In their editorial Modern times, ancient system, the Winnipeg
Free Press recommends internet voting as a means of increasing
voter turnout. Senior city hall elections official Marc Lemoine
has also expressed an interest in online voting. As a computer
engineer who teaches web programming courses I would urge them
to reconsider. Internet voting would be much less secure than
our current system and would mean the loss of a physical record
of votes for auditing purposes. We would also lose the ability
to verify that each vote was cast by a unique voter. For
example, a parent might be tempted to ask their 18-year-old
children if they could vote on their behalf, or vice versa.
Recently, election officials in Washington D.C. invited security
experts to test an internet voting system designed for overseas
voters. Within 36 hours a team of computer scientists from the
University of Michigan had compromised the system, allowing them
to read and change recorded votes. One member of the team, J.
Alex Halderman, had this