Electronic Voting in Ireland Colm MacCárthaigh Irish Citizens for Trustworthy E-voting - www.evoting.cs.may.ie E-mail: colm -at- allcosts.net
Electronic Voting in Ireland
Colm MacCárthaighIrish Citizens for Trustworthy E-voting - www.evoting.cs.may.ie
E-mail: colm -at- allcosts.net
Before I begin
• Some photos are from www.ireland.com (and can be purchased there)
• Some photos are from www.electronicvoting.ie
• Other links:
• www.evoting.cs.may.ie
• www.cev.ie
• www.stdlib.net
Elections in Ireland - some background
• Proportional Representation by means of a Single Transferable Vote (PRSTV) specified in the constitution.
• An election occurs roughly every 2 years on average
• A referendum occurs roughly every 3 years on average
• Counts are centralised and lengthy
• Counts have a very high degree of scrutiny by international standards
• Polls are administered by the Government through the Department of the Environment, Heritage and Local Government but operated locally.
Elections in Ireland - some background
• Polling stations in local schools, sports centres and so on
• 1 Polling officer and 1 control clerk per ballot box. Roughly 50 ballot boxes per constituency
• 1 returning officer per constituency
• Roughly 30 counting officers per constituency
• Long voting hours (08:00 to 22:00)
• Electoral register is notoriously inaccurate
Reasons to use E-voting
• Enables voting for the disabled ✔
• Reduces voting error ✔
• Reduces counting error ✖
• Saves money ✖
• Looks better, advances society, e-government, etc. ?
E-voting timeline
• E-voting first examined and proposed in 1998
• First procurement round in 1999 (Nedap/Powervote are winners)
• E-voting trials in 3 and then 7 constituencies in 2002
• ICTE founded in May 2003
• E-voting scheduled for use nationwide in June 2004
• E-voting abandoned on May 1st 2004
Major E-voting issues
• No meaningful tests were ever performed, no end to end test.
• The only limited parallel tests actually failed, and the public were never told.
• The software has never been finalised and is under constant re-development.
• System had no functional specification.
• System had no acceptance tests.
Irish Citizens for Trustworthy E-voting
• E-voting activism did exist before ICTE
• Margaret McGaley thesis
• Joe McCarthy FoI requests
• Others too
• ICTE founded in May 2003 by Margaret McGaley
• First action was to start the mailing list, and announce ourselves to the world
• First real world meeting in July 2003 (over 100 subscribers by then)
Irish Citizens for Trustworthy E-voting
• Margaret and Joe, and the Labour party, present to a parliamentary committee in December 2003, twice.
• Committee asks Minister to suspend roll-out and all spending, but a week later reverses this decision.
• Contract for 7,000 machines signed the very next day.
• Contract for even more machines signed the next month.
• Through action and media attention issue heats up over next few months
Commission on Electronic Voting
• Following several debates in the parliament, Government finally concede a little and form the special Commission on Electronic Voting.
• Commission consists of 2 political appointees, a former high court judge, and the clerks of the upper and lower houses of parliament.
• Commission accepts over 165 submissions on the issue (less then 10 favour the system), asks various academics to analyse the issues.
• Reports on April 30th that it cannot recommend the system for use.
• Issues full report in December 2004, and then 2nd report in 2006.
Government Line
• Junior Government party decided to get out of the argument
• Government line has consistently been that the machines will be put to use following various changes (mainly the counting software), have never accepted the need for a VVAT.
• Government has at times resorted to outright lies.
• Government now saying the machines will be used in 2009, though it is not clear if anything is actually being done about this.
• Government changed its media campaign in response to us. Instead of Electronic voting being “easy for everyone”, the new campaign says “safe, accurate and reliable”.
What worked for us
• Not ever getting distracted by side-issues. By refusing to engage in meaningless arguments over money wasted, various reports and so on, simply constantly re-iterating the need for VVAT proved very successful.
• Open Collaboration - including press releases, media and legal strategies. There is little to fear when you have truth on your side.
• Political and Media awareness. Knowing the names of politicians, correspondents and other journalists can be very important.
• Having no money - being independent and grass-roots is a help with the media.
• ICTE supports E-voting, but only with a VVAT
What we could do better
• Hard to coordinate and channel a volunteer effort, requires a lot of dedication.
• More focus on the legal strategy and a call for an independent electoral commission.
• Help the E-voting issue internationally, particularly in Europe.
• Having realistic alternatives described can help win the media battles.
Current Status
• Government say they want to use the machines in 2009
• NEDAP say extensive and expensive modification required (initial speculation is at 20 million euro)
• Electronic Voting elections require more staff and cost more to run than traditional ones
• Electronic Voting would probably lead to queueing due to miscalculation on the number of machines required
• Public confidence in the machines at an all-time low due to hacking here in the Netherlands.
Current Status
• Machines still costing 700,000 euro a year just to store.
• More and more FoI material is coming in.
• ICTE and Digitalrights.ie cooperating on a potential legal challenge.
• Still no work within Government on the issue