[EM] danger of coercion (Re: First U.S. Scientific Election Audit...)

[Juho]

On May 17, 2007, at 7:07 , Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:

> At 09:07 PM 5/16/2007, Juho wrote:
>> On May 16, 2007, at 18:26 , Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
>> Yes, there are ways to *reduce* the possibility of a coercer
>>> verifying that the victim complied. None are guaranteed to work.
>>
>> What would be the most likely scenario where the coerced person could
>> not avoid being coerced? I'm assuming that a typical coercer would
>> not be a member in the team that counts the votes and he/she would
>> not have open access to the ballots.
>
> That's not reliable.

I asked for the most likely scenario. I'll take this to mean that  
maybe the most likely scenario is one where the coercer sits in the  
vote counting team.

>>  This would
>> be the same as having marked ballots! (Write-ins would be quite
>> recognizable but in most elections they are maybe not really relevant
>> and need not be supported. Write-in votes are also revealing in the
>> sense that the write-in candidates probably get relatively few votes
>> each.)
>
> Write-ins are considered essential to democracy here, bypassing the  
> nomination process.

An alternative method is to require potential additional candidates  
to collect a list of e.g. 1000 supporters before the election and  
thereby become "regular candidates".

>> In good voting methods/processes it should be and is quite hard to
>> prove to others how you voted yourself.
>
> It has always been relatively easy. To prevent it entirely, you  
> have to outlaw write-ins, you have to prevent all physical contact  
> between the voter and the ballot, and you still can't avoid the  
> possibility of special voting patterns, which will get easier to  
> pull off with Range. Even IRV makes it easier.

I propose simple ballots and separate ballots for each race in  
addition to what you said.

>> Of course cameras and video equipment should be banned in the voting
>> location. It is not possible to guarantee 100% that such recording
>> will not take place but one should try.
>
> I disagree. And nobody searched me for my cell phone when I last  
> voted.

No need to remove cell phones, just to make it clear to all that  
taking pictures is forbidden (maybe even punishable if extreme  
measures are needed).

>> Combining multiple elections in one ballot is a risk.
>
> Sure. But it is absolutely the norm. In fact, I've never voted in a  
> public election where there were not many races on the single ballot.

Bad design. I have never voted in an election with several races on  
one sheet. (Usually there has been only one race per election, but  
when there have been more the ballots have been separate.)

>> The risk of allowing access to the ballots to everyone is much
>> riskier than having multiple vote counters (maybe not local people)
>> each counting a small portion of the votes.
>
> You say so. What is the evidence?

No evidence, just the understanding that allowing the ballots to be  
inspected by whoever has interest, with sufficient time to do careful  
analysis and with whatever techniques may reveal something of the  
identity of the voters of the ballots.

> There is a lost performative in the last comment from Juho. "In  
> having multiple vote counters"....
>
> *Who* is going to "have" multiple vote counters?

The society. Sorry for my non-native English.

> The fact is that this is what I'm suggesting: multiple vote counters!
>
> Ballot imaging would put the public in the position of being an  
> election observer, to a degree.

The step of initial vote counting (and possibly imaging) may be even  
more critical point to safeguard.

> By the way, ever try to get correlated election data? Did people  
> who voted for Bush vote against the school bonds? That kind of data  
> has plenty of legitimate use. And you can't get it now, unless you  
> are willing to spend prohibitive amounts of money to get it....

Sounds a bit dangerous from privacy point of view. The next step  
could be to include the voter's profession, age etc. Better be  
careful with these.

Juho



		
___________________________________________________________ 
Copy addresses and emails from any email account to Yahoo! Mail - quick, easy and free. http://uk.docs.yahoo.com/trueswitch2.html