eVoting discussion between Geneva and MIT/Caltech Voting Technologies Project
eVoting discussion between Geneva and MIT/Caltech Voting Technologies Project
SHARE organized a transatlantic discussion combining low tech (voting) and high tech (internet) elements. On the Geneva side, home of one of the first successful internet voting implementations, Michel Chevallier started the discussion by giving an overview of the internet procedures and the status of the legislation. Prof Alexander Trechsel - live from Florence where he holds the Swiss chair for Federalist studies - commented on his experience studying the evoting procedures in Geneva, Zurich and EStonia. Michel Warinsky proceeded to give the audience an overview of the Internet architecture that was built for the vote.
On the US side, Ted Selker, professor at MIT, and co-director of the MIT/Caltech Voting Technologies Project, shared results from studying actual ballots in various parts of the country. Michael Alvarez, the author co-director and a world expert on voting based at Caltech, gave an analysis of forensic from ballots. Ron Rivest, a cryptography expert and prof at MIT, explained the technological challenges linked to the principles of voting in the US such as one person one vote and the voter isolation.
The videoconference was only the starting point of a dialogue between the 2 groups and virtual and physical exchanges will continue.
