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Abstract
Casting a vote for the European Parliament from a cybercafe in India, a cruise ship in the Atlantic Ocan, a weekend cottage in the Alps or plainly at home from your laptop computer? This article tackles this question from a legal point of view. It examines the basic principles surrounding online voting. Are the conditions for democratic elections – such as the freedom to vote without undue influence or coercion of any kind, the secrecy of the vote, the integrity, reliability and security of the ballot box, the verifiability and audit ability of the voting process and the principle of one person, one vote – sufficiently met or do we run into legal obstacles? Does the introduction of an electronic or even online voting process jeopardize the principles of non‐discriminatory access to the election process? And what about the anonymity? How can one guarantee that a vote over the Internet is cast by the legitimate voter, all the while guaranteeing his privacy? The last chapter of the article analyses the current state of affairs within the European Union. Is the introduction of online voting merely a science fictional feature or really within reach?
Notes
Correspondence: Mieke Loncke, K.U. Leuven—ICRI, Leuven, Belgium; E‐mail: mieke.loncke@ law.kuleuven.ac.be.
This contribution is based on ICRI's legal research in the CyberVote project http://www.eucybervote.org. The legal research in this project has been performed by Mieke Loncke, Frederic Debusseré and Bart Van Oudenhove, under the supervision of Jos Dumortier.
California Secretary of State California Internet Voting Task Force Report January 2000 (USA)—http://www.ss.ca.gov/executive/ivote.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Ibid.
Article 2.1 of the International Convent on Civil and Political Rights states: ‘Each State Party to the present Covenant undertakes to respect and to ensure to all individuals within its territory and subject to its jurisdiction the rights recognised in the present Covenant, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status.’ Article 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states: ‘Everyone is entitled to all the rights and freedoms set forth in this Declaration, without distinction of any kind, such as race, colour, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status. Furthermore, no distinction shall be made on the basis of the political, jurisdictional or international status of the country or territory to which a person belongs, whether it be independent, trust, non‐self‐governing or under any other limitation of sovereignty.’ Article 7 of the same Declaration provides the following: ‘All are equal before the law and are entitled without discrimination to equal protection of the law. All are entitled to equal protection against discrimination in violation of this Declaration and against any incitement to such discrimination.’ Article 14 of the International Convent on the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms: ‘The enjoyment of the rights and freedoms set forth in this Convention shall be secured without discrimination on any ground such as sex, race, colour, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, association with a national minority, property, birth or other status.’ For example, article 10 of the Belgian Constitution prescribes the following: ‘There are no class distinctions in the State. Belgians are equal before the law; they are the only ones eligible for civil and military service, but for the exceptions that could be made by law for special cases.’ Article 11 of the same Constitution states: ‘Enjoyment of the rights and freedoms recognized for Belgians should be ensured without discrimination. To this end, laws and decrees guarantee notably the rights and freedoms of ideological and philosophical minorities.’
R Rivest ‘Electronic voting’, http://theory.lcs.mit.edu/∼rivest/Rivest-ElectronicVoting.pdf.
Techniques have been developed to enable voting from a (specially adapted) mobile phone, eg the CyberVote project, for more information see: http://www.eucybervote.org.
Article 25 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights prescribes the following: ‘Every citizen shall have the right and the opportunity, without any of the distinctions […] and without unreasonable restrictions: […] To vote and to be elected at genuine periodic elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret ballot, guaranteeing the free expression of the will of the electors; […].’ Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights states the following: ‘(1) (2) […] (3) The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government; this shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which shall be by universal and equal suffrage and shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures.’ Article 3 of this Protocol to the Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms deals with the right to free elections: ‘The High Contracting Parties undertake to hold free elections at reasonable intervals by secret ballot, under conditions which will ensure the free expression of the opinion of the people in the choice of the legislature.’ For instance, the Belgian Constitution states in article 61: ‘The members of the Chamber of Representatives are elected directly by citizens who have completed the age of eighteen and who do not fall within the categories of exclusion stipulated by law. Each elector has the right to only one vote.’ Article 62 of the same Constitution: ‘The establishing of the constituencies or electoral colleges is governed by law. Elections are carried out by the system of proportional representation that the law determines. The ballot is obligatory and secret. […].’ Art. 63 §4 of the Constitution: ‘The law determines the electoral circumscriptions; it also determines the conditions required to be an elector as well as those for the carrying out of electoral operations.’
