Haley Horan, DGPNet Facilitator

posted: 3 January 2006

Original Query: Ahmed Ghanem, UNDP Egpyt

Dear colleagues,

UNDP Egypt is elaborating a project introducing an electronic voting system in the country. During the last elections the voting had been operated according to the traditional manual proceedings. Taking into consideration the numerous advantages of electronic voting systems, UNDP will work with the Government to assess the needs of the polling stations, to build the capacity of the polling agents and to provide technical assistance on different aspects of the introduction of electronic voting.

Thus I would like to ask you to share any lessons learned and knowledge about projects involving introduction and implementation of electronic voting systems. In addition, we would like to organize study tours for relevant officials to selected countries, where electronic voting was particularly successful. We would also like to know how the necessary software and hardware requirements were effectively developed and implemented.

Thank you,

Ahmed GHANEM

Programme Analyst

UNDP-Egypt

Responses were received, with thanks, from:

• Serdar Bayriyev, UNDP Turkmenistan
• Lenni Montiel, UNDP Vietnam
• Pradeep Sharma, UNDP India
• Noha El-Mikawy and George Akl, SURF-AS
• Ivar Tallo, E-Governance Academy, Estonia, DGPNet External Advisory Group
• Linda Maquire, BDP/DGG, NY
• Alan Budde, ABA-UNDP International Legal Resource Center (ILRC)
• Raul Zambrano, BDP/DGG, NY(off-line contribution)

Summary of Responses:

• UNDP will become increasingly involved in electronic voting programming as more e-governance projects are being implemented worldwide (including in the Arab States region). Comparative experiences were shared on the design, implementation and evaluation of e-voting systems from developing (India, Brazil, Venezuela, Mexico) and developed countries (Estonia, USA, Canada, Australia, Ireland). Additionally a wealth of resources were identified for further research, including Electronic Voting Best Practices, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, June 2004; and presentations on e-voting from the 2004 Manila meeting on Electoral Systems and Processes; and Analysis of an Electronic Voting System.

• Member contributions balanced a measured degree of optimism on the benefits of e-voting (e.g., e-voting might increase voters’ turn-out; saves paper; may enhance voter independency; speeds up counting of votes, etc.), with cautionary notes on the shortcomings of this technology, which coupled with other deficiencies in the electoral processes, may seriously adverse effects on elections’ fairness and transparency. For a comprehensive discussion of risks and challenges of e-voting, auditing of e-voting systems, as well as examples of countries with e-voting projects, please see E-Voting as a Tool Enhancing Good Governance of the Election Process; CONSOLIDATED REPLY: Suriname/ Comparative Experiences / Electronic Voting Systems and Study Tours; Administration and Cost of Elections (ACE) (special in focus feature: e-voting).

• In response to CO Eqypt’s query, the UNDP-ABA IRLC prepared a memo covering a range of information including the experiences of several countries in implementing suche-voting systems,descriptions of the voting mechanisms,particular issues raised in designing the system including electionintegrity, and a compilation of anti-electronic voting resources. Two specific issues which are highlighted as of being particular concern are security and use of paper. Security is mentioned both in terms of the program’s source code being uncompromised as well as the system’s protection against voting fraud during the election. Some experts recommend the use of paper receipts of electronic votes as an extra layer to protect against fraud or error. Others see the conservation of paper as one of its main advantages over the old system, which can reach up to several thousand tons for a national election in a populous country.

• An assessment of Egypt’s current electoral process and its needs is a key prerequisite to establishing an e-voting system. In, E-Voting as a Tool Enhancing Good Governance of the Election Process, colleagues from SURF-AS provide a current political analysis of the country, calling attention to several obstacles which cannot be overcome by introducing a new technology, but whose resolution requires a long-term holistic approach. Some of the country’s most pressing problems include: the public’s lack of trust in the electoral system; inaccuracies in voters’ lists; lack of gender sensitivity in the electoral process; high incidents of rigging votes; weak civil society’s capacity to monitor elections; weak or non-existent research capacity on e-voting and electoral processes at large. Moreover, the current institutional framework of state electoral bodies, political parties and civil society must be examined in order to assess the country’s capacity to introduce e-voting. A needs assessment on e-voting systems must take into consideration all of the above.

