Report: Online voting possible, but challenging

[unhappycamper]

Report: Online voting possible, but challenging
By Leo Shane III, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Friday, January 2, 2009

WASHINGTON — Election officials could use faxes, e-mail and online programs to more quickly deliver voter registrations and ballots to overseas voters with minimal risk, according to a study released last week.

But the report notes that tallying votes through the Internet or faxes still carries considerable security questions. Researchers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology acknowledge that the methods would speed up the overseas voting process but say those problems would require considerable attention to solve.

"It’s really going to be up to election officials to decide what risks they’re willing to accept," said Andrew Regenscheid, co-author of the NIST study. "It’s not always easy to say which option works worse than the others."

The report, funded by the Election Assistance Commission, took more than a year to compile. NIST officials called the study the first to identify the potential threats to various voting system options, and hope it will be used as a baseline for future improvements.

Military Postal Service Agency officials said they returned more than 520,000 absentee ballots worldwide during the presidential election cycle this year. Typically the ballots take several weeks to travel from downrange bases to local election offices.


Rest of article at: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=59742