Internet Policy Institute, ‘Report of the national workshop on Internet voting: issues and research agenda’, 2001, http://news.findlaw.com/cnn/docs/voting/nsfe-voterprt.pdf.
L Mitrou, D Gritzalis and S Katsikas ‘Revisiting legal and regulatory requirements for secure e‐voting’, 2002, http://www.instore.gr/evote/evote_end/htm/3public/doc3/public/evote_paper_ SEC_2002_2.doc.
Directive 1999/93/EC of 13 December 1999 on a ‘Community framework for electronic signatures’ OJ L 013, 19 January 2001.
Rivest, op cit, note 6.
Programming mistakes, etc.
Electrical disturbance, hardware failures (central server, intermediate hardware, user hardware, etc.), network disturbance, server breakdown, hacking attacks, etc.
California Secretary of State, op cit, note 1.
Rivest, op cit, note 6
L Cranor ‘Electronic Voting, computerized polls may save money, protect privacy’ ACM Crossroads Student Magazine, April 1996, http//www.acm.org/crossroads/xrds2-4/voting.html.
Mitrou, op cit, note 10.
'E‐voting security study, issue 1.2', 2002, http://www.edemocracy.gov.uk/library/papers/study.pdf.
L Cranor and R Cytron ‘Sensus: a security‐conscious electronic polling system for the Internet’, 1997, http://lorrie.cranor.org/pubs/hicss/.
The CyberVote project claims to be one of the most innovative and secure systems available. For more information see: http://www.eucybervote.org.
P Neumann ‘Security criteria for electronic voting’ 1993, http://www.csl.sri.com/users/neumann/ncs93.html.
http://www.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/20000002.htm.
http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/about-us/researchpub.cfm.
http://www.electoralcommission.org.uk/about-us/may2003pilots.cfm.
Ibid.
http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/ers/intro.htm.
http://www.electoral-reform.org.uk/topstories/elecvoting.htm.
http://www.local-regions.odpm.gov.uk/egov/index.htm.
E.g. mousemats, clips to attach onto the computer, ….
B Watt ‘Implementing electronic voting, a report addressing the legal issues raised by the implementation of electronic voting’, http://www.lcd.gov.uk/elections/e-voting/pdf/legal-report.pdf.
http://www.edemocracy.gov.uk/home.php.
http://socio.ch/intcom/t_hgeser12.htm.
www.geneve.ch/chancellerie/E‐Government/e‐voting.html.
http://www.geneve.ch/chancellerie/E-Government/e-voting.html.
‘Der Bundesrat kann die Kantonsregierungen ermächtigen, für die Ermittlung der Wahl‐ und Abstimmungsergebnisse mit technischen Mitteln von diesem Gezetz Abweichende Bestimmungen zu erlassen. Wahl‐ und Abstimmungsverfahren mit technischen Mitteln bedürfen der Genehmigung des Bundesrates.’
http://socio.ch/intcom/t_hgeser12.htm.
http://www.riga.lv/minelres/NationalLegislation/Estonia/Estonia_ElectParl_excerpts_English.htm.
http://www.vm.ee/eng/kat_175/2972.html.
University of Maryland, Towson University, ‘Electronic voting research project’, http://www.bsos.umd.edu/gvpt/lawonline/journals/lolj2/LOLPAPER1a.doc.
Ibid.
C Lavin ‘Internet voting and preserving anonymity’ San Francisco Chronicle, 17 April 2000, p 23.
Office of the Deputy Prime Minister ‘Implementation of electronic voting in the UK, a report addressing the legal issues’ http://www.local-regions.odpm.gov.uk/egov/e-voting/01/03.htm.