Can Blockchain Make The Elections Fair?
7 out of 10 Americans do NOT trust the election process according to a survey taken by Gallup in 2017. Whether it’s the Russian hacking situation or our election going to the highest bidder on Wall Street, there is a lot of distrust. The US has a fairly up to date voting system, imagine countries that don’t? In Asia Pacific, Middle East, and Africa only 15% of people say that the system is working. Blockchain is the technology that could solve this trust and corruption issue.
Why Blockchain?
Blockchain is decentralized, much more secure, and instant. Imagine watching the election unfold as every single vote is cast. Imagine being able to vote from your phone. Imagine a system where nobody can fudge the numbers. You don’t have to imagine any of this, it is already here and already being used.
West Virginia has already tested a new blockchain voting app in various counties and plans to have it statewide by November elections. This new app will allow those out of state, such as those serving overseas, to vote. Agora, a Swiss lab and foundation with a focus on digital democracy, has just overseen the presidential election in Sierra Leone. These are the first two implementations of blockchain in elections and certainly won’t be the last.
Countries around the world are having serious discussions about the implementation of blockchain in their elections. Of course, like any election, there are two sides. Marian K. Schneider, president of Verified Voting, a U.S transparency nonprofit, is one of the people that express concern. One of her concerns is if questions arise how can we complete an audit? She also fears issues of potential malware or denial of service attacks. A researcher for the European Union Think Tank, Philip Nicholas Boucher wrote:
“Many experts agree that e-voting would require revolutionary developments in security systems. The debate is whether blockchain will represent a transformative or merely incremental development, and what its implications could be for the future of democracy.”
The internet has created a high demand for transparency and has been exposing everyone. Blockchain applications will grant much-wanted transparency to our election systems. Russia’s VTSIOM, which is the Public Opinion Research Center plans on using blockchain to conduct exit polls during the country’s presidential election. Before their election poll had been shut down by hackers. Valery Fyodorov, VITSIOM’s general director stated that she hopes the blockchain system will “reduce the effectiveness of hacker attacks, & ensure the transparency of the process of data collection and aggregation.”
Blockchain is unable to be tampered with by one party. Since each block is connected to the other, a hacker would have to change all of the blocks in order to change one piece of information. But this doesn’t stop malware or spyware which could be already installed on a device. It also doesn’t stop people from blocking the internet connection to prevent voting.
Both West Virginia and Agora provide excellent registration protection and remote voting. This may help solve two problems in the voting system, voting turnout, and voter fraud. Voter fraud and low turnouts are problems that are plaguing many countries including the USA. There is an estimated 8,500 duplicate votes in the USA. This doesn’t seem like a lot, but when you consider George W. Bush won the election by 537 votes in Florida it’s a lot. Especially when there was an estimated 2,200 duplicate voters in the 2016 presidential election in Florida.
It was estimated that in the 2016 election a little more than 58% of eligible voters showed up in the USA. Smaller countries show much lower percentages. Experts predict that if voters have the ability to vote remotely, we would see a much higher turnout. In some countries like Venezuela this could also be a safer means of voting being how heated the elections get.
Cost is another gigantic factor. Applying blockchain would be worth the investment and save billions of dollars. One bulky voting machine in the US costs around $3,000. That machine by the way has been proven to be susceptible to hacking. Not to mention all of the trees that we could save. It would also allow employees and state employees to vote at work, saving your tax dollars.
Blockchain is going to make our elections more secure, faster, transparent, and save us money. It’s going to open up an entirely new world for us as voters and politicians as candidates.
