# Blockchain tech for votes **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [October 10, 2017, 1:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478 "2017-10-10T13:06:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 1:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/81 "2017-10-13T13:42:23Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Hey, **Okrahoma** , aside from your proposal here, what do you think of the voting system in which every eligible voter is mailed a ballot, which they can then fill out at their leisure and mail back in? I don’t like it. It completely removes the anonymity of the vote, has no counting transparency, and is subject to ballot stuffing. > [@](#): > > Seems like this addresses many of your intentions in the system you are proposing. No need to show up at a voting booth. Every voter has a chance to vote. Authenticity of the ballot can be established with simple measures, like having a unique identifier on every ballot mailed out (and returned). So, why doesn’t this solve any voting problems you are concerned about? See above. And one of the most important things I am concerned about is the transparency of counting the votes. Blockchain voting allows you, me, and millions of other people to see/count the votes, and the votes database is tamper-proof. No other system does that. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/82 "2017-10-13T14:00:30Z")
So, your main interest is to let the public count votes in elections? ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/83 "2017-10-13T14:05:25Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > So, your main interest is to let the public count votes in elections? Fully transparent votes. Votes are stored in a public archive that is tamper-proof and open to inspection/recount by anyone. Do you see something wrong with that? ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/84 "2017-10-13T14:09:58Z")
Well, I’m trying to figure out why it is worth the effort. Are you looking for evidence that Donald Trump stole the election, and the boards of elections of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin were in on it? ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/85 "2017-10-13T14:13:46Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > Why go to personalities though? For that exact reason. > [@Okrahoma](#): > > That is why I suggested that the issuance of keys, destruction of undistributed keys, and distribution of keys be supervised by all the interested parties. Closely. All the keys generated are recorded in the blockchain. All destroyed keys are recorded in the blockchain. That way any key that is recorded as a voting transaction can be checked to have been generated and not destroyed. OK, you were in the room when the keys were issued, you watched very closely… I guess that’s your plan? However, now that the election is over and done, Citizens for Okrahoma have declared that, despite being able to count they votes as often as they’d like, they don’t think the 200 votes I have over you came from legitimate voters. How do you convince them they you actually lost the election? > [@Okrahoma](#): > > Once that is done, though, there are no more points of failure. Any voter holding a token can vote. His vote cannot be falsified. And the total results can be verified by anyone, openly, at any time, and all the tallies will match. The inference from CfO is that BobLibDem, being the partisan hack that he is, secretly implanted malware in the token generator that assigned 250 of the 1000 tokens to fake voters and stored the private keys on a hidden thumb drive that he retrieved later. When you viewed the key associations the malware made it look like they were assigned to legitimate voters, but they really weren’t. How do you verify that this didn’t happen and calm your supporters? ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/86 "2017-10-13T14:18:53Z")
> [@Ravenman](#): > > Well, I’m trying to figure out why it is worth the effort. Are you looking for evidence that Donald Trump stole the election, and the boards of elections of Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Wisconsin were in on it? It really doesn’t inspire confidence in our election system when each recount gives a different number of votes. “Recount until our guy wins” shenanigans certainly do not. The system is opaque. Whenever it was somewhat exposed (“hanging chads” anyone?) it was just shown to be more and more ridiculous. Blockchain voting would would eliminate that. Why would you object? And more fundamentally, there is the “does my vote count?” problem. When the error factor in counting votes is in hundreds if not thousands, that really makes your one vote meaningless. ---
**Author:** ![Khendrask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/3e96dc/32.png) [@Khendrask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Khendrask)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/87 "2017-10-13T14:22:23Z")
Honestly, this is just a plain silly idea. It is incomprehensible, over-complicated, and would completely disenfranchise potential voters who are not tech-savvy. ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/88 "2017-10-13T14:24:11Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > The inference from CfO is that BobLibDem, being the partisan hack that he is, secretly implanted malware in the token generator that assigned 250 of the 1000 tokens to fake voters and stored the private keys on a hidden thumb drive that he retrieved later. When you viewed the key associations the malware made it look like they were assigned to legitimate voters, but they really weren’t. Can’t do that. All the keys generated are recorded in the blockchain and timestamped at the time of generation. All undistributed (destroyed) keys are recorded in the blockchain and timestamped at the end of key distribution. All assigned keys are recorded in the blockchain and timestamped at the time of assignment. The recording of these keys is public, transparent, and the blockchain cannot be tampered with. That’s the whole point of blockchain. You cannot add the extra keys to the blockchain later. It is all fully verifyable. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:28pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/89 "2017-10-13T14:28:09Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > Can’t do that. All the keys generated are recorded in the blockchain and timestamped at the time of generation. All undistributed (destroyed) keys are recorded in the blockchain and timestamped at the end of key distribution. All assigned keys are recorded in the blockchain and timestamped at the time of assignment. The recording of these keys is public, transparent, and the blockchain cannot be tampered with. That’s the whole point of blockchain. You cannot add the extra keys to the blockchain later. It is all fully verifyable. How do you distribute these publicly recorded keys? And what about this invalidates the claims of CfO, that BobLibDem secretly distributed 250 of the keys to himself? eta: To clarify, the accusation isn’t that BobLibDem generated fake keys, it’s that he generated real keys for phony voters, but made it look like the keys were for real voters. ---