• SURF-AS recommends specific steps which UNDP Egypt could undertake to prepare for the improvement of the country’s electoral processes and for the introduction of e-voting. One crucial task for UNDP Egypt to consider in relation to the e-voting project is a multifaceted needs assessment composed of: a user-centered analysis; a context-centered analysis (based on the specifics of the local political context); a monitoring and evaluation analysis (with clear, measurable and verifiable standards); analysis of training needs; institutional framework; assessment of country’s capacity to introduce e-voting (in-country knowledge, research capacity and existing technology technology, literacy levels, computer literacy levels, etc.). The overall recommendation is to start small “testing” e-voting during local elections (for instance in one particular governorate such as Giza, Cairo, Qena or Alexandria), or on sports’ clubs or professional syndicates’ elections.

• Study Tours Recommendations: The difference between e-voting at the polling stations (where the voter uses electronic technology at the polling place) and remote e-voting (where the voter casts his/her vote over the internet of phone) has implications for the purpose of study tours, project design and implementation. In the former case Brazil and India have been recommended for a study tour; and in the latter Canada and Estonia.

* India: the last general election in the country was 100% based on e-voting.Nearly 1 million EVMs were deployed for 672 million registered voters. The battery-operated machine costs $100, it is simple to operate and not dependent on erratic power supply; easy to transport, and it saves paper. Economics is hugely in favour of EVMs as it more than recovers the cost of paper used for printing ballot papers, and can be (However, see also cautionary note of the ILRC that the use of paper receipts of electronic votes as an extra layer to protect against fraud or error). The Electoral Commission (EC) of India has also computerised huge amount of data onvoters These EVMs used in India were not networked. They had to be physically transported to a central place for counting of votes and announcing results. In India, political parties have accepted EVMs without any protest, a sign of ther faith in the EC of India and in the country’s electoral processes. In August 2004 there was an agreement between UN EAD and the Election Commission of India under which the latter would provide technical assistance required. See also Electronic Voting in India, FAQs, presentation by Pradeep Sharma during Global Practice Meeting on Electoral Systems and Processes, Manila, November 2004; India’s Electronic Voting Machine. Contact: Pradeep Sharma, UNDP India Pradeep.sharma@undp.org.

* Brazil: By the end of 1994, Brazil's Superior Electoral Tribunal (TSE) had prepared the specifications for an electronic voting system and in the 1996 elections, about 30% of the Brazilian voters were able to cast their vote with a Direct Recording Electronic Voting System (DRE), called "urna eletr?a". The use of these urnas eletr?as in Brazilian elections grew progressively from election to election, until it reached the totality of precincts. By the 2000 and 2002 elections more than 400 thousand electronic voting machines were used nationwide in Brazil and the results were tallied electronically within minutes after the polls closed. Data was transferred on secure diskettes or via satellite telephone to central tallying stations. These in turn transmitted data electronically over secure lines to tabulating machines in the capital, Brasilia, where the results were consolidated and announced within hours. For more information see www.tse.gov.br; www.observatorioelectoral.org, and The Role of ICT in Building Trust in Governance, p. 34-36. Contact: Pl�o de Assis Pereira plinio.pereira@undp.org.br, UNDP Brazil

* As one of world’s leaders in e-governance, Estonia was recommended as a possible study tour destination, particularly for an example of remote e-voting (last year, Estonia conducted the first country-wide remote electronic elections for local government). The Estonian e-Governance Academy is already cooperating with Egyptian authorities on related project in Fayoum region and a study tour is planned for March 2006, with trainings scheduled at the Academy. There is a possibility of additional officials joining this study tour group. Contact: Ivar Tallo, e-Governance Academy.

* For more comparative experiences and other potential study tours destinations, please review DGP-Net CONSOLIDATED REPLY: Suriname/ Comparative Experiences / Electronic Voting Systems and Study Tours and the resources section of this document.

