting the Republican party majority control), but also of those who did not, the people who deem the situation so fubar (look it up) that it isn’t salvageable. I guess only time will tell, but one thing is for certain. America, a country based on democratic people, has a voting problem, and it’s one that needs to be fixed.

~Brice Moon~

Read the full article.

The post The Miserable Case of Voter Turnout appeared first on Follow My Vote.