Is online voting in your e-future?
By Lisa M. Bowman, ZDNet News
dailynews.yahoo.com
The holy grail of e-voting -- casting ballots from home on the Net -- is years away, but thousands will be clicking away this presidential election.
Ken Lundie showed up to vote this year in a button-down shirt and tan cargo pants. Next time around, he wants to wear his pajamas.
Lundie is one of a thousand people testing out new online voting systems offered at polling places in San Mateo County, Calif.
Right now, the results are non-binding, and voters still have to go to their polling places to cast the online ballots -- as well as their official ballots. Lundie hopes election officials will find a way to let him vote online from home soon.
"I don't consider myself to be really computer literate, but it was so easy," said Lundie, who serves as one of county's harbor commissioners. "If I can do it, anyone can do it."
Online voting within a year?
Several companies are testing online voting systems in hopes of getting certified by the state for future elections.
The holy grail of electronic voting -- casting ballots from home via the Internet -- is still years away because of concerns about security and worries that people without computers won't have access.
Still, some form of electronic voting at polling places is expected to be in place within a year.
How it worked
San Mateo County's ballot system -- designed by Omaha, Neb.-based Election Systems & Software -- was relatively easy to navigate for the computer-savvy voter.
After checking in with election workers, voters obtained a random code they could enter into one of the Toshiba laptops provided by the county.
After logging in, voters could see a permanent box on the left-hand side of the screen that listed the various political races. They then could select from the list, or let the software take them through the entire ballot.
After voters selected a race, a box on the right side of the screen would display most of the choices. However, in order to see the entire list of candidates, voters had to scroll down the screen, a concept that might not be apparent to all voters.
For example, clicking on the presidential race yielded a list of the major candidates including Al Gore, George Bush, and Ralph Nader. However, a voter would have to actively use the mouse to see candidates listed from other parties.
The system did pose a challenge for people who weren't as tech-savvy.
One elderly man crouched over the computer to check it out, but wasn't familiar enough with a mouse to do the voting by himself. An election official had to walk him through the process, guiding his hand as he scrolled down the screen.
Can it crash?
Another county worker, who asked that her name not be used, said she didn't like it.
"If something goes wrong, what's the backup?" she asked, pointing out that when flooding crashed a vote-calculating system in a nearby town a few years ago, the ballots could be tabulated by hand.
She wondered if votes could be lost in cyberspace if the system crashed.
Online-voting proponents are trying to address those and other concerns.
Jim Adler, president of Bellevue, Wash.-based Votehere.net, which is conducting similar trials in San Diego and Sacramento counties, said the system provides at least as much security as the absentee ballot process by requiring a password and numerous authentication measures.
He said the system simplifies the process for voters and could save counties money because they wouldn't have to print as many ballots.
An 'evolutionary' process
Still, Adler said the reality hasn't lived up to the hype.
"This is going to happen in an evolutionary way," he said -- moving from voting via computer stations at polling places to voting via the Internet from home or work.
He predicted that his product will be certified by election officials in 40 states within a year.
Garden City, N.Y.-based Election.com, an online voting company that's not participating in the trials, already has shown off its system during the Democratic Primary in Arizona, the Democratic Convention, and the election of at-large members of ICANN (Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers).
Unlike in the test cases, which require folks to go to the polls, the ICANN and primary races allowed people to vote from home.
"What we offer is the ability to vote when you have time," said Election.com Vice President Bill Taylor. "What we've been doing all along is demonstrating the power of online voting from a remote perspective."
But fair-voting advocates have challenged the Arizona vote on the grounds that it discriminated against some people by making voting easier for those with computers. The case is still making its way through the courts.
Taylor countered the charges by pointing out that turnout among Hispanic and Native American populations jumped more than fivefold from the 1996 primary, when incumbent Bill Clinton was running unopposed.
A voting supplement
Plus, the idea behind electronic voting is to supplement current voting methods, not replace them, proponents say.
Some people predict Internet voting will boost turnout in general elections, too, especially among younger voters, a tech-savvy group that tends to have extremely low voter-participation rates.
But if online voting is ever going to take off in any major way, election officials will have to overcome public perceptions that hackers can get in and tinker with votes.
Even Lundie -- the San Mateo County voter who praised the new electronic method -- had some reservations.
"This is a big 'what if,' but I'd hate to get to a terminal, type in my code, and see it say, 'Sorry, you've already voted.' " he said. |