Resources:

From the Network Archives:

CONSOLIDATED REPLY: Suriname/ Comparative Experiences / Electronic Voting Systems and Study Tours

Recommended Contacts/Resource Persons:

• Cairo University’s Parliamentary Studies Center: the director Ali El-Sawi has published extensively on electoral systems in Egypt and the Arab world

• Cairo University’s Center for the Studies of Developing Countries: the center has had a focus on developing country politics and its capacity for comparative analysis of electoral systems in conjunction with UNDP and IDEA (Stockholm) can be easily developed

• Al-Ahram Center for Political and Strategic Studies: it has been pioneering in polling and political process analysis. Its capacity may be strengthened together with UNDP, the Oslo Governance Center and IDEA (Stockholm).

• International Foundation for Elections Systems

• Pradeep Sharma, UNDP India

• Ivar Tallo, e-Governance Academy, Estonia

• Pl�o de Assis Pereira plinio.pereira@undp.org.br , UNDP Brazil

• Harvard University, Kennedy School of Government, Professor Jean Camp (jean_camp@harvard.edu or 617-233-6658). He participated in the capturing of best practices in the symposium organized by Harvard in 2004.

• The Irish Independent Commission on Electronic Voting: Secretary to the Commission, Kildare House, Kildare Street, Dublin 2, Email: info@cev.ie, Tel +353-1-6184833, Fax +353-1-6184839.

Comparative Experiences:

Brazil

• www.tse.gov.br

• www.observatorioelectoral.org.

• Tribunal Superior Eleitoral http://www.tse.gov.br/

• Description of the system: http://brazilembassyinindia.com/e-voting.htm

• http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,61654,00.html

• Paper & Security - http://www.cic.unb.br/docentes/pedro/trabs/election.htm

• The Role of ICT in Building Trust in Governance, p. 34-36

India

• Election Commission of India http://www.eci.gov.in/

• Description of EVM http://www.eci.gov.in/EVM/index.htm

• http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3493474.stm

• http://www.indian-elections.com/electoralsystem/electricvotingmachine.html

• Security, http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_16/b3879074.htm

Estonia

• http://www.vm.ee/estonia/kat_175/pea_175/2972.html

• http://www.vvk.ee/engindex.html

• http://www.vvk.ee/elektr/docs/Yldkirjeldus-eng.pdf

• http://www.ega.ee/

USA

• The Carter Baker-Report “Building Confidence in U.S. Elections” Report of the Commission on Federal Election Reform, USA. September 2005. http://www.american.edu/ia/cfer/report/report.html

• The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) Report on Security Problems With Electronic Voting Systems (GAO-05-956) http://reform.house.gov/UploadedFiles/102105VotingGAO.pdf and/or http://reform.house.gov/UploadedFiles/GAO-05-956.pdf

• US Congressional Committee on Government reform to the GAO Report on Security Problems With Electronic Voting Systems

• http://reform.house.gov/GovReform/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=35848

• Election Reform and Electronic Voting Systems (DREs): Analysis of Security Issues Congressional Research Service ˜ The Library of Congress, USA

• From EPIC – Electronic Privacy Information Center http://www.epic.org/privacy/voting/crsreport.pdf

• An assessment and validation report of the Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machines from four vendors, done for the Ohio Secretary of State, USA http://www.sos.state.oh.us/sos/hava/compuware112103.pdf

• Report to the Maryland General Assembly, USA, on e-voting http://www.raba.com/press/TA_Report_AccuVote.pdf

• Electronic Voting Hotlist, http://lorrie.cranor.org/voting/hotlist.html

• National Science Foundation Internet Voting Workshop 2001http://lorrie.cranor.org/voting/ipi-voting-report.pdf

• Maryland State Board of Elections(Annapolis), http://www.elections.state.md.us/, http://www.elections.state.md.us/citizens/voting_systems/index.html

• SBE Risk Assessment http://www.dbm.maryland.gov/dbm_publishing/public_content/dbm_search/technology/toc_voting_system_report/votingsystemreportfinal.pdf

• Maryland Security Action Plan http://www.elections.state.md.us/pdf/SBE_Final_Action_Plan.pdf

Ireland

• Independent Commission on Electronic Voting and Counting at Elections, http://www.cev.ie/

• http://www.cev.ie/htm/report/first_report.htm. The first report of the Commission on Electronic Voting, 2004.