**Author:** ![Ruken](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f475e1/32.png) [@Ruken](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ruken)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/90 "2017-10-13T14:32:39Z")
Other issues aside, one barrier is the ignorant refusing to fight their own ignorance: > [@Ravenman](#): > > I’m not going to read up on the technology any more than I already have ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/91 "2017-10-13T14:33:31Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > How do you distribute these publicly recorded keys? Post #44. All distributed keys are recorded in the blockchain at the time of distribution, and the registered voters are checked off in the registration books or however those records are kept. > [@](#): > > And what about this invalidates the claims of CfO, that BobLibDem secretly distributed 250 of the keys to himself? You cannot “secretly” record these keys in the blockchain. The recording is fully public and transparent. Anyone can watch these being recorded. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/92 "2017-10-13T14:34:20Z")
I found a [couple](https://www.csoonline.com/article/3138869/security-awareness/fraud-and-privacy-problems-on-the-blockchain.html) of [articles](https://blockgeeks.com/public-blockchain/) about potential fraud and privacy problems with blockchain technology. ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/93 "2017-10-13T14:37:25Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > Post #44. All distributed keys are recorded in the blockchain at the time of distribution, and the registered voters are checked off in the registration books or however those records are kept. So in this case, you looked at all the generated keys and made sure they matched up with valid SDMB accounts? > [@Okrahoma](#): > > You cannot “secretly” record these keys in the blockchain. The recording is fully public and transparent. Anyone can watch these being recorded. You’re recording the private keys in the blockchain? ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/94 "2017-10-13T14:39:47Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > So in this case, you looked at all the generated keys and made sure they matched up with valid SDMB accounts? I made sure that the number of keys distributed and recorded was the same as the number of registered voters marked off as having received them. As I watched them receiving them. > [@](#): > > You’re recording the private keys in the blockchain? No. Public keys. Why would you need to record private keys? ---
**Author:** ![steronz](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/steronz/32/11765_2.png) [@steronz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/steronz)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/95 "2017-10-13T14:43:08Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > I made sure that the number of keys distributed and recorded was the same as the number of registered voters marked off as having received them. As I watched them receiving them. What do you mean “watched them receiving them.” Was this done in person? > [@Okrahoma](#): > > No. Public keys. Why would you need to record private keys? You wouldn’t. You distribute them. In this case, the accusation is that some number were distributed to a thumb drive. In secret. Secretly recorded to a thumb drive. ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/96 "2017-10-13T14:46:31Z")
> [@steronz](#): > > What do you mean “watched them receiving them.” Was this done in person? Yes. That one failure point - distribution of keys - has to be watched in person by observers from all parties. Later voting doesn’t have to be done in person. > [@](#): > > You wouldn’t. You distribute them. In this case, the accusation is that some number were distributed to a thumb drive. In secret. Secretly recorded to a thumb drive. Can’t. It’s done in person. Physically. People come in and leave with the keys. And each is marked off as having received them. The keys they received are publicly, transparently, recorded in the blockchain at the time they are distributed. You can put as many keys as you want on the thumb drive, but if they are not recorded in the blockchain, they are useless. And you cannot add them to the blockchain later because it is tamper-proof. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/97 "2017-10-13T14:54:34Z")
As noted in one of the links I provided, blockchain tech works best when the two sides of the transaction know and trust each other. How do you get people to trust the government? ---
**Author:** ![Okrahoma](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/90db22/32.png) [@Okrahoma](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Okrahoma)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/98 "2017-10-13T14:56:40Z")
> [@Czarcasm](#): > > As noted in one of the links I provided, blockchain tech works best when the two sides of the transaction know and trust each other. How do you get people to trust the government? As I already pointed out, there needs to be some trust of government at some point or points in the process. The scheme I proposed minimizes the need for that trust to one point in the process (distribution of keys) and adds supervision and verification at that one point. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/99 "2017-10-13T14:59:17Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > Yes. That one failure point - distribution of keys - has to be watched in person by observers from all parties. Later voting doesn’t have to be done in person. If the voting isn’t done in person, what stops people from handing over keys to friends and/or family? What stops the homeless from handing over keys for a bit of cash or some cheap booze? ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [October 13, 2017, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478/100 "2017-10-13T15:01:33Z")
> [@Okrahoma](#): > > It really doesn’t inspire confidence in our election system when each recount gives a different number of votes. “Recount until our guy wins” shenanigans certainly do not. The system is opaque. Whenever it was somewhat exposed (“hanging chads” anyone?) it was just shown to be more and more ridiculous. Blockchain voting would would eliminate that. Why would you object? > > And more fundamentally, there is the “does my vote count?” problem. When the error factor in counting votes is in hundreds if not thousands, that really makes your one vote meaningless. Two thoughts: first, you seem to be starting with a solution rather than a set of requirements. I think the logical first question is, “Should the world be able to inspect every ballot cast in our elections?” If the answer is yes, then we should design the system to do so. If the answer is no, your block chain idea, and all other similar concepts, are moot. Second, in the list of issues with our electoral system, I don’t think an OCD-like insistence that all vote recounts be identical to the number rates as an actual problem. > [@Ruken](#): > > Other issues aside, one barrier is the ignorant refusing to fight their own ignorance: That comment was based more on the OP’s initial reluctance to further explain his proposal by asserting that everyone else should spend their time researching his genius rather than him putting in an effort to make a case for it. His attitude has changed as this thread goes on. But tell me: do you feel compelled to do a lot of research on every thread started on this board? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478.md?page=4) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/blockchain-tech-for-votes/798478.md?page=6)