Traps in electronic election voting

Published in the Australian Financial Review 18 July 2016

Malcolm Turnbull, Bill Shorten and many others are calling for electronic voting in Australia (“Leaders call for e-voting as count meanders,” July 11).

As the most experienced online voting practitioner in Australia, many may expect I welcome this call. In fact, I see serious danger for democracy.

The NSW Electoral Commission’s iVote system, used in the 2015 state election, is touted by some as a success. Actually all 280,000 votes harvested by iVote were exposed to tampering risk. No votes were genuinely verified as authentic. The scientific evidence is clear. iVote is not a safe solution for government voting. I agree fully with the many security concerns expressed by respected network security scientists, such as University of Melbourne’s Vanessa Teague in her various publications and media comments on iVote. No one has a safe answer yet for remote online voting in government elections.

The NSWEC has not acknowledged or denied its iVote re-voting security flaw. Just 1.7 per cent of electors attempted to use its flawed vote verification process and all who did risked loss of anonymity. The NSWEC has not released statistics on re-voting in the 2015 election or other essential data required to assess the election integrity. The NSW Electoral Matters Committee has delayed its routine hearing following its call for submissions until the end of the year.