UK

• http://www.parliament.uk/post/pn155.pdf. This briefing note looks at options for using new technologies in voting, focusing on the pros and cons of internet voting and the implications of such a radical change in the way that elections are conducted.

Austalia

• Electronic voting and counting. Australian Capital Territory Electoral Commission's http://www.elections.act.gov.au/Elecvote.html

• http://news.com.com/Global+lessons+in+e-voting/2009-1008_3-5387540.html

Costa Rica

• Tribunal Superior de Elecciones http://www.tse.go.cr/menu_votoelect.html

• http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/102297costarica.html

Venezuela

• http://www.venezuela-referendum.com/

• http://news.com.com/Global+lessons+in+e-voting/2009-1008_3-5387540.html

• http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4487686.stm

• http://www.oas.org/main/main.asp?sLang=E&sLink=http://www.upd.oas.org . Observations from the Venezuelan experience. The link briefly summarizes the findings of an OAS (Organization of American states) technical mission to Paraguay to observe the electronic voting process and the Remote E-Voting in the Netherlands.

Mexico

• http://www.iimahd.ernet.in/egov/ifip/jun2003/article1.htm. This paper assesses the ICT driven potential as it relates to Mexico’s initial experience with online citizen participation mechanisms. The paper concludes by arguing, as a basic proposition, that the elevated quantity of citizen generated information derived from online citizen participation mechanisms has positively informed law and policy making and safeguarding processes in Mexico.

Council of Europe

• Recommendation Rec (2004)11of the Committee of Ministers to member states on legal, operational and technical standards for e-voting, September 2004 https://wcd.coe.int/ViewDoc.jsp?id=778189&Lang=en

• Critique: http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/voting/coe2004.shtml

Association of Central and Eastern European Election Officials

• http://www.aceeeo.org/

• http://www.aceeeo.org/projects/e-voting.html

Policy Papers and General Resources

• Practice Meeting on Electoral Systems and Processes in Manila in 2004, UNDP

• Analysis of an Electronic Voting System, IEEE Computer Society Press, May 2004, http://avirubin.com/vote.pdf. This paper provides an analysis of US paperless e-voting system which shows that this system is far below even the most minimal security standards applicable in other contexts. It identifies several problems including unauthorized privilege escalation, incorrect use of cryptography, vulnerabilities to network threats, and poor software development processes. As a result, voters can cast unlimited votes without being detected by any mechanisms within the voting terminal software. Other flows of any paperless electronic voting system have been reviewed suggesting that the best solutions are voting systems having a “voter-verifiable audit trail,” where a computerized voting system might print a paper ballot that can be read and verified by the voter.

• E-Voting as a Tool Enhancing Good Governance of the Election Process, SURF-AS, by Noha El-Mikawy, Research Support by George Akl.

• Toolkit for E-government, Canadian Center for Management Development, November 2002. The document provides references to best practices and lessons learned in implementing e-governance in general, i.e. providing citizens with expanded access to information and more opportunities for participation in decision making through ICTs.

• Administration and Cost of Elections (ACE), Ace Project.

• The Role of ICT in Building Trust in Governance, Inter-American Development Bank, November 2005.

• E-voting Security, Johns Hopkins University, by Avi Rubin

• Voting and Elections, Iowa University, by Douglas W. Jones

• E-voting, News and Analysis form the Experts, http://www.evoting-experts.com/

• Election Incident Reporting System (EIRS) is an integrated set of computer tools for recording and analyzing information about voting problems before, during, and after elections https://voteprotect.org/?jsc=1

• Accurate Voting, http://accurate-voting.org/

• National Committee For Voting Integrity http://www.votingintegrity.org/

• Verified Voting.org, http://www.verifiedvoting.org/

• Paper vs. Electronic Voting Records http://euro.ecom.cmu.edu/people/faculty/mshamos/paper.htm

• Power point presentation on steps and tools to be taken care of when designing an e-voting system, http://www.louiseferguson.com/files/evotingPPFergusonL.ppt.

• The Need for Usability of Electronic Voting Systems, http://www7.nationalacademies.org/cstb/project_evoting_acm-sigchi.pdf

• This paper provides interesting analysis on electronic voting and discusses, highlighting important questions for Voters and Policy Makers.

