Security of Online Voting

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2015/04/new-south-wales-attacks-researchers-who-warned-internet-voting-vulnerabilities

A New South Wales parliamentary election was held a few weeks ago, and it featured an Internet voting system, called iVote, which made access to the election easier for disabled and rural voters. As might be expected with any online voting system, there were doubts about security of iVote before the election took place. Specifically, researchers “warned that the NSW system had not sufficiently addressed potential security concerns. The election went on, and some of those eligible to cast their votes on iVote did so. Not surprisingly, it turned out that the system was vulnerable attack. The same researchers who had warned about the possibility of security issues have discovered security flaws in iVote. Of roughly 4.5 million votes cast, up to 66,000 were vulnerable to this security flaw. The flaw made it possible for attackers to intercept and change votes cast using the Internet voting system.

This is not the only instance of an online voting system being vulnerable to attack. Estonia’s I-voting system, which has been in used in Estonian elections in varying degrees since 2005, has been shown to have multiple vulnerabilities. Security researchers recently published a paper analyzing the security of the system. They concluded that “there are abundant ways that such an attacker could disrupt the voting process or cast doubt on the legitimacy of results,” and recommended that “Estonia discontinue use of the I-voting system.” Perhaps it is not currently feasible to create a secure online voting system.

There are other issues with online voting besides the voting systems themselves. For a vote to have integrity, the voter’s own computer must be secure against vulnerabilities, and free from viruses that may manipulate their vote. For every voter’s computer to be secure seems far less practicable than building a secure online voting system in the first place. Considering the possibility of viruses and other means of tracking, there are also concerns about the anonymity of online voting. Although our current voting process isn’t perfect, it seems less flawed than an online voting solution.

Since the world is becoming increasingly connected, it might at first make sense that so too would our voting process. But given what seems to be inherent security issues with such systems, and the paramount importance placed on the integrity of accurate elections, it is easy to conclude that online voting is not a good idea.