Utah’s Online Caucus is Making Security Experts Cringe

Utah's Online Caucus is Making Security Experts Cringe

  • By Sydny Shepard
  • Mar 22, 2016

Security researchers almost unanimously agree that letting people vote online is not a very good idea. It is fraught with risks and vulnerabilities that could have unknowable consequences for the future of democracy. This week, Utah is going to give it a shot anyway.

On March 22, registered Republicans in Utah who want to participate in their state’s caucus will have the option to either head to a polling station and cast their vote in person, or log onto a new website and choose their candidate online. To make this happen, the Utah GOP paid more than $80,000 to the London-based company Smartmatic, which manages electronic voting systems and internet voting systems in 25 countries.

Smartmatic’s system allows people to register to vote online, when they do, they receive a unique PIN code to their mobile device or email, which they can use to vote on Election Day. Once their vote has been cast, the system generates another unique code, which voters can use to look themselves up on a public-facing bulletin board. Each code will match up to the name of a candidate, so people can check that they actually voted and for who they voted for.

As of the morning of March 21, 59,000 Utah Republicans had registered to take part in the online program.

Utah GOP chairman James Evans, who founded the idea, told WIRED that he was aware of the security risks, but believed that they seemed a little far-fetched. He also noted that as a private political party, the Utah GOP isn’t held to the same security standards as the government.

Still, security researchers are not swayed. While companies like Smartmatic may take every possible security precaution they can, it is nearly impossible to secure the laptops, smartphones and other person devices that voters will use to vote online. If they device running the voter’s website is infected with malware, there is no telling what could happen.

It makes sense that we would want to move to an online voting process, as President Obama recently brought up at the South by Southwest conference, the current voting system disenfranchises many Americans by forcing them to stand in line for sometimes hours on end to cast a paper ballot that may be subject to ballot stuffing or miscalculation.

But while in-person voting has its flaws, online voting can introduce issues on a much larger scale, issues that are tougher to control and harder to detect.

About the Author

Sydny Shepard is the Executive Editor of Campus Security & Life Safety.

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