• Electronic Voting Best Practices, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, June 2004

• Putting People First, The Importance of User-Centered Design and Universal

• Usability to Voting Systems, http://www7.nationalacademies.org/cstb/project_evoting_wq_sjl.pdf. This white paper discusses why usability and the user experience should be the starting point for the design of any voting system and how user-centered design and universal usability principles are critical to the development of voting systems. The purpose of this white paper is to explore the issues of how to best implement usability and accessibility in voting systems.

Responses in Full:

Pradeep Sharma, UNDP India

CR to Suriname should be able to address most of your questions. In particular, you can refer to the website of India's Election Commission. Last general election was 100% based on E-voting -nearly 1 million EVMs were deployed for 672 million registered voters. The machine costs $100, learning on it is simple, it is battery operated and hence not dependent on erratic power supply (particularly useful for India), easy to transport, saves paper (nearly 7700 tons!), and software is sealed and if tampered with gets destroyed. Economics is hugely in favour of EVMs as it more than recovers the cost of paper used for printing ballot papers. EC has also computerised huge data of voters.

Though I will be hesitant giving full credit to EVMs, to a large extent drastic reduction in booth-capturing and associated violence in last general elections was due to EVMs. All political parties have accepted this without any protest because they have inherent faith in the Commission and electroal processes. But remember, these EVMs are not networked. They have to be physically transported to a central place for counting of votes and declaring results.

In August 2004 there was an agreement between UN EAD and the Election Commission of India under which the latter could provide any technical assistance required. We could help you with study tours but will have to consult Election Commission beforehand.

Let me know if you need any further information / help with regard to your query.

Noha El-Mikawy, SURF-AS

Please find the link to the consolidated reply to your request on e-voting which SURF-AS has prepared with the much appreciated support of SURF-AS research and knowledge team officer George Akl http://content.undp.org/go/practices/governance/share/Research---Discussion-Papers/download/?d_id87583&g11n.enc=O-8859-1&src=v. We will be happy to respond to any further inqueries that you may have and we stand ready and willing to assist in the further development of the activities planned by your country office in this regard.

Ivar Tallo, e-Governance Academy, Estonia

A happy new year to you too, this time from Sharm el Sheik! I am enjoying Egyptian winter at Red Sea for couple of days with unfortunately limited internet connection despite promises. As it happens I was in Cairo and Fayoum a month ago on behalf of Estonian government because they have promised some foreign assistance to Egypt and wanted me to check out for the ideas. Since the task was to create a project for Fayoum region, I spent most of the time there but I had meetings also in Cairo, met with minister of Administrative reform dr.Derwish and people from the prime minister’s think tank as well as from ministry of telecommunication.

In short, my experience with Egyptian specialists was that in the central government level they are very good and ready to benefit from study visit to Estonia. I have recommended that to MFA Estonia as a possible project but due to previous commitments I think they will prioritize educational project in Fayoum. However, the governor of Fayoum and his deputy in educational matters are coming to Estonia at some time in March, April and e-Governance academy is going to have a short training program for them. If you are interested to sponsor couple of people to join him, we will certainly welcome it.

As to election experience, Estonia became the first country last year to have country-wide remote electronic elections for local government. E-Governance Academy together with Swiss Center of e-Democracy made a survey of these elections for the Council of Europe. We also have other materials about these elections but I don’t have them with me since I am on holiday.

Linda Maguire, UNDP/BDP, NY

Thanks for your query. It is a very interesting issue and one that is coming up more and more, particularly in the Arab States region. In terms of requirements for e-voting; auditing of e-voting systems; opportunities, risks and challenges of e-voting; potential risks in e-voting; and countries with e-voting projects, you should consult the Administration and Cost of Elections (ACE) website for a recent special in focus feature on the topic available at: http://focus.aceproject.org/e-voting. It goes into all of these issues, as well as guiding principles, cost implications and technological applications, and provides links to other resources, such as the draft recommendations on Standards on E-Voting by the Council of Europe (polling place e-voting, remote e-voting). The article also goes into depth on the experiences of 17 countries plus the EU which have tried e-voting initiatives.

