Matt Blaze

The Call for Presentations for the 2024 Voting Village is open! The Voting Village, held at DEFCON (Las Vegas, Aug 9-11, 2024), is the premier event for exploring voting technology, vulnerabilities, and solutions. We invite research and educational presentations on a range of election security and integrity topics; see the CFP here: https://www.votingvillage.org/cfp

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CFP — Voting Village

Voting Village
Jun 5, 2024 at 5:14amWeb
Show threadMatt BlazeJun 5, 2024

Also, we need your help!

The Voting Village is an independent event, funded mostly out of our pockets. We do not accept funding from election system vendors or similar entities that might compromise our ability to openly explore and publish about the security of voting systems (and how to improve them).

Please help us stay independent! We're a 501(c)(3); contributions are tax-deductible to the extent permitted by law.

Consider donating: https://givebutter.com/ZDfqzC

(Boosts appreciated!)

VOTING VILLAGE 2024 AT DEF CON 32

By Election Integrity Foundation Inc

Election Integrity Foundation Inc
Show threadJohnMasheyJun 5, 2024
@mattblaze
OK, worthy cause.
Show threadMatt BlazeJun 5, 2024
@JohnMashey Thank you!
Show threadJyrgen NJun 5, 2024

@mattblaze Good you are doing that!

But then, in my European eyes the problem is already in the term "voting technology". Technology in that place instantly makes the process intransparent and too difficult to analyse.
Good old paper ballots and manual counting (in which I participated a number of times) while anyone can observe the process, and the numbers and sums published in every step makes the process transparent and (in theory) even reproducible. (1/2)

Show threadJyrgen NJun 5, 2024
The US cannot get rid of their technology-riddled system, of course, because no one can make a good profit off paper ballots. (2/2)
Show threadJyrgen NJun 5, 2024
(Sorry if this comes across as adversarial. I assume you already know what I am saying here, and you cannot change the system. But maybe this plants a seed in someone else's brain in a place where such a decision might be due in the future. Like mine.)
Show thread2xfoJun 5, 2024

@jyrgenn paper ballots are too cumbersome to accurately count by hand in any election in any metro area.

Better to have machines do the bulk of the work and audit the results to limit the risk of failure. Hand marked and hand countable are great goals and good to have a backup.

Show threadJyrgen NJun 5, 2024
@RnDanger A great nope to that. We do exactly that, paper counting by hand, and it works. In an area with more people, you also have more people to do the counting. It works!
Show thread2xfoJun 5, 2024

@jyrgenn
I don't believe that but it's good if you're happy, i guess. Arizona tried to count ballots by hand and it was not feasible.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/elections/arizona-republicans-hand-count-ballots-price-tag-errors-mojave-county-rcna97769

Arizona Republicans wanted to hand-count ballots. Then they saw the price tag — and the errors.

An Arizona county has decided not to hand-count ballots next year, discovering that it would cost more than a million dollars and leave it with inaccurate results.

NBC News
Show threadJyrgen NJun 5, 2024
@RnDanger There is a price to it — work of volunteers, and to top that up, people working in public service who can be obliged to do the work.
To me, it is a sign of taking democracy seriously, not taking the cheap way out. (1/3)
Show threadJyrgen NJun 5, 2024

Where I was, we counted mail ballots; 10 people IIRC for a few thousand (dunno, in the order of 3000 or 4000) envelopes, each with a few ballots, depending on the exact election. Federal elections have a first and a second vote (I'll skip the details); then the city parliament and the borough parliament.

We started preparing at 14:30 or so, got to open the envelopes at 18:30, and were done some time between eleven and midnight. Also, a training, a few hours a few weeks before. (2/3)

Show threadJyrgen NJun 5, 2024
We get 50 € per person for refreshments, or if you are in public service and can count this as work time, 25 €. So, 500 € for about, say, 3000 voters. This does, of course, not take into account the whole organisation of the election including summing up all those results from the actual counting, but there shouldn't be a big difference between the systems. (3/3)
Show threadMatt BlazeJun 5, 2024
@jyrgenn Technology is used in elections everywhere in the world.
Show thread2xfoJun 5, 2024

@mattblaze @jyrgenn

😇 Lol