The Case for Networked Remote Voting Precincts

Voting in national elections from the comfort of one’s home computer may never be practical or secure, but we argue that remote network voting can be both practical and secure. Provisional and postal absentee ballots, which trade some amount of anonymity for the ability to determine the eligibility of a distant voter, serve as a template for how electronic remote voting might proceed. We propose the “remote voting center”: a governmentoperated facility located in embassies, consulates, and other remote areas where voters might normally need to vote by mail. Each remote voting center would maintain one or more electronic voting systems and a registration system. A voter presents identification to the registrar on site and is then directed to cast a ballot in a private electronic voting booth. The cast ballot is encrypted and forwarded to the registration system, where it is wrapped with the voter’s identifying information. This double enclosure is signed by the voting center and posted publicly where it can be examined and canvassed by officials in the voter’s home precinct. If and when the ballot is accepted, it can be combined with existing tallies using standard cryptographic techniques to preserve the voter’s anonymity. The resulting system has privacy properties comparable to provisional voting in a local polling place, and represents an improvement over postal voting by offering the voter privacy in a supervised voting center.