In terms of study tours, it depends on what type of e-voting is being contemplated for Egypt. If it is a matter of polling place e-voting (where the voter uses electronic technology at the polling place)—which I am guessing is the case—then certainly the two cases that immediately spring to mind of developing countries with large populations and/or large geographic areas which have successfully implemented e-voting are India and Brazil. If what is being contemplated is remote e-voting (where the voter casts his/her vote over the internet or phone, for example), other countries would be more suitable, such as Canada or Estonia.

By the end of 1994, Brazil's Superior Electoral Tribunal (TSE) had prepared the specifications for an electronic voting system and in the 1996 elections, about 30% of the Brazilian voters were able to cast their vote with a Direct Recording Electronic Voting System (DRE), called "urna eletr?a". The use of these urnas eletr?as in Brazilian elections grew progressively from election to election, until it reached the totality of precincts. By the 2000 and 2002 elections more than 400 thousand electronic voting machines were used nationwide in Brazil and the results were tallied electronically within minutes after the polls closed. Data was transferred on secure diskettes or via satellite telephone to central tallying stations. These in turn transmitted data electronically over secure lines to tabulating machines in the capital, Brasilia, where the results were consolidated and announced within hours. For more information see www.tse.gov.br and www.observatorioelectoral.org.

In India, the Election Commission has since 1998 used Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs) in polling places. In 2003, all state elections and by-elections were held using EVMs. Encouraged by this the Commission used only EVMs for the 2004 elections. EVMs were used throughout India with a voter population of approximately 680 million. Over one million EVMs were used in these elections (Further information on the functioning of the voting machines is available at www.eci.gov.in/EVM). Also, Pradeep Sharma (pradeep.sharma@undp.org) of the UNDP-India office is a great resource on this issue. He presented the EVM during the Global Practice Meeting on Electoral Systems and Processes in Manila in 2004 (http://www.undp.org/governance/eventsites/electoral-manila/) and would be able to provide you more information. There are also other resources on the practice meeting website on the issue of e-voting, as this was on the learning day agenda and presentations were made on a variety or related topics (see the presentations at: http://www.undp.org/governance/eventsites/electoral-manila/papers.htm).

Serdar Bayriyev, UNDP Turkmenistan

The following document provides an overview of the e-voting system introduction and a case study of Brazil experience in this area (see Chapter

5): http://www.iadb.org/sds/doc/ROLE%2010%2D28%2D05finalweb.pdf

The "Toolkit for E-government" provides references to best practices and lessons learned in implementing e-governance in general, i.e. providing citizens with expanded access to information and more opportunities for participation in decision making through ICTs:

http://idbdocs.iadb.org/wsdocs/getdocument.aspx?docnum=626924

Lenni Montiel, UNDP Vietnam
Improving electoral systems and practices is a process that should never be stopped. There is always room for improvement in general. Certainly the introduction of electronic voting is an area that can bring a lot of benefits in the actual process of voting. The consolidated reply on the query from Suriname presented by the Network Facilitator is providing good examples of positive uses of e-voting and for country cases that you may consider visiting.

It is FUNDAMENTALLY IMPORTANT, however, not to get overenthusiastic about what electronic voting can do. You should not only look at benefits but also at the problems and difficulties that electronic systems of voting may create. During recent years the experience accumulated in a series of OECD countries is showing that appropriate measures need to be taken before considering that electronic voting per se is indeed safe, reliable, private and accurate, as many may claim (at least up to now).

I would like to complement the responses to the Suriname case with a series of reports and references raising awareness about the problems that e-voting may still be facing to guarantee security, transparent, fair, reliable and auditable elections.

