Arizona City Plans To Allow Residents To Vote By Their Phones Using Blockchain Technology

City council members approved a pilot program on Aug. 26 that would look into utilizing block-chain technology as a secure form of voting from anywhere that would allow more participation in election.

“This pilot program will help us identify the feasibility and interest of using this technology in future City elections, and Council believes this could enhance accessibility, increase voter participation and streamline the election process,” according to Mayor Kevin Hartke.

The concept would first be tested in a mock election later this year for a three-week period after the city’s bond election on Nov. 2.

State law prohibits voting by phone, so the Arizona Legislature would have to act to make this a reality on a larger scale.

Link

It is beyond the purview of the OP to get into the specifics of what Blockchain is and how it works, but you can familiarize yourself with it here.
Note that Blockchain, while being one of the better technologies we have for securing database transactions, it is not perfect...
Once hailed as unhackable, blockchains are now getting hacked
...though it has improved since its inception.

As someone who makes his living as part of the tech industry, I appreciate technology and what it can do for us as a civilization. However, I have little to no trust for the corporations behind said technologies. I personally like the idea of voting from a mobile app on your phone. We have the technology to implement it and secure it up to the point the data reaches its destination. BUT, and it's a big BUT, we still have that one variable that makes digital voting even less reliable than paper voting.

The human element. Someone or something has to validate the myriad of issues that are inherent with ballots whether paper or digital. Blockchain may be an effective deterrent in the sending, receiving, and tampering of data, but either humans or AI must be able to change or expunge data at some level, and this is where nefarious activity can be introduced.

In my opinion, digital voting will not fix election fraud, and may even enable it on a much larger scale, unless we turn the whole process over to AI, but even then we still have the human element involved in programming that AI.

Just another way to enable mass voter fraud. The more complicated a system is the easier it is to cheat.

Blockchain is, at least in theory, immutable. Once you put the data on the blockchain it will be there forever. It will be impossible to change the data once it's there.

This will be a great solution.

It will not only increase accessibility to vote, it will also increase security!

Blockchains will make it incredibly difficult to hack even one vote, and the difficulty and resources needed will go up exponentially for each attempt after that.

originally posted by: Ohanka
Just another way to enable mass voter fraud. The more complicated a system is the easier it is to cheat.

You are correct, they will boast how secure it is but never mention that the voter rolls are fraudulent and that the system that "counts" the votes has some interesting "features" like voting for you if you forgot to submit your e-ballot and of course some manual over-rides to change vote tallies for who they "meant" to vote for.


If it is truly secure and fair, the DNC will be venomously against it. Time will tell.

originally posted by: grey580
Blockchain is, at least in theory, immutable. Once you put the data on the blockchain it will be there forever. It will be impossible to change the data once it's there.

I just refuse to think in absolutes...absolutely! (a bit of a joke there). If you would have told me of all the things that we're experiencing in the world and our country today, I would have said, absolutely not! That's impossible. And yet, here it is. When I think of the one immutable absolute, I think of math. No matter how you slice it, 2+2 is always, absolutely going to equal 4. Apparently there are those who no longer believe this, but rather that math, MAAAAATH!, is subjective.

I'm sure that there was many an expert at the pentagon who said to some general or stuffed suit, sir, it would be impossible to hack our new system! Impossible! To which the general would reply, you're certain smart computer guy? Absolutely, he would say. Then why, would reply the general, am I getting all these ads for boner pills.

originally posted by: infolurker

originally posted by: Ohanka
Just another way to enable mass voter fraud. The more complicated a system is the easier it is to cheat.

You are correct, they will boast how secure it is but never mention that the voter rolls are fraudulent and that the system that "counts" the votes has some interesting "features" like voting for you if you forgot to submit your e-ballot and of course some manual over-rides to change vote tallies for who they "meant" to vote for.

He/She, along with you are incorrect.

If it is a true blockchain model, it is not easier to cheat because of its complexity.

Now, I will meet you half way and say that if the initial system is designed to allow for corruption, then it will occur. That being said, one of the key features of blockchain is its highly transparent and can easily be audited.

User: Projectvxn, once wrote a thread on this very subject as a voting mechanism based off the premise of this sound technology.

I think it's a great idea.

a reply to: TheMirrorSelf

Well blockchain is math. And as far as I know there is only one way to mess with a network. But you'd need to have control of over 50% of the nodes on the network to make that attack. But since almost anyone can run nodes. You can decentralize control and mitigate those sorts of attacks. Plus people would know if it happened.

originally posted by: grey580
Blockchain is, at least in theory, immutable. Once you put the data on the blockchain it will be there forever. It will be impossible to change the data once it's there.

Blockchains are particularly attractive to thieves because fraudulent transactions can’t be reversed as they often can be in the traditional financial system. Besides that, we’ve long known that just as blockchains have unique security features, they have unique vulnerabilities. Marketing slogans and headlines that called the technology “unhackable” were dead wrong.

Link from OP

it will be an interesting thing to see who would oppose this type of accessibility. Blockchain is duplicated and can be verified at any and all points in the process, so cheating would be very labor intensive if it even could be done. Once folks realize what is needed to establish you are who you claim, they might start to rethink voter ID, but blockchain would be secure enough to use from a phone to vote. (IMHO)

I suppose it depends on what the desired outcome is. Secure elections, or an easy way to cheat.

a reply to: network dude

I suppose it depends on what the desired outcome is. Secure elections, or an easy way to cheat.

I think we both know the answer to that question.

No, blockchains are not easily hacked.

The article you posted focuses on exchange hacks and poorly maintained projects that were once susceptible to 51% attacks. We call those "# coins".

That's said, no blockchain tech is not ready for prime time and they aren't the one shot answer to universal voting and airtight security. I hope they succeed because the alternative isn't good. There is a hardware and human compotent to this that would have to be verified and secured.

a reply to: Klassified

Hacking on the blockchain can be done. But it's usually caught quickly and usually reversible with a hard fork.

originally posted by: grey580
a reply to: TheMirrorSelf

Well blockchain is math. And as far as I know there is only one way to mess with a network. But you'd need to have control of over 50% of the nodes on the network to make that attack. But since almost anyone can run nodes. You can decentralize control and mitigate those sorts of attacks. Plus people would know if it happened.

Well there you go...

Our gov. has billions invested in cloud computing, all they need is 51% or more of the blockchain.

that would be even more unsecured as dominion & smartmatic lol

originally posted by: projectvxn
No, blockchains are not easily hacked.

The article you posted focuses on exchange hacks and poorly maintained projects that were once susceptible to 51% attacks. We call those "# coins".

That's said, no blockchain tech is not ready for prime time and they aren't the one shot answer to universal voting and airtight security. I hope they succeed because the alternative isn't good. There is a hardware and human compotent to this that would have to be verified and secured.

Thank you. This is a much more realistic response to the OP and better addresses the points I was getting at.

originally posted by: grey580
a reply to: Klassified

Hacking on the blockchain can be done. But it's usually caught quickly and usually reversible with a hard fork.

Understood. I DO know something about Blockchain.

The purpose of the OP was not to knock Blockchain, but to show it is not impervious and the human element must be considered.

a reply to: imitator

The great thing about blockchain is that all the transactions are there. And a double spend would be noticeable. So even if they tried that. Everyone would know. It's on the blockchain and you can't hide it.

a reply to: Klassified

As I have done all my life, I will be in person voting, that is the way fair elections should be.