[geeks] geeks Digest, Vol 48, Issue 22

[William Kirkland]

Message: 3
Date: Wed, 08 Nov 2006 07:50:48 -0500
From: Phil Stracchino <phil.stracchino at speakeasy.net>
Subject: Re: [geeks] I just saw...

...

> The weakness of the punch-card or ScanTron ballots is that people can
> incompletely mark or punch them, or change their minds with one entry
> partly marked or punched, or vote for multiple candidates, or therwise
> spoil the ballot.  Personally, I think the obvious solution is  
> perfectly
> simple:  Have an "error-resistant" touchscreen voting machine that
> prints a ScanTron-type ballot, which the voter verifies represents  
> their
> intended vote and then deposits into a ScanTron vote-registering
> machine.  The possibility of voter error is all but eliminated, the
> voter can verify that their ballot was printed correctly, and the  
> paper
> ballots can be easily recounted, either via ScanTron again, or by hand
> as a check.  It's also trivial to do "spot checks" by picking a random
> machine from each precinct, hand-counting the ballots from its bin,  
> and verifying that they match the vote totals it recorded.

I like this idea! The "voting machine" would do no more than print a  
customized ballot with the voter's selections ... but we still need  
to be aware of the remaining insecurities of the system. It is still  
possible for election board representatives to falsify the ballots.  
Even so, the suggested system relieves many security concerns.

--
bill.kirkland at gmail.com