1) Two key and very updated references on the subject associated also to the process of electoral reform in the USA:

The Carter Baker-Report “Building Confidence in U.S. Elections” Report of the Commission on Federal Election Reform, USA. September 2005. http://www.american.edu/ia/cfer/report/report.html

The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) Report on Security Problems With Electronic Voting Systems (GAO-05-956) http://reform.house.gov/UploadedFiles/102105VotingGAO.pdf and/or http://reform.house.gov/UploadedFiles/GAO-05-956.pdf

See also reactions from the US Congressional Committee on Government reform to the GAO Report on Security Problems With Electronic Voting Systems http://reform.house.gov/GovReform/News/DocumentSingle.aspx?DocumentID=35848

2) Other relevant official reports on e-voting from the USA case

Election Reform and Electronic Voting Systems (DREs): Analysis of Security Issues

Congressional Research Service ˜ The Library of Congress, USA

From EPIC – Electronic Privacy Information Center http://www.epic.org/privacy/voting/crsreport.pdf

An assessment and validation report of the Direct Recording Electronic (DRE) voting machines from four vendors, done for the Ohio Secretary of State, USA http://www.sos.state.oh.us/sos/hava/compuware112103.pdf

Report to the Maryland General Assembly, USA, on e-voting

http://www.raba.com/press/TA_Report_AccuVote.pdf

3) Other cases – Australia and Ireland

Independent Commission on Electronic Voting and Counting at Elections, Ireland

http://www.cev.ie/

Electronic voting and counting. Australian Capital Territory Electoral Commission's

http://www.elections.act.gov.au/Elecvote.html

4) On strengths and weaknesses of e-voting, in general……

E-voting Security. Avi Rubin. Johns Hopkins University. USA http://avirubin.com/vote/

Voting and Elections. Douglas W. Jones. Iowa University, USA

http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/voting/

Voter-verified paper ballots - http://www.verifiedvoting.org/

Electronic Voting http://www.notablesoftware.com/evote.html

E-voting experts BLOG

http://www.evoting-experts.com/

Election Incident Reporting System (EIRS) is an integrated set of computer tools for recording and analyzing information about voting problems before, during, and after elections https://voteprotect.org/?jsc=1

Accurate Voting - http://accurate-voting.org/

I hope the debate that is taking place in developed countries about security and reliability of e-voting will help you in assessing appropriately what you will suggest to the electoral authorities in Egypt.

Finally, a word is needed to address the issue of “conditions required” for the introduction of e-voting on a massive/national scale. This is not an easy issue since, even today, in many developing and transitional countries important parts of the population are not familiar with ICTs, not to mention issues related to power supply and the physical/administrative/security conditions needed for the appropriate operation and maintenance of the equipment not only on the election day but on the long run…..I will not get into this in detail, but I hope you will may appropriate considerations of these issues before embarking in the final decision of making huge investments on electoral equipment. In that sense, it will be useful for you to have a look at the 2005 report:

UN Global E-government Readiness Report 2005: From E-government to E-inclusion

UNPAN/2005/14. Department of Economic and Social Affairs. Division for Public Administration and Development Management

Alan Budde, ABA-UNDP International Legal Resource Center

In response to yourJanuary3rd query, the ABA-UNDP International Legal Resource Center (ILRC - http://www.abanet.org/intlaw/ilrc/) has prepared the following memo onElectronic voting. The report covers a range of information including the experiences of several countries in implementing suche-voting systems,descriptions of the voting mechanisms,particular issues raised in designing the system including electionintegrity and theuse of paper for receipts. Articles from the popular press are included as well as scholarly articles. The examples of India and Brazil are highlighted as examples of large countries thatare considered to have successfully adopted nationwide electronic voting systems. Estonia is highlighted as one of the first countries attempting to create a dual system which includes the option of voting over the internet. The experiences of the US and other countries which are in the process of implementing electronic voting to various degrees are included, as are several (mostly-US) anti-electronic voting sources which might offer some insight into possible challenges to prepare for. Finally, the International Foundation for Elections Systems is one of the foremost NGOs working in the area of elections. I understand that they may be in the process of working with the government of Egypt and may be worth contacting if UNDP is not already in communication with them.

If you would likemore information or the ILRC is able to further help you in any way, please let us know.

ABA-UNDP International Legal Resource Center

UNDP/Egypt—Electronic Voting

UNDP/Egypt’s query of 1/3/2006 concerned the design and implementation of electronic (or e-) voting systems, particularly in terms of providing the government with technical assistance to train workers and select an appropriate system. In response, the ILRC has prepared the following response, with a focus on the experience of Brazil and India in introducing electronic voting systems countrywide. The websites of both the Election Commission of India and the Tribunal Superior Eleitoral of Brazil[1] address e-voting. The report contains links to descriptions of the systems being used and articles from the press on the topic.

Two specific issues which are highlighted as of being particular concern are security and use of paper. Security is mentioned both in terms of the program’s source code being uncompromised as well as the system’s protection against voting fraud during the election. Some experts recommend the use of paper receipts of electronic votes as an extra layer to protect against fraud or error. Others see the conservation of paper as one of its main advantages over the old system, which can reach up to several thousand tons for a national election in a populous country.

Also useful may be the example of Estonia, which unveiled optional internet voting in its municipal elections in 2005. Additional resources from the United States, Costa Rica, Venezuela, Australia, and Europe can be found below. Finally a list of anti-electronic voting resources is listed.

A. India

Election Commission of India http://www.eci.gov.in/

Description of EVM http://www.eci.gov.in/EVM/index.htm

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3493474.stm

http://www.indian-elections.com/electoralsystem/electricvotingmachine.html

Security - http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/04_16/b3879074.htm

Paper - http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=dn3998

B. Brazil

Tribunal Superior Eleitoral http://www.tse.gov.br/

Description of the system: http://brazilembassyinindia.com/e-voting.htm

http://www.wired.com/news/business/0,1367,61654,00.html

Paper & Security - http://www.cic.unb.br/docentes/pedro/trabs/election.htm

C. Estonia

http://www.vm.ee/estonia/kat_175/pea_175/2972.html

http://www.vvk.ee/engindex.html

Description of system - http://www.vvk.ee/elektr/docs/Yldkirjeldus-eng.pdf

e-Governance Academy - http://www.ega.ee/

D. US National Sources

Electronic Voting Hotlist

http://lorrie.cranor.org/voting/hotlist.html

National Science Foundation Internet Voting Workshop 2001

http://lorrie.cranor.org/voting/ipi-voting-report.pdf

US Election Assistance Commission

http://www.eac.gov/sa_boards.asp?format=none

DC Board of Elections and Ethics

http://www.dcboee.org/

Maryland State Board of Elections(Annapolis)

http://www.elections.state.md.us/

http://www.elections.state.md.us/citizens/voting_systems/index.html

SBE Risk Assessment

http://www.dbm.maryland.gov/dbm_publishing/public_content/dbm_search/technology/toc_voting_system_report/votingsystemreportfinal.pdf

Maryland Security Action Plan http://www.elections.state.md.us/pdf/SBE_Final_Action_Plan.pdf

E. Other Countries

Costa Rica

Tribunal Superior de Elecciones

http://www.tse.go.cr/menu_votoelect.html

http://www.nytimes.com/library/cyber/week/102297costarica.html

Venezuela

http://www.venezuela-referendum.com/

http://news.com.com/Global+lessons+in+e-voting/2009-1008_3-5387540.html

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/4487686.stm

Australia

Australian Capital Territory Electoral Commission http://www.elections.act.gov.au/

http://www.elections.act.gov.au/Elecvote.html

http://news.com.com/Global+lessons+in+e-voting/2009-1008_3-5387540.html

Council of Europe

Recommendation Rec(2004)11of the Committee of Ministers to member states on legal, operational and technical standards for e-voting

30 September 2004

https://wcd.coe.int/ViewDoc.jsp?id=778189&Lang=en

critique: http://www.cs.uiowa.edu/~jones/voting/coe2004.shtml

Association of Central and Eastern European Election Officials

http://www.aceeeo.org/

http://www.aceeeo.org/projects/e-voting.html

F. Anti-electronic voting sources

Analysis of Electronic Voting System

http://avirubin.com/vote.pdf

National Committee For Voting Integrity

http://www.votingintegrity.org/

Rebecca Mercuri

http://www.notablesoftware.com/evote.html

Verified Voting.org

http://www.verifiedvoting.org/

Paper vs. Electronic Voting Records

http://euro.ecom.cmu.edu/people/faculty/mshamos/paper.htm

Thanks to all that contributed! If you have more information that you would like to share with the network on this topic, please send it to: surf-gov@groups.undp.org