I am a software engineer but only one person my idea would need more people to implement and get a prototype made.
Humans can't be trusted to do the right thing. Humans say moot or no standing. Humans print extra ballots. Humans block other humans from observing. Humans abuse SOFTWARE that was made by other humans to be exploited.
Machines do as they are programmed to do. Restrict functions and access at all possible points and pair with other forms of checks and validation then you have something that is almost unfraudable.
My idea "self checkout" and self auditing.
Make all ballots cast public. Let people see their ballot online and verify it is in its original state. Open source.
Places that are red states will need these machines to stay red.
Places that are traditionally red but inexplicably went blue need these machines.
This is how we continue to have rights when no else will stand up for us.
We know the voting machines are the problem, so what are we waiting for? Let's get rid of those and put in our own.
I don't think it will cost that much to make. Really need simple hardware, less functionality the better. I don't think it will take that long with a few people - look at what u/doggos did!
Some pedes are running for office, some of us have different skills that can be put to use.
WHY DON'T WE?
Voter ID, Pen, paper, and an jnked finger. Done.
There's actually already of pretty solid voter machines, 3rd party verifications, printed receipt, and a clear audit trail.. That's why the "elected" officials will never use those machines. Can't buy you're way into office with transparency.
How do you prevent people from counting them incorrectly? Or destroying the ballots they don't like? Or keeping observers from seeing the counting?
I just don't trust humans at this point to be decent or honest. The less access other people have to each ballot, the better.
Same argument applies to voting machines. Only instead of a black box of code, paper has an auditable paper trail.
If you can't trust humans to count, why would you trust humans to code the counting machines with even less transparency?
The machines I have in mind -
Vote on the machine, get a receipt with your vote and a unique ID for your ballot. These never connect to the internet. Totally closed with one receipt in the machine, one paper receipt kept under lock and key, the last receipt you take with you.
Still hashing out the way to get the voter to directly upload their vote without anyone else handling it at any point.
Once results are posted you use your ID to look up your vote to make sure it wasn't changed. . If it was, then there would be a way to remedy it based on your receipt, the other paper receipt and other situational information.
Use a number of different checks - # of people through the door vs # of votes cast at that location. Random phone count updates throughout the day so any abnormal spikes in data would become obvious. Simple things to add security outside of the machines.
Microsoft made a voting machine with a variety of audit trails and verifications. Basically their India devs made something based off their non-retarded voting standards in India.
But the 2 main issues are; no matter what a human you can't trust will be involved and election security is weak by design. We could easily improve elections in a hundred different ways, but having terrible election standards is the goal.
I know just enough about technology/code to know how the future is stupid and has far more vulnerabilities than old tech like paper. It's a miracle half this technology works at all. A physical paper trail that can't be hacked, deleted, or digitally adjusted or miscalculated by some minor code issue (which happens all the damn time).
I agree, most technology is terrifyingly insecure.
That's why a closed system machine vote + 2 separate paper trails, one of which decentralizes the power of whoever thinks they can rig the election by giving it to the voter directly.
It would be very simple code under the cover. VERY SIMPLE.
I'm not sure what you mean by ' election security'
And yes, live data uploaded in real time + party observers to report on machine numbers periodically throughout the day from the closed system seems pretty secure to me, no?
With other dumb technology added in.
Smart technology + dumb technology = win?
Yes. Wanting to let people have control over their votes at all times.
Making it difficult to fake a vote.
Stuff like that.
TYpically with grant funded surveys, I have seen the counters actually use two people for manual data input off of survey sheets. If each of them made the same entry for each item on the survey it was considered valid. If the two data entry people input different answers for the same question it would have to be resolved.
Biggest issue I see is registration process. Every precinct in this country should update voter rolls and stop registration days to weeks in advance and every precinct should make public the number of registered voters in that precinct. There should NEVER be any question over the denominator!
I agree. This is a huge problem beyond just a machine and everyone should be putting in effort to try and solve our help someone else solve.
A number of things could be done to prevent someone from voting twice in person and perhaps from voting via mail and in person.
The problem would be dead people 🤷♀️ or people that don't exist voting.
I don't have an answer for that.
I do think that a system could be created to cross check data from different states to prevent someone being registered in more than one state or location though.
Fuck voting machines! Paper ballots with scanners/counters that have no ability to be connected to the internet. Results phoned in and witnesses from both parties swarming over all of it.
You realize what you said, right?
In places like maricopa county, they did paper ballots and the reason they ended up with dominion machines was because of " over voting" and other problems " with the machines not reading the vote" which I think was all created by them making voters use certain markers on the ballots to purposefully cause machine reading problems.
The machines I have in mind -
Vote on the machine, get a receipt with your vote and a unique ID for your ballot. These never connect to the internet. Totally closed with one receipt in the machine, one paper receipt kept under lock and key, the last receipt you take with you.
Still hashing out the way to get the voter to directly upload their vote without anyone else handling it at any point.
Once results are posted you use your ID to look up your vote to make sure it wasn't changed. . If it was, then there would be a way to remedy it based on your receipt, the other paper receipt and other situational information.
Mandate observers, put in different random time checks and counts to compare # of voters that come through the door to # of votes on computer.
Like you said, phone results ahead of usb data.
There are lots of ways
It's also about stopping the spread of those machines meant to commit fraud by giving a strong alternative
You're right.
That's why I make the machines known to the voters and have the voters demand them/ know the machines were refused.
What happens after that?
There are legislatures who probably see the writing on the wall, if they don't do SOMETHING NOW they will just be cheated out of office and they will never get it back.
Goodbye to everyone's states
That's pretty good motivation, I think.
Not everyone is evil, just most.
Lastly, they don't use the same machine for eternity. Someone could sign a contract for a few years then decide for whatever vs reason they need to switch again.
It's a game to most, right? What better way to play the long game then to basically guarantee people to trust you by pretending to fight for them and then be like a politician and stab then in the back afterwards 🎉
Heck idk, I'm not a politician.
If someone is trying to get this off the ground, how would one become involved to help out?
That would be me. By myself, apparently lol.
You can dm me I can send you more specific info.