Electronic Voting (E-Voting) as a term encompasses a broad range of voting systems that apply electronic elements in one or more steps of the electoral cycle. In conformity with the International IDEA Policy Paper “Introducing Electronic Voting: Essential Considerations” (December 2011) [http://www.idea.int/publications/introducing-electronic-voting/] this Focus On is concentrating on systems that support one or more of the following steps in the election or referendum process electronically: the recording, the casting and/or the counting of votes.
A very basic distinction has to be made between e-voting systems that are implemented in controlled environments (1) and e-voting systems that are (partially) implemented in uncontrolled environments (2):
(1) E-voting systems in controlled environments include such forms as punch-card voting, optical scans and DRE. They are characterized by the fact that voting is taking place in a physically supervised (by representatives of government or independent electoral authorities) place such as a polling station
(2) E-voting in uncontrolled environments means that the casting of the vote can take place anywhere outside a polling station, e.g. at home at a PC. The vote is then transmitted over the Internet (hereafter referred to as remote Internet voting), the television, telephone or mobile phone network. Another form of e-voting in a partially uncontrolled environment is kiosk voting. Hereby the voting machine is located in a public place that can only partially be controlled by election officials.
There is an ongoing discussion in many countries about e-voting. While some kind of e-voting is already widely used by society, organizations and private industry voting in non-professional/non-official polling, the situation is quite different when it comes to national elections and referendums. Several countries are considering the introduction of remote Internet voting and are running a variety of pilot projects (e.g. Switzerland). A few countries have concluded the testing phase and either refrained from introducing remote Internet voting (e.g. Norway) or they have introduced it as a standard voting channel (e.g. Estonia). Because of security concerns there is, in some countries, a strong opposition to any kind of e-voting, including voting computers in polling stations as well as the use of the Internet for voting at national elections or referendums. Voting machines in controlled environments that support the counting or recording of the vote are perceived as the less controversial forms of e-voting. They are used on a regular basis in several countries (e.g. Brazil, USA, India). However, there are also countries that explicitly refrained from using or stopped using voting computers (e.g. Germany, the Netherlands)
While the ACE Project does not recommend any particular type of e-voting to be used for national elections and referendums, the sections that follow explain several types of e-voting, give a historical overview and outline some basic requirements for additional consideration when introducing e-voting to the electoral process. This is followed by a presentation of the various stakeholders in the field of e-voting and a summary of benefits, risks and costs of e-voting. This “Focus On” ends with an overview of countries considering e-voting applications and an outlook into possible future developments. For more information on the use of technology in elections see the ACE Project topic area “Elections and